St. Martinus Church (Etzel)

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St. Martinus Church Etzel
Evangelical Lutheran St. Martinus Church (north side)
Organ in Etzel behind historical prospectus (1864)

The Evangelical Lutheran St. Martinus Church is located in Etzel , Friedeburg municipality in East Frisia , and was built in the first half of the 13th century. The church is designated as a monument .

History and description of the building

In the Middle Ages, the church belonged to the Archdiocese of Bremen and was under the transmission area of Reepsholt Monastery . Excavations in 1974 revealed that there had been two wooden predecessor churches built using a wooden beam construction, both of which were destroyed by fire. The present church is dated around 1240 and was consecrated to Saint Martin .

The Romanesque hall church was built from bricks on a foundation of granite blocks . The large arch in the east wall, which is now walled up, still bears witness to the original east apse. The apse must have collapsed and rebuilt several times. The arched portals on the north and south sides were also walled up later.

In the course of the Reformation , the congregation switched to the Lutheran creed. After the building suffered severe damage from a lightning strike at the end of the 16th century and the roof and interior fittings were destroyed by flames, it was rebuilt and equipped in 1612, reduced in size by three meters. In 1829 all windows were redesigned and today's west entrance was created. The north entrance was exposed again in 2005 to enable step-free access.

The free-standing bell tower was built in 1666 as a gate tower with a pyramid roof and a ridge turret 15 meters west of the church. There were two bells there until 1914. One was melted down for armaments purposes in World War I; a bell cast in 1934 had to be delivered during World War II.

In 1968 the pastorate was abolished and Etzel became a chapel congregation. Etzel has shared a pastorate with Marx since 1990 .

Interior

The interior is closed off by a flat wooden beam ceiling and has probably never had a vault. The room is dominated by the richly decorated reredos in white frame, which reaches up to the ceiling. The similarity with the reredos in Engerhafe shows that the work in Etzel is a work by Hinrich Cröpelin . The predella depicts the birth of Christ, the large main picture between winding columns shows the Lord's Supper, above the crucifixion scene and at the very top the resurrection of Christ. The pictures are framed by tendrils and the reredos are decorated with sweeping carvings. The reformer Jan Hus is depicted on the altar bar with a goose as his symbolic bird and Martin Luther as the swan, as they distribute the Lord's Supper in both forms. The relatively late date 1714 has led to the assumption that the altarpiece was originally created for Esens and transferred to Etzel in 1714. The lavishly carved pulpit with twisted columns, between which fields depicting the evangelists, the large sound cover with openwork tendrils and the staircase come from Master Cröpelin. On the north wall are the remains of the older reredos from 1617: the rear wall with fittings and inscriptions from Luther's catechism.

The three brass chandeliers were donated in 1660, 1675 and 1726. The Vasa Sacra includes a gold-plated silver chalice donated in 1687 and a paten from 1694. In 1713, Albertus Seba , who was born in Etzel , donated an octagonal wooden baptismal font with a pewter bowl covered by a brass dome, as well as two paintings with the signature “Petter van Alfem den Oct. 30, 1713 ”. Gerd Sieben Janssen created an organ from 1862 to 1864, of which only the prospectus remained; the interior was replaced in 1928 by P. Furtwängler & Hammer . The fault-prone pneumatic instrument was thoroughly repaired by Bartelt Immer in 2007 .

See also

literature

  • Hermann Haiduck: The architecture of the medieval churches in the East Frisian coastal area . 2nd Edition. Ostfriesische Landschaftliche Verlags- und Vertriebs-GmbH, Aurich 2009, ISBN 978-3-940601-05-6 , p. 12 f., 26, 179 .

Web links

Commons : St. Martinus Church (Etzel)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Menno Smid: East Frisian Church History . Self-published, Pewsum 1974, p. 39 (Ostfriesland in the protection of the dike, vol. 6).
  2. ↑ a b c d e Homepage of the Etzel parish , viewed June 13, 2011.
  3. ↑ a b c Gottfried Kiesow : Architectural Guide Ostfriesland . Verlag Deutsche Stiftung Denkmalschutz , Bonn 2010, ISBN 978-3-86795-021-3 , p. 354 .
  4. ↑ a b c Hannelore Reents (local chronicle of the East Frisian landscape ): Etzel (PDF file; 56 kB), viewed June 13, 2011.

Coordinates: 53 ° 28 ′ 3.1 ″  N , 7 ° 54 ′ 18.8 ″  E