Parish Church of St. John the Baptist (Kortsch)

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St. John the Baptist from the South. In the left foreground the modern cemetery chapel

The Church of St. John the Baptist is the Roman Catholic parish church in the village of Kortsch , a fraction of the South Tyrolean community of Schlanders .

history

The current church was probably preceded by several previous buildings. Few fragments of a church from Carolingian times have survived that are now attached to the church's sacrament house . Nothing has been handed down from other previous buildings.

The choir , first mentioned in 1432 , which ends in a five-eighth closure , comes from the Gothic style , as does the west portal (today on the north side), which is dated to 1483 by an inscription.

In 1588 a north aisle was added ; In 1597 the originally Romanesque tower was raised by eleven fathoms , as reported by an inscription on the north side of the tower.

In the cemetery, in the immediate vicinity of the church, a chapel was donated by Hans Strimmer and his wife in 1699, which was later connected to the nave.

Around 1756 the church interior was made Baroque . In the course of this, the Gothic buttresses and the ribbed vault were removed. The latter was replaced by a stitch cap vault .

Since the church became increasingly too small for the growing congregation, an extension was added to the west side of the nave in 1978 and 1979, in which the presbytery has been located ever since. The design for the extension came from Karl Rappold . In the course of the construction work, the historic west wall of the nave was removed and the west portal was moved to the north side of the church. A Gothic funeral chapel , which was integrated into the west building, now serves as the sacristy .

Furnishing

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In the east choir of the church is the baroque high altar by Josef Jacob Witwer . The altarpiece shows in the upper part the Mother of God with the baby Jesus , in the lower part the hll. Korbinian , Lawrence and John the Baptist depicted. To the side of the picture are the figures of St. Georg and Florian . In the gable of the altar is the figurative representation of the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan . Some of these sculptures were created by Johann Georg Witwer.

Above the altar there is a fresco showing the four evangelist symbols. There is a holy spirit hole in the yoke in front of it .

A crucifixion group hangs on the north wall of the choir ; on the same side is the baroque pulpit .

In the north aisle there is a painting from around 1690, which shows the dance of Salome and the beheading of John the Baptist. The way of the cross of the church also hangs there .

In the south side chapel there is a baroque altar by Gregor Schwenzengast , in the gable of which there is a crucifixion group from around 1500.

For the west building of the church, the Kortsch artist Karl Grasser created the folk altar , the sedil , the ambo and the sacrament house in Lasa marble at the end of the 1970s . The latter was put together from fragments of the Carolingian predecessor building and contemporary additions.

To the right of the people's altar is a small winged altar that comes from the Agidius Church , which lies above Kortsch. It was created after 1500 and transferred to the parish church in 1906. In the shrine of the altar, which is crowned by a crucifixion group, is Mary , surrounded by the hll. Aegidius and Dorothea shown. The insides of the wings show the hll. James the Elder (left) and Wendelin (right). When the wings are closed, the Annunciation to Mary can be seen. The predella of the altar is in the open state Sts. Florian and Georg; The plague cartridges Rochus and Sebastian are depicted on the back of the small predella wings .

On the east wall of the west building is a glass window by the artist Robert Scherer from Kortsch . It shows the baptism of Jesus and St. Catherine of Alexandria and other saints.

The church also features several figures of saints, such as the late medieval sculpture of a bishop and a Pietà from around 1400.

The organ of the church was built by the Carinthian organ building company Zanin.

tower

Tower, detail with dial and lettering on the north side

The three-story tower is decorated with several designs and coats of arms. The north side in particular is richly designed. There the ogival sound window is surrounded by two round heraldic shields, which are framed by stylized wreaths. The left-hand plate showing the double eagle the Habsburgs ; the right one the binding shield . On the floor below is the clock face of the tower clock , in the corners of which the coats of arms of Austria (top left), Tyrol (top right), the chicken (bottom left) and the Montani (bottom right) are shown. Below the dial is the lettering that refers to the addition of the tower in 1597:

Anno 1597 Got the Almechtigen to praise the holy John the Baptist had ain honorable Gmein all here rich and poor this turn from the eleven fifth and the 9th day of October volent so God belons all here and there.

Below the pyramid roof , a disc ornament surrounds the tower. Above, in the spandrels of the tower roof, there is a marble mask, which still comes from the Romanesque tower of the church.

Cemetery chapel

The modern chapel in the cemetery was built in 1989. Walter Dietl was responsible for the design . A Gothic chapel was used until 1978 and is now used as a sacristy.

literature

  • Hans Wielander: Sacred art in Schlanders . Pluristamp, Bozen 1994, p. 36-43 .
  • Martin Laimer: Building culture in the community of Schlanders . Ed .: Marktgemeinde and Schlanders Education Committee. Passeier Verlag, Lana 2011, ISBN 978-88-89474-20-4 , pp. 112-115 .

Web links

Commons : St. Johannes (Kortsch)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Leo Andergassen: Kunstraum Südtirol . Athesia, Bozen 2007, ISBN 978-88-8266-231-8 , p. 192 .
  2. Korsch. Parish of Schlanders, accessed on June 29, 2017 .

Coordinates: 46 ° 37 ′ 47.3 "  N , 10 ° 45 ′ 30.8"  E