St. Martin (Speyer)

The position of the Martinskirche, which was already demolished at that time, and the also abandoned Holy Sepulcher Monastery on the map from 1730, the then still existing Poor Clare Monastery is shown , to which the possessions of St. Martin were handed over in 1685.

St. Martin was a church built in the 12th century for St. Martin parish church in the Speyer suburb of Altspeyer . With her was a Beguinage, which was converted into a convent of Augustinian choir women in 1482 . The church was located on the southern part of the St.-Klara-Kloster-Weg, which was formerly called Martinsgasse, i.e. between today's Martinskirchweg and Wormser Landstrasse.

history

Already in the early Middle Ages there was a Martinskirche in Altspeyer, which belonged to the German pen , although it is not clear where this church stood and whether its location was identical to the later church. This was probably built in the 12th century as the parish church of the village of Altspeyer. The St. Clare Monastery was founded on a courtyard near this church in 1310 . At the church there was a Beguinenklause, which was first mentioned in a document after Franz Xaver Remling in 1439 after Fritz Klotz in 1237. There are no sources about the founding year and the circumstances of the foundation. Due to the proximity of the hermitage to the Holy Sepulcher Monastery , Remling suspects that the hermitage was founded after this monastery was handed over to the Denkendorf Monastery , as a women's convent originally belonged to the Holy Sepulcher Monastery. The first reference to the hermitage near St. Martin comes from a document from 1333, which mentions Beguins who lived behind the Bartholomäuskirche , which is located near the Martinskirche . However, it is unclear whether this meant this hermitage. It is also unclear whether the Beguinenklause near St. Martin is identical to the Beguinenklause St. Martha.

Conversion into an Augustinian choir convent

In 1482 the Beguines, who earned their livelihood by handicrafts, received “a new order” from the Speyer bishop Ludwig von Helmstatt and thus became the “ choir women of St. Augustine "assigned. So they were subordinate to the vicar general, but were allowed to choose the superior, who had to swear allegiance to the bishop, and the confessor themselves. In addition, they were allowed to accept gifts. In 1492 the bishop ordered that they could not accept any instructions from the Augustinian prior of Höningen . In 1514 the rules were confirmed by Bishop Georg .

Consequences of the Reformation

In 1524 Werner von Goldberg, the pastor of St. Martin, preached the new teaching, which is why he was transferred by the bishop. In a letter on November 12, 1521, the latter accused several pastors of spreading Luther's teachings, which had been condemned as errors not only by the Pope, but also by the Emperor and the imperial estates.

The first mention of a mother or master, i.e. head of the monastery, dates back to 1525. This head was called Christina Unger and had a difficult time with her 15 co-sisters, as they clung to Catholicism and the primarily Protestant city council tried to wrest them special taxes for handicrafts .

End of the monastery

As a result of the Thirty Years War , Altspeyer and the monastery were destroyed by the Swedes in 1635, which is why the nuns fled. After the Peace of Westphalia they returned, but the income was not enough to rebuild the monastery. They could only survive with the help of “benefactors”, one of whom built a makeshift house for them in the ruins of the monastery. The bishop's efforts to raise money were also unsuccessful. On December 1, 1685, the Speyer Bishop Johann Hugo transferred the monastery to the Klara Monastery, including foundations, slopes and land, at the request of the two remaining sisters and the Franciscan provincial Andreas Gast. The two sisters moved there and were allowed to live there according to their rules. A little later the ruins of the monastery were leveled. A wooden cross was erected on the area of ​​the church in the 18th century, later the " Jewish Cemetery St. Klara " was located on the opposite side of the street , reminiscent of the wall running along the street Am Nonnengarten.

remains

Today only the "Martinskirchweg" and the street "Am Nonnengarten" remind of the monastery. There are pictorial representations on a woodcut from 1550 from Sebastian Munster's Cosmographia , on a copper engraving from Frans Hogenberg's Civitates Orbis Terrarum from 1537 and a similar city view from 1600 and a view from 1637 by Matthäus Merian . The complex can be seen very well in Philipp Stürmer's picture The Free Imperial City of Speyer before its destruction in the Palatine War of Succession in 1689 .

literature

• Franz Xaver Remling: Documented history of the former abbeys and monasteries in what is now Rhine Bavaria . tape 2 . Christmann, Neustadt an der Haardt 1836, p. 87–91 ( full text in Google Book Search).

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d} Fritz Klotz: Speyer: small town history . District group Speyer of the Historical Association of the Palatinate, 1988.
2. ^ Hans Ammerich: Brief history of the city of Speyer . 1st edition. G. Braun Buchverlag, Karlsruhe 2008, ISBN 978-3-7650-8367-9 , p. 33-34 .
3. ^ ^{A b} Franz Xaver Remling: Documented history of the former abbeys and monasteries in what is now Rhine Bavaria . tape 2 . Christmann, Neustadt an der Haardt 1836 ( full text in the Google book search).
4. ^ Franz Xaver Remling: History of the Bishops of Speyer . Kirchheim 1854, p. 249 ( full text in Google Book Search).
5. ^ Helmut Steiner: Contributions to the economic history of the St. Klara Monastery in Speyer on the Rhine . In: Archive for Middle Rhine Church History . tape 8 , 1956, pp. 152 ( online ).

Coordinates: 49 ° 19 ′ 28.2 "  N , 8 ° 25 ′ 56.7"  E