St. Nicholas (Koblenz)

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The parish and pilgrimage church of St. Nikolaus in Koblenz-Arenberg
Interior of the church
Chancel, historical photo around 1900, colored
Grave of Johann Baptist Kraus in the cemetery next to the church

The parish and pilgrimage church of St. Nikolaus is a Catholic church in Koblenz . The district in Arenberg located parish - and pilgrimage church was from 1860 to 1872 in Neo-Romanesque style by pastor Johann Baptist Kraus of (1805-1893), the founder Pfarrer-Kraus-systems and the pilgrimage Arenberg built. It bears the patronage of St. Nicholas of Myra .

history

A first parish church was first mentioned in Arenberg in 1330 and belonged to the imperial rule of Mühlenbach . With the construction of the Pfarrer-Kraus-Anlagen by Pastor Johann Baptist Kraus from 1845 a new place of pilgrimage should be created. To this end, the new parish and pilgrimage church of St. Nicholas was built from 1860–1872 in place of a smaller medieval church. The new church building was built by the Koblenz master builders Josef and Peter Mündenich according to the pastor's plans. In furnishing the church, Pastor Kraus was supported by patrons and sponsors, such as the German Empress Augusta .

During the air raids on Koblenz during World War II , almost all windows were destroyed and replaced in the 1950s with the same theme. The chancel was redesigned in 1963 by the sculptor Johannes Scherl from Wittlich and in 1989. The last exterior renovation took place in 1992, new entrance doors were installed in 1998.

Construction and equipment

Outside

The parish and pilgrimage church of St. Nikolaus is a three-aisled neo-Romanesque pillar basilica with a double tower facade and a round arch choir across the width of the central nave . For the construction of the towers, Pastor Kraus oriented himself to the three main churches of Koblenz, Kastor , Liebfrauen and Florinskirche . Under the three-storey towers with triangular gables and pointed helmets , the church has two entrances (women's and men's). The central building of the towers has two large arched windows, the upper floors of the two towers have glare triforias with overhanging arches .

The brick is by pilaster strips of black basalt divided, the circumferentially arched Friese under the final beams carry. The church windows are round-arched on the side aisles and circular on the upper aisle . The choir of the church is a yoke long and has a two-storey semicircular apse . The ornamental use of stones of different colors on the outer walls, especially around the windows, goes back to a development by the architect Johann Claudius von Lassaulx .

The chapels of the 9th and 12th station of the Way of the Cross of the Pfarrer-Kraus-Anlagen are built directly onto the two eastern aisle bays.

Inside

The interior of the church is characterized by the main nave, which is six bays long. The rectangular pillars with pilasters and shield capitals support the groin vault . The baptistery is located under the two towers . The chancel, which protrudes into the east nave yoke, has a grotto-like, figured calvary above the main altar . The sacrament chapel is located on the upper floor of the apse . At the east end of the north aisle is the prayer chapel with Christ in the grave, at the east end of the south aisle the prayer chapel with the empty Mary's grave.

Pastor Kraus chose a comprehensive program for the interior decoration that reflected and further developed the forms of expression of the religious landscape picture Bible. The pillars separating the ship are made of a smooth sandstone surface, while the nave walls, the outer walls of the side aisles, the west end of the nave with the baptistery between the towers and the east end with the choir and the chancel are covered with caves.

Oculi are located above the arcades as upper cladding . Above the arcade pillars stand statues of saints and rulers, above all the "Prince of the Apostles" Peter and Charlemagne as incarnations of the two divinely ordained powers: the spiritual rule (papacy) and the secular (empire). Between the arcades and the top there are large wall paintings with passion scenes of Christ in the style of the Düsseldorf Nazarenes . They were created by Johann Heinrich Lange (1823–1908) and Peter Joseph Molitor (1821–1898). Passion scenes in the form of a way of the cross can also be found again on terracotta reliefs on the pillars of the aisles. Two stations are missing, but these have been replaced by two other works of art: Station 12 (Crucifixion) with the monumental crucifixion group above the altar and Station 14 (Entombment) with a chapel in the left aisle with a reclining figure of Christ. In the church, the complex “suffering of Christ and redemption” is discussed several times and finds its unity with the Way of the Cross outside.

Diametrically opposed to the subject of Christ's suffering and death is the subject of birth and baptism in the baptistery in the entrance area. The baptismal font stands in the middle of this room, which is built on the foundations of a previous building documented since 1330, of which nothing has survived. On the left is the sculptural group Baptism of Christ in the Jordan by John the Baptist and on the front wall the group of Nativity in the form of a nativity scene. The stained glass window of this chapel, also depicting the birth of Christ , is the only one that was not destroyed in the 1944 bombing . All other windows were replaced after the Second World War. The entire church is equipped with mosaics made of stones, shells and minerals, which Pastor Kraus collected from the area and also from more distant places.

In her dissertation from 1984, Silvia Maria Busch showed that the indoor and outdoor facilities - “Grotto and Grail, earthly paradise and heavenly Jerusalem” - are based on a holistic concept based on the certainty of salvation and redemption. It is expressed in the architecture and is reflected in the natural landscape with rocks, forest and water. Pastor Kraus selected the statues in such a way that believers of all ages and different living conditions are surrounded by "their" patron saints:

This image program is an " option for the people ". It does not want to appeal to the educated middle class. Rather, the "common people" should find themselves in it.

Bells

In a tower there are four steel bells (cis / e / fis / gis) that were cast by the Bochumer Verein in 1922 .

Surroundings of the church

The parish and pilgrimage church of St. Nikolaus is embedded in the Pfarrer Kraus complex. On the opposite side to the west, on the terrace wall, there is a kiosk for selling devotional items . The picturesque half-timbered building has ornamental curved beams and a verschiefertes gable roof with roof turret and gable with Freigespärre .

The rectory built in 1900 is located near the church. The stately two-storey stream stone building with surrounding arcade friezes has been adapted to the historicizing exterior of the church. In 1930 a memorial for Pastor Kraus was erected south of the rectory .

The cemetery of Arenberg is adjacent to the church . Next to the grave of Pastor Kraus there is a war memorial for those who fell in the First World War .

Parish community

St. Nikolaus is part of the " Parish Community Koblenz Right Side of the Rhine" founded in October 2005, which also includes the Assumption of Mary on the Asterstein, St. Peter and Paul in Pfaffendorf, St. Aldegundis in Arzheim, the Holy Cross Church in Ehrenbreitstein, St. Maximin in Horchheim, St. Pankratius in Niederberg and St. Martin on the Pfaffendorfer Höhe belong.

Monument protection

The parish and pilgrimage church of St. Nikolaus is a protected cultural monument under the Monument Protection Act (DSchG) and entered in the list of monuments of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate . It is located in Koblenz-Arenberg in the monument zone of the Arenberg pilgrimage complex .

The parish and pilgrimage church of St. Nicholas has been part of the UNESCO World Heritage Upper Middle Rhine Valley since 2002 .

See also

literature

  • Energieversorgung Mittelrhein GmbH (ed.): History of the city of Koblenz. Overall editing: Ingrid Bátori in conjunction with Dieter Kerber and Hans Josef Schmidt. Theiss, Stuttgart 1992-1993;
  • Fritz Michel : The art monuments of the city of Koblenz. The profane monuments and the suburbs , Munich Berlin 1954, (Die Kunstdenkmäler von Rheinland-Pfalz, first volume).
  • Silvia Maria Busch: The Grail Temple Idea and Industrialization. St. Nicholas of Arenberg. A pilgrimage site of the Catholic Late Romanticism in the Rhineland (1845-1892). Diss. Univ. Frankfurt. - Frankfurt a. M .: Art History Institute of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University 1984 (= Frankfurt Fundamentals of Art History, Volume IV).
  • Ulrike Weber (edit.): City of Koblenz. City districts (= monument topography Federal Republic of Germany . Cultural monuments in Rhineland-Palatinate. Vol. 3, 3). Werner, Worms 2013, ISBN 978-3-88462-345-9 .

Web links

Commons : St. Nikolaus (Koblenz-Arenberg)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Hans-Joachim Sander : From the holiness of the homeland - the holy places in Arenberg. On the 100th anniversary of the death of Johann Baptist Kraus . In: Trier theologische Zeitschrift , vol. 102 (1993), pp. 146–156, here p. 148.
  2. ↑ The oil paintings of the church , on arenberg-info.de
  3. ^ Parish community Koblenz right side of the Rhine in: Diocese of Trier
  4. ↑ General Directorate for Cultural Heritage Rhineland-Palatinate (ed.): Informational directory of cultural monuments - district-free city of Koblenz (PDF; 1.5 MB), Koblenz 2013

Coordinates: 50 ° 22 ′ 5 ″  N , 7 ° 39 ′ 10.5 ″  E