St. Albani (Göttingen)
| St. Albani | |
|---|---|
 St. Albani Church from the west |
|
| Data | |
| place | Goettingen |
| Architectural style | Gothic |
| Construction year | ~ 1400-1467 |
| particularities | |
| Winged altar from 1499 | |
The Evangelical Lutheran parish church of St. Albani is a three-aisled Gothic hall church in Göttingen .
history
The origin of the church lies in the darkness of history. Allegedly a foundation of Emperor Otto I , it served as the church of the village Gutingi, so it must have already existed when it was first mentioned in 953. A legend reports that a previous building was built by St. Boniface was consecrated. Later, St. Albani served as a church for a small and poor parish, which mainly looked after the areas outside the city walls.
The first explicit mention of St. Albani is in 1254. In that year, Duke Albrecht I of Braunschweig acquired the right of patronage from Pöhlde Monastery , which his descendant Duke Otto der Quade and the church later gave to the Teutonic Order . A letter dated 1404 testifies to the loss of the Church by the Order. Another document from 1271 reports that new bells were cast for St. Albani and St. Nikolai . This must have been the Romanesque predecessor of the Albanikirche.
In 1376 the city wall was built. In contrast to the old city wall, this also includes parts of the village and the church, whose apse already touched the wall. This "incorporation" may have been the impetus for the construction of the Gothic church, which was created in several construction and renovation phases.
The three-year choir began around 1400 with a 5/8 degree . An inscription on the southwest corner pillar mentions the year 1423. At this point in time, the choir was probably already completed and the west building began, which was then connected to the choir by the nave. The nave was built in the form of a relatively low relay hall in four bays . The octagonal pillars, which do without capitals and thus merge seamlessly into the pointed arches , as well as the high shield walls above, create a stronger separation of the three naves. From 1428 documents name a certain Jacob von Worms as the master builder. A cast bell in 1447 suggests that the cubic bell tower was already completed by this time. This was initially crowned by a hipped roof with a high ridge , as documented by contemporary images of the city. In 1467 the vault was closed by Master Jacob von Worms and the building was thus completed. The three eastern bays of the south aisle, which bear the only ribbed vault in Göttingen , are remarkable . The secco paintings in the vault, uncovered again in 1996, date from around 1470.
In 1499 the church received a double-winged altar from Hans von Geismar.
In 1726 the original tower spire, in need of renovation, was replaced by a baroque bell-shaped roof dome (a so-called Welsche dome ).
During the Seven Years' War , in 1762, a powder tower explosion damaged the church. At the end of the war, the church was renovated, the old sacristy on the north side was torn down and the church was given a classical pulpit altar . The plan to straighten the apse of the choir was rejected. However, the old winged altar was sold.
From 1857 the church was regotized. It was given a neo-Gothic interior , from which today's pulpit , three leaded glass windows in the choir, the stalls and the galleries come from. A new sacristy was also built on the north side of the choir.
In 1907 the Municipal Museum bought back the panels from the altar from 1499, which were believed to have been lost. They came to the church on permanent loan in 1931 and were installed in their present form.
The last comprehensive renovation of the church took place from 1994 to 1996. In 2005 13 windows were restored.
Furnishing
altar
The most valuable treasure of the church is the winged altar , which was created by Hans von Geismar in 1499 . The current panels on the altar have gone on an adventurous odyssey. In 1857 the church was renovated and the altar, which was in need of restoration, was intended for second-hand dealers. The Göttingen student Hubert von Arnswald bought the altar panels from the sexton for 1 thaler per piece. Some of them ended up on the von Arnswaldt family estate in Pomerania and some in the Rostock Museum. The figures on the former festival page were lost. In 1907 the painted altar panels were bought back by the city of Göttingen for 1,000 Reichsmarks . They came to the municipal museum. It was not until 1931 that the altar panels were returned to their old place in the church on loan from the museum. The individual panels had been separated from one another for private use and even split lengthways so that they could be hung separately from one another on the wall. When the panels were put together to form an altarpiece, the panels on the former weekday side were not placed on the back of the outer wings of the Sunday side, but slightly angled on the outside so that the former Sunday and weekday sides can now be viewed at the same time. As a result, however, the possibility of using it as a convertible altar has been lost. When assembling the pictures of the circumcision and the death of the Virgin were exchanged.
The outer panels, which used to form the weekday page, each show a portrait format painting: on the left the martyrdom of Saint Alban of Mainz , on the right the Last Judgment . The boards on the former Sunday page show scenes from the life of the Virgin Mary in eight pictures. From left to right, the following can be seen in the top row: Mary's Temple Walk , the Annunciation , the Visitation and the Nativity . The bottom row shows from left to right: the death of Mary (originally the circumcision of Jesus at this point ), adoration of the kings , representation of the Lord and the circumcision of Jesus (originally the death of Mary at this point ). During the restoration of the altar in 1961, the restorer Kurt Manning discovered thirteen mourning apostles on the altar panel Death of Mary . The thirteenth apostle without a halo looking over the shoulder of another is most likely a self-portrait of the creator of the altar, Hans von Geismar.
Further equipment
Next to the altar, the church also houses a votive cross from 1342, which bears the oldest inscription in the city in German. It was previously used as a tower cross and later replaced by a replica for security. The pulpit comes from the neo-Gothic era and was probably redesigned in the 1960s. The font is modern. In the choir there are also three relief-like and polychrome keystones. They point from west to east: pelican , phoenix and an agnus dei with a victory flag. The secco painting in the vault mainly shows floral motifs such as lilies and tendrils, but also other motifs such as the evangelist symbols or the ascension of the church patron Alban. In the main nave vault there are also two so-called holy spirit holes from which a plastic dove of the holy spirit was lowered at Pentecost .
organ
Paul Ott built a new organ with 36 registers in 1964 , divided into three manuals and a pedal . His student Rudolf Janke carried out a renovation in 1990.
Bells
Until 2017, the chimes of St. Albani consisted of three bells with the striking tones es 1 , f 1 and a flat 1 . These were cast in 1951 by the Weule company in Bockenem as a replacement for the bronze bells melted down in the world wars. Since the community did not have enough money for new bells made of bronze, only so-called sound cast bells could be purchased, which in an untreated condition rust over time and are therefore no longer functional at some point. For this reason, the old chimes of St. Albani were to be replaced in October 2017 by four bronze bells with the chimes b 0 , c 1 , es 1 and g 1 , which were cast by the Petit & Gebr. Edelbrock foundry in April of the same year . At the end of September 2017 it became known that the two larger of the new bells had significant casting defects and therefore had to be re-cast. Only the re-casting of the c 1 bell succeeded; the b 0 had to be melted down again. In the third attempt at the end of 2018, it was finally cast. The two smaller bells were lifted into the tower for Advent 2017 and have been calling for church services ever since; in May 2019 they were followed by the two larger ones.
Vierkirchenblick
The place on the market square from which the towers of the four churches of St. Albani, St. Jacobi , St. Johannis and St. Michael can be seen is marked with a bronze plate and is called the Vierkirchenblick .
literature
- Jens Reiche, Christian Scholl (ed.): Göttingen churches of the Middle Ages. Göttingen University Press, Göttingen 2015 [1]
- Dr. Jens-Uwe Brinkmann: The altar of Hans von Geismar in St. Albani in Göttingen. Evangelical Lutheran parish of St. Albani and Göttingen City Museum, Göttingen 1998
- Willi Pöhls: St. Albani Göttingen . Printed by the Evangelical Lutheran St. Albani Community in Göttingen, Göttingen 2011
Web links
- Homepage of the parish of St. Albani
- Security filming of the winged altar 1943–1945 ( Memento from April 5, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
- https://albaniglocken.wir-e.de/aktuelles
Individual evidence
- ↑ Hendrik Munsonius: Why does St. Albani need new bells? In: Bells for St. Albani - albaniglocken.de. Retrieved March 6, 2017 .
- ^ Matthias Heinzel: New bells with serious casting errors. In: Göttinger Tageblatt. September 29, 2017. Retrieved October 2, 2017 .
- ↑ Hendrik Munsonius: Press release on May 16, 2018: Glockguss. In: Bells for St. Albani - albaniglocken.de. Retrieved June 11, 2019 .
- ^ Hendrik Munsonius: Successful bell casting. In: Bells for St. Albani - albaniglocken.de. December 14, 2018, accessed June 11, 2019 .
- ↑ Hendrik Munsonius: There they are: the new bells. In: Bells for St. Albani - albaniglocken.de. Retrieved June 11, 2019 .
- ↑ Andreas Fuhrmann: ““ Vierkirchenblick ”: bronze plate is being revised. Göttingen city administration has carved figures removed / slab from “private initiative” relocated and designed ». In: Göttinger Tageblatt . of March 29, 2017, page 10. Except for the headings of textually identical online articles from March 31, 2017, accessed on April 2, 2017.
Coordinates: 51 ° 32 ′ 1.3 ″ N , 9 ° 56 ′ 28.1 ″ E