Keppel monastery

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View of the coat of arms hall with the Bridge of Sighs to the abbey wing, the new house and the collegiate church
Monastery coat of arms

Keppel Abbey is a public high school in Hilchenbach - Allenbach . It is supported by the combined Geseke-Keppel Foundations in the special fund of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia .

Since its founding in 1236 by Frederick vom Hain has experienced a turbulent history: Pin Keppel was Premonstratensian monastery , free secular convent , pen School, Lyceum and Oberlyzeum , teachers seminar and finally co-educational school . Until the 19th century it was under the protectorate of the Counts and Princely House of Nassau-Orange , later of the Prussian royal family . The collegiate church in its design from the 18th century with the adjoining secular buildings of the New House and the hall building with the convent hall are among the most important baroque monuments in the Siegen-Wittgenstein district .

In addition to the grammar school there is a conference and guest house . A small museum shows the life of the canonesses and boarding school students.

Location of Keppel Abbey

The monastery buildings and the collegiate church of St. Maria and St. Johannes-Evangelist are located in the Ferndorftal between the districts of Allenbach and Dahlbruch of the city of Hilchenbach on the federal road 508. There is a separate train station on the Kreuztal – Cölbe railway line with a connection to Siegen or Bad Berleburg . This is one of three stations in Germany with a monastery reference in the name; the others are Marienthal Monastery (Westerwald) and Oesede Monastery near Osnabrück. Keppel Abbey still has extensive land used for agriculture and forestry, including 491  hectares of forest.

history

The Keppel Premonstratensian Convent

Keppel Abbey was first mentioned in a document from 1239. In it, Count Heinrich II the Rich of Nassau transferred the income of the Netphener parish of St. Martini to the monastery at the request of his liege Friedrich von Hain . The document also mentions that Friedrich built the Keppel cannon monastery on his property. In the necrology of the Premonstratensian Abbey of Arnstein an der Lahn , to which the Keppel Monastery was assigned, a Keppel monastery leader is remembered as early as 1236. Early on, the monastery also served to provide adequate care for the unmarried daughters of the local landed gentry. This is why the names of von and zu der Hees , von Selbach-Lohe , von Meschede , von Bicken , von Schnellenberg and others are often found among the conventual women . a. In the monastery regulations from 1392, Johann I, Count of Nassau, is named patron and founder of the monastery. He chose the collegiate church of St. Maria and St. Johannes-Evgl. as a burial place for us his wife Margarethe, Countess von der Mark. His mother Adelheid, b. Countess von Vianden , in the last decades of her widowhood, herself managed the fate of the monastery as “Magistra”.

View of the abbey gardens with hall and abbey wing

The free worldly women's monastery Keppel and the Collegium virginum nobilium

Count Wilhelm the Rich of Nassau introduced the Reformation in his country until 1536. In 1594 his son Johann VI. , the founder of the Nassau High School , finally the secularization of the monastery to a "free worldly Fräuleinstift" evangelical character. In 1549 Wilhelm the Rich initiated the establishment of a Collegium virginum nobilium , a collegiate school, at which around 350 daughters (and sons) of the nobility and upper middle class were taught until the Thirty Years War . The pupils came u. a. from the houses of Nassau , von Wittgenstein , von Sayn , von Solms , von Waldeck , von Isenburg and von Wied , but also daughters of commoners, lawyers, mayors, professors, pharmacists can be found in the register. Christine von Diez , the illegitimate daughter of Anna von Sachsen , wife of Wilhelm von Orange , with Jan Rubens, father of Peter Paul Rubens, was among the students from 1581 to 1596 . During the war, Keppel briefly came into the possession of the Jesuit college in Siegen . However, in 1650, after the Peace of Westphalia, the monastery superior Maria von Effern achieved the reconstitution of the women's monastery. Under the sovereign Count Johann the Younger , who converted to Catholicism, a simultaneum was set up with four Reformed and four Catholic canonesses, an alternation between Catholic and Reformed abbesses and two denominationally separate households. At the time of the baroque , the interior of the collegiate church was redesigned, and the new house and the hall with the convent hall were rebuilt.

Keppeler Stiftsorder

The abolition of the pen in the 19th century

The new sovereign, Grand Duke Joachim Murat von Berg , a brother-in-law of Napoleon Bonaparte and later King of Naples, placed Isabella Marquise de Meslé as abbess on the convent in 1808. In 1812, under Napoleonic rule and after most of the Siegerland noble families had died out, the monastery was abolished, and after the Congress of Vienna in 1815 , it fell to Prussia with the entire Principality of Nassau-Siegen . The Prussian king also appointed canonesses, but they were not subject to any residence obligation, including the poet Katharina Diez . The orphaned collegiate church was used from 1839 to 1846 by the evangelical-reformed community of Hilchenbach and from 1844 to 1900 the Catholic diaspora mission community of St. Augustine resided there and maintained an elementary school in the convent hall.

The Keppelsche School and Education Institute

In 1871, the governor of the monastery, Piper, and the mayor, Manger, set up the "Keppelschen Schul- und Erziehungsanstalt" for girls with an attached boarding school under the patronage of the Prussian queen widow Elisabeth . The opening date was September 10, 1871. Financial support came from her brother-in-law, the King and Emperor Wilhelm I. The role models were the Queen Luise Foundation (founded in 1811) in Dahlem near Berlin and the "Educational and Educational Institutes" in Droyßig (founded in 1811) 1847).

After an audience in Charlottenburg Palace in Berlin, Queen Elisabeth appointed the Droyßiger teacher Nanny von Monbart as the first canon superior. Antonie von Triebenfelde (also head of housekeeping), Adele von Eisenhart, Pauline von Westhofen and Elisabeth von Burghoff were further teachers of the canon. Other academic teachers were Pastor Romberg and the Hilchenbacher teachers' seminar director Böckler and the seminar teachers Steinbruch and Wolfram. In 1874 Hugo Rönneke was hired as a priest and academic teacher. Later the monastery hired its own senior teachers and - when this became possible - senior teachers.

In 1872 a seminar for teachers was added . The external students came from Siegerland, the internal students from all over Prussia, but also England, France and Italy. Well-known former Keppeler pupils were the Thuringian minister for public education, Marie Torhorst , and the poet Helene von Monbart , a niece of the first monastery superior.

In 1899 the former Keppeler pupil Anna von Ciriacy-Wantrup was appointed second superior . In order to meet the increased number of female students and the new laws on higher education for girls, a new school building and two new wings of the main building were built. In 1910 it was recognized as a Lyceum and Oberlyzeum . In 1926, women in Keppel took the Abitur as a requirement for admission to university for the first time .

After the resignation of Oberstiftshauptmann Piper , the Keppeler Stiftsfonds was represented by department heads in Arnsberg, including the later Chancellor Georg Michaelis and Oberregierungsrat Johannes Gisevius , until Carl Freiherr von Wittgenstein was appointed Keppeler Stiftskurator in 1923 and carried out this task until 1962.

After the National Socialists came to power in 1933, Keppel was converted into a women's high school and the mayor Cornelia van Senden , who had been in office since 1927, was removed from office. In 1944 the monastery was to be nationalized. At the end of the Second World War , Keppel served as an emergency hospital.

The public high school

As early as 1946, the monastery curator Freiherr von Wittgenstein managed to have the nationalization of the monastery reversed and the monastery fund became the owner and sponsor of the school. Lessons began again, albeit under the most difficult conditions. In the following decades, however, there was a sharp increase in the number of students, the introduction of co-education in 1977 and a generous expansion of the school buildings. The high school today has around 730 students and 40 teachers. After the Jung-Stilling-Gymnasium was closed in 2008, Stift Keppel is the only gymnasium in the area of ​​the city of Hilchenbach .

List of abbesses, superiors, school principals

Abbesses of the monastery Abbesses of the women's monastery Superiors / Headmasters
13th Century 1. Kunegundis I. 16th Century 17. Anna von Schellenberg 1871 33. Nanny von Monbart
2. Elisabeth I. 18. Elisabeth von Selbach-Lohe 1899 34. Anna from Ciriacy-Wantrup
3. Aleidis 19. Magdal. from the Hees 1921 35. Anna Engels
14th Century 4. Gertrud I. 17th century 20. Anna of Nassau 1927 36. Cornelia van Senden
1378-1381 5. Adelheid of Nassau-Dillenburg 1624-1654 21. Maria von Effern called Hall 1934 37. Anna Stolberg
6. Lucardis 22. Sophie Margarete of Nassau 1941 38. Mrs. Ballowitz
7. Gertrud II von Haiger 23. Ernestine Claudia MF from Nassau 1945 39. Ms. Löffler
15th century 8. N. of Westerburg 1654-1659 24. Johanna Stephana von der Hees 1945 40. Annemarie Schaefer
9. Katharina von Holdinghausen 1659-1663 25. Eleonora Theodora Vogt von Elspe 1948 41. Juliane Freiin von Bredow
10. Elisabeth von Hilchenbach 1663-1685 26. Johanna Maria von Holdinghausen 1966 42. Waltraud Giesekus
11. Elisabeth von Haiger 1685-1691 27. Agathe Juliane von Steprodt 1988 43. Renate Shimada
12. Kunigunde of Lünen 1692-1717 28. Anna Elisabeth von der Hees 2007 44.Sibylle Schwarz
13. Else Kolbe from Wilnsdorf 1717-1748 29. Sophie Charlotte von Bottlenberg 2014 45. Jochen Dietrich
14. Sibilla von der Bruch 1753-1779 30. Johanna von Syberg
15. Elisabeth Rode von Wilnsdorf 1780-1806 31. Marianne von Donop
16. Elisabeth of the Hees 1808 32. Isabella de Meslè

Renate Shimada was the last headmistress who also held the title of mayor.

High altar in the collegiate church

architecture

The originally Romanesque collegiate church of St. Maria and St. Johannes Evangelist from 1275 is based on an older previous building that burned down in the middle of the 13th century. The simple rectangular choir was later expanded to include a Gothic choir polygon. It still shows the classic threefold structure of the Premonstratensian churches in choir, Leutkirche and nuns' gallery. In the choir there are u. a. 18 grave epitaphs from the period from 1464 to 1748 and a late Gothic choir stalls. The altar stone and the baroque pulpit were donated in 1677 and 1682 by the abbess Johanna Maria von und zu Holdinghausen. The multi-tiered altarpiece (1701) in the choir and the church organ (1695) on the nuns' gallery were donated by Abbess Anna Elisabeth von der Hees. According to the rules of the order, the church never had a basic bell tower. The patrons of the collegiate church are the evangelist Johannes and the 1231 in Marburg and 1235, shortly before the foundation of the foundation canonized Elisabeth of Thuringia , who was close to both the parent monastery Arnstein and the house of Nassau .

Epitaphs in the choir of the collegiate church St. Maria and St. Johannes-Evgl .: 1464: Johann v. Bruch, 1501: Philippe vd Hees, 1562: Anna v. Schnellenberg, 1572: Katharina v. Doubt, 1580: Anna vd Hees, 1581: Elisabeth v. Selbach-Lohe, 1590: Agnes v. Selbach-Quadfasel, 1592: Agnes v. Selbach id Eichen, 1612: Magdalene vd Hees, 1616: Anna v. Bruch, 1621: Elisabeth vd Hees, 1717: Anna Elisabeth vd Hees, 1719: Maria Marg. Elis. v. Bicken, 1719: Dietr. Ph. Ludw. Ms. v. Meschede, 1736: Maria A. Gertr. V. Neuhoff, gnt. Ley, 1741: Maria Franziska v. Riedt, gnt. Chain v. Bassenheim, 1747: Margareta Alvera v. Winshem, 1748: Sophie Charlotte v. Bottlenberg, gnt. boiler

Convent hall

The so-called New House (1733) and the adjoining hall building with the artfully designed convent hall (1752) were built along the cloister by Abbesses Sophie Charlotte von Bottlenberg, called Kessel, and Elisabeth von Neuhoff, called Ley.

From 1903 to 1911 a new south wing was built on the area of ​​the abbey wing and an extended church wing in the area of ​​the old dormitory , the latter by the Herborn architect Ludwig Hofmann , who also designed the senior teachers' house .

In the 1950s to 1970s, the new school buildings with the coat of arms hall , the science classrooms, the gymnastics hall, today's auditorium, several teachers' houses and the new boarding school building with the tennis courts were built. The large multi-gym (1991) on the sports field is even more recent. In addition, some houses in the Ferndorftal and the old train station belong to the monastery buildings.

The old practice school with a small gym, the collegiate hospital, the old cemetery, the collegiate mill, the brewery, the utility building and the outdoor pool are no longer available .

literature

  • Gaillard: Keppel Abbey. A chat from the Siegerland. With six illustrations based on photographs. In: Reclam's universe. Moderne Illustrierte Wochenschrift , Vol. 27 (1911), Issue 1, pp. 377-381.
  • Heinz Flender and Wilhelm Hartnack : Keppel Abbey in Siegerlande 1239–1951 . Volume 1, self-published, 1963 (431 pages); Wilhelm Hartnack and Juliane Freiin von Bredow: Keppel Abbey in Siegerlande 1239 to 1971. Volume 2: History of the school and boarding school. 1871-1971. Stiftsfond, Stift Keppel 1971.
  • Erwin Isenberg (Ed.): Old Keppeler Chronicles. Document collections and chronical treatises from the 18th and 19th centuries on the history of the monastery and later free world monastery Keppel in the former principality of Nassau-Siegen. Verlag Die Wielandschmiede, Kreuztal 1992, ISBN 3-925498-43-5 .
  • Erwin Isenberg: Keppel Abbey. Westfälischer Heimatbund, Münster 1996 ( Westfälische Kunststätten 80, ISSN  0930-3952 ).
  • Erwin Isenberg, Udo Reich, Horst Wunderlich (eds.): 750 years of Keppel Abbey. 1239-1989. Contributions to the past and present . Keppel Abbey, Keppel 1989.
  • Dorothea Jehmlich: Keppel Abbey. Girls education in the monastery walls . In: Edgar Reimers (Hrsg.): On the history of schools in Siegerland. Verlag Die Blaue Eule, Essen 1992, ISBN 3-89206-445-8 , pp. 75-103 ( Siegener Studies 50).

Web links

Commons : Stift Keppel  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikisource: Keppel Abbey in Merian's Topographia Hassiae  - sources and full texts

Individual evidence

  1. ^ "Scrolled back ...", Siegener Zeitung of September 11, 2010, p. 43
  2. ↑ Steffen Schwab: Keppel Abbey - Number 13 is a man. April 30, 2014, accessed on June 22, 2019 (German).

Coordinates: 50 ° 58 ′ 33 "  N , 8 ° 5 ′ 5"  E