St. Sylvester (Quakenbrück)
The St. Sylvester Church in Quakenbrück is a small hall church made of natural stone and brick . It was built by 1235 by the Bishop I. Konrad founded by Osnabrück canons .
As a parish church and “open church”, St. Sylvester is accessible all day in the summer months. Every year on Trinity Sunday , the Low German Bible of the reformer Bonnus , printed in 1534, is exhibited and given to his home community.
Location and local conditions
The church stands in the middle of a round-oval churchyard in the old town of Quakenbrück, barely a hundred meters from the central market square. The location of the church is special in terms of urban planning because it is at the end of a dead end street (Große Kirchstraße). The gardens and houses adjoining the churchyard leave just enough space that you can walk around it. It was founded in 1235 as the center of a collegiate foundation, a corporation of secular clergymen.
In a document from 1235, which is often used as the foundation document of the monastery, a church ( basili ) is already mentioned. Since the Carolingian era, the term basilica has been used to describe a multi-aisled church building, which can still be seen today in individual, different wall zones of the building. Since in the Middle Ages it was not possible to move into a monastery without a room for worship, the church must have been in use before 1235.
Foundation and foundation construction
The patron saint, Saint New Year's Eve since 1271 , also became the main saint of the parish church. The parish church appears for the first time in a document in 1296; a pastor of this church is named as early as 1286. Construction of the church building began in the last decades of the 13th century. Little is known about the previous building, which was consecrated to the Mother of God. It was called basilica or capella , so it was probably only of modest dimensions.
In the exterior, the first construction period from around 1300 is recognizable by the brown-red lawn iron stone. Most of the buttresses are made of the same small rubble stone as the tower substructure. The elevation of the early Gothic nave walls only occurred when the nave was arched. At that time the mid-roofs were built with their gables over the aisles.
Building
Ship and choir
The different building materials are striking: sandstone , brick (friezes and parts of the side walls) lawn iron stone .
A single-nave late Gothic choir (1470), consisting of a rectangular yoke and a polygonal apse (5/8 end), adjoins the two-bay Gothic hall nave with narrow aisles, which was built around 1320 . The two square nave bays and the similarly designed choir bay are spanned by ribbed vaults. The date is evidenced by an inscription on the triumphal arch in front of the choir:
- "Anno DM mcccclxx (1470) do word ghewelffet de kercke, in which tyd weren kercksworen otto vos, knape, tepe, bureke, albert spreman".
The medallions above contain the Quakenbrück city coat of arms and the coat of arms of the Bishop of Osnabrück. As is quite common in Old Westphalia , the roof of the nave has double gables over the side aisles.
tower
The tower in the west with its stone substructure was built between 1489 and 1499. In the lower area to the west it has a Gothic, pointed-arched window opening, further up, Romanesque, round-arched biforias . According to the history of architecture, this seems surprising, but the brick tower of the Alexander Church in Wildeshausen shows a similar distribution of styles. Until 1703 the tower had a pointed late Gothic helmet. After a storm damage, today's baroque roof was created: on the end of the wall sits a hood that leads to several octagonal constructions, first a windowless storey, then another hooded roof, then an open lantern with a suggested onion hood . The crowning cross is at a height of 68 m.
Wall painting
The exposed and completely restored elaborate tendril paintings of the vaults are late Gothic and are connected to the coats of arms of the noble families, including those of the Voss, Scharpenberg , von Dincklage and von Elmendorff families . Another keystone shows the wheel of the city of Osnabrück and the Quakenbrück city coat of arms. There are more coats of arms in the choir vault. It should have been carried out immediately after the vault, i.e. from 1470. Presumably the frescoes were created at the same time , of which the " Saint Ursula with the 10,000 virgins" is above the door to the sacristy and the pictures of the Mount of Olives and the Crucifixion on the walls of the vestibule. These images were uncovered in 1914 and transferred from the south-east corner of the nave to their new location.
Above the wall paneling of the church stalls there is a mural from around 1470: Christ on the Mount of Olives with the inscription:
- "God Vader should et mäglik un van syne mode sin, so no va mi de bitter pin."
Furnishing
High altar
The high altar was donated in 1662 by the Burgmann family Voss . Large pillars flank the main picture and support a protruding cornice. The motif of the flanking columns is repeated on a small scale next to the central picture on the upper floor. The large painting shows the Last Supper, painted by the Osnabrück painter Clostermann based on the image of the Last Supper by Peter Paul Rubens from around 1620 . The other paintings, the Resurrection on the upper floor and the Fall of Man, the Annunciation, the Adoration of the Shepherds and the Ascension in the medallions on the side are by other (unknown) hands. The large figures of Peter and Paul stand next to the picture of the Lord's Supper as carved figures. The four evangelists with their attributes are smaller and integrated into the overall outline of the altar. The crowning group shows the crucified between Mary and John.
pulpit
In addition to the city arms and those of the Voss and Dincklage families, the epitaph of the pastor and consistory councilor Vitus Büscher from the 17th century is listed on the sound cover of the pulpit .
Triumphal cross
The oldest renovation of the cross took place in 1473 by the barrel painter and renovator Magister Johannes and his son Bernhardus. In 1659 the cross was brought down again. A third time an acceptance and restoration for 1786 has been handed down. The last restoration took place in 1961.
Palm donkey
A palm donkey, unique in northern Germany, dates from the end of the 15th century , a wooden donkey with a figure of Christ riding on it, which was dragged through the streets by the students of the Latin school during the Palm Sunday procession .
The artist is settled by experts in northern Germany, perhaps even in Quakenbrück itself. According to Professor Ottenjann from the museum village of Cloppenburg, there are a total of around 150 processional donkeys in Germany, but the vast majority are in southern Germany. Most are made of wood, only eight made of stone.
The basic type of Christ riding in blessing and holding the reins or a book in his left hand with an erect upper body on the donkey, which stands or walks on a floor board with wheels or a mobile frame, is only slightly varied in the following years.
Real donkeys were carried in processions at least until the eleventh century. The Bamberg Boys' Choir has been handed down from the 15th century that they walked with a real donkey. But because of their well-known stubborn nature, the animals disrupted the strict order of procession and were therefore replaced by wooden figures.
In the 16th century chroniclers reported of a "hältzin donkey on a little wagon with a picture of yhres god made on it".
This tradition ended with the Reformation, at least in northern Germany. The Lutherans composed songs of mockery on the processional donkey and chopped it up to make firewood. His name became a swear word: Those who came too late to the service were scolded on the palm donkey.
In Quakenbrück, which only received a Catholic church again after the Reformation in 1875, the custom was kept alive by the Latin school until around 1920 - probably more out of joke than spiritual devotion.
Choir and church stalls
The return of the New Year's Eve chapter, which had to move to Bramsche in 1276, to Quakenbrück in 1489 was significant for church history. This event was the reason for the production of the late Gothic choir stalls made of oak, with late Gothic ornamental decorations on the eastern cheeks and foliage on the knobs of the armrests wearing.
In the pews from the Renaissance has Artländer dragon originated. Around 40 different flat carved ornaments show the "symbolic figure for the evil that was captured here", a motif that later became typical for Artländer furniture such as chests and cupboards. The stalls in the wall paneling next to the pulpit are dated to 1572. Above is a mural from around 1470: Christ on the Mount of Olives with the inscription:
- "God Vader should et mäglik un van syne mode sin, so no va mi de bitter pin."
Further equipment
The Burgmannsstadt Quakenbrück, also a foundation of the Osnabrück Bishop Konrad, is inextricably linked to the history of the church. In the first centuries the noble families of the Burgmann families were dominant. The importance of these families, who came from rural areas and had settled in the city with the construction of a Burgmannshof, is reflected in the interior of the church. In addition to the coats of arms of Osnabrück and Quakenbrück, the keystones in the vault of the country house also bear the coats of arms of leading Burgmann families, namely those of Elmendorff , Boss and Dincklage . There is also a long row of coats of arms on the choir vault, namely those of Frydag , Nagel , Schele, Kobrinck , Smerten, Brawe, Aswede, Düthe, Snetlage, Bockraden, Grothaus , Smerten and Knehem . Many of these families have long since died out; most of the names were mentioned as early as the 13th and 14th centuries.
The epitaph of the pastor and councilor Vitus Büscher dates from the 17th century.
The peace clock above the door to the tower hall was donated by Hilmar zur Mühlen in 1648, the wooden font in 1721 by Johann Brun, who was born in Quakenbrück and was then secretary in Bergen .
literature
- Ernst Bockstiegel, Heiko Bockstiegel: The St. Sylvester Church in Quakenbrück and its parish. Chronicle from the 12th to the 20th century. Thoben, Quakenbrück 1997, ISBN 3-921176-82-4 .
- Eva Heye: The St. Sylvester Church (= large monuments . Issue 289). 2nd Edition. Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich et al. 1983.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Church district Bramsche ( Memento of the original dated May 30, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .
- ↑ Otto Meyer : The founding of monasteries in Bavaria and their sources mainly in the High Middle Ages. In: Journal of the Savigny Foundation for Legal History . Canonical department. Vol. 20, 1931, pp. 123-201, here p. 198, doi: 10.7767 / zrgka.1931.20.1.123 .
- ↑ Sebastian Frank: World Book. 1534. After: Wilhelm Mannhardt : Forest and field cults. Volume 1: The tree cult of the Teutons and their neighboring tribes. Mythological investigations. Borntraeger, Berlin 1875, p. 258 .
- ^ Claudia Wüst, Christian Wüst (Ed.): Das Artland. Cultural treasure in the northwest. Discover & experience. Badbergen, Menslage, Nortrup, City of Quakenbrück. Travel Guide. Artland Atelier, Quakenbrück 2006, ISBN 3-00-018542-9 .
Web links
Coordinates: 52 ° 40 ′ 37.5 ″ N , 7 ° 57 ′ 19.5 ″ E