Steterburg Collegiate Church

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South side of the collegiate church

The Evangelical Lutheran collegiate church in Steterburg , a residential area in Salzgitter-Thiede , was built from 1752 to 1758 by Duke Karl I of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel on the site of a previous church. The church belonged to Steterburg Abbey and has been used as the parish church of the Protestant community of Steterburg since its dissolution in 1939 . Until 1980 the church bore the name of the patron saint of the monastery “St. Christophorus and St. Jacobus minor ”.

Prehistory and first church building

The Steterburg Abbey was founded around 1000 by Frederunda von Oelsburg († March 16, 1020), the daughter of Count Altmann von Oelsburg († 1000/03). As a monastery church, the canons initially used a church dedicated to St. Nikolaus chapel of the old Stederburg , which was built from 924 to 933 by Heinrich I , on the site of which the monastery was built. According to the Stederburger Annalen , the first church of the monastery was consecrated in 1070 by Werner von Wolkenburg, the then Bishop of Merseburg . The church, probably a wooden basilica , was added to the keep of the castle.

Second church building from 1160 to 1748

Steterburg Abbey around 1654/1658, engraving by Matthäus Merian

Almost 90 years later the church fell into disrepair and had to be demolished. The foundations were laid in 1160 under Provost Ekbert, the new building began in 1165 and completed in 1174 under the direction of the then Provost Gerhard II . The building was built in the Romanesque style . The keep, to which the old church was built, was converted into a church tower and integrated into the new building. The square tower that has been preserved to this day has a side length of 6.6 m, the walls are one meter thick. In a drawing from 1730 the tower is shown with a high, pointed roof. A chapel was added to the north wall of the church tower, which was dedicated to St. Nicholas was consecrated. The chapel was later rebuilt and is now part of the rectory of the Protestant parish of Steterburg.

The building had the ground plan of a basilica with a nave , two aisles and a transept . The flat, paneled wooden ceilings were mostly painted. The church had four altars: a Marian altar and three more dedicated to Saints James the Younger , John and Christophorus . An organ was mentioned in 1273, this was placed opposite the choir on the west gallery . Behind this organ were the choir stalls for the conventual women of the monastery, who could not be seen by the other church visitors.

The church and many buildings of the monastery were destroyed by fire in 1328, the reconstruction took place in the previous form and was completed in 1332. Due to the proximity of Steterburg to the ducal residence of Wolfenbüttel and the city of Braunschweig , Steterburg was often involved in armed conflicts in the following centuries, through which the monastery and its goods were repeatedly plundered and destroyed; so z. B. 1493, when Duke Heinrich d. Ä. moved against Braunschweig during the Hildesheim collegiate feud from 1519 to 1523 and during the Schmalkaldic Wars between 1542 and 1547.

After Duke Julius introduced the Reformation in 1568, the monastery was converted into an evangelical virgin monastery, and in 1691 into a noble women's monastery .

Baptismal font from 1674

When the Danes had to flee from the emperor's troops approaching Wolfenbüttel in the Thirty Years' War in 1627 , they destroyed the church and large parts of the monastery. Later it was the Swedish troops who destroyed other buildings of the monastery in 1641. The residents of the monastery had to move to Braunschweig. A Merian engraving from 1654 shows the ruins of the destroyed monastery, in the center of the picture the rectangular church tower, the roof of which was only renewed between 1672 and 1674. It was not until 1674 that part of the building could also be restored and the canonesses could move in. A new bell for the church had already been purchased in 1668.

The font , still in use today, was a gift from Domina Hedwig Maria von Oberg . It was erected on November 13, 1674 and was the work of the stonemason Ulrich Wendt. The eight-sided font has a diameter of 0.75 m and is 1.1 m high. The name of the founder and the foundation year 1674 are carved on the edge of the baptismal font. According to the donor's wishes, the baptismal font was placed over her grave; today it is in the front choir area above the walled-up entrance to the crypt.

Construction of the current church building (since 1748)

The church had only been poorly repaired since the Thirty Years' War and later fell into such disrepair that Duke Charles I ordered the new building in 1748. The state master builder Martin Peltier submitted a first draft for a new building in the same year, but this was rejected by the duke. At the Duke's request, the old foundations and other components should be included in the construction of the church. The church was built according to the drafts submitted in 1750 by the Brunswick colonel and architect Anton Ulrich von Blum. The model for the interior design was the St. Trinitatis Church in Wolfenbüttel , which was rebuilt by Hermann Korb after a fire in 1716 .

The old church was demolished in 1751, and construction began the following year. In January 1753, the previous builder von Blum died. Captain Wilhelm Grützmann was commissioned to continue the work. The stucco work were made by Giuseppe Buzzi, which I for the Duke Karl already working on Salzdahlumer Castle had performed. The painting of the church and the altar was entrusted to the court painter Heinrich Christoph Piccart. At the Duke's request, the altar pulpit, benches, chairs and doors should not be lavishly gilded. The new church was consecrated on October 22nd, 1758. Miss Margarethe Cathrin Götzen von Ohlenhausen donated two bells to build the church. In 1767 and 1768 the church received an organ.

A burial vault was built under the floor of the church in 1755 , which was accessible through a wide staircase in the central aisle. This crypt was used for the burial of abbesses and canonesses until 1882, after which it was closed. In World War II it was largely destroyed when one part of the tomb to a bomb shelter rebuilt. The crypt was redesigned in 1980, and today the baptismal font donated in 1674 stands above the walled entrance in the central area. The grave slabs of seven canonesses were placed under the west gallery.

Building description

Sanctuary

According to the ground plan, the Steterburger Church is a hall church , which was given the shape of a cross with short side arms through the two central projections on the north and south walls. The windows are arranged on two floors. When the facade was renovated in 1999, the exterior paint was restored to its original pink color. Overall, from the outside the church offers the impression of a small castle.

In the interior, 16 columns with Corinthian capitals support the circumferential gallery and the ceiling, they also divide the space into the elongated central nave and an outer gallery . The eastern part of the central nave is three steps higher than the rest of the room. The seats in this area were reserved for the canons, while the lower part of the nave was reserved for the canons and other secular visitors to the services.

The wooden pulpit altar built in 1756 forms the end of the choir area . The original plans of Blum's first master builder were to set up the pulpit well in front of the altar near the steps to the choir. His successor, Grützmann, changed the design and relocated the pulpit to the altar wall, also to create space for access to the later planned burial chapel. The Corinthian columns adorned with golden capitals to the left and right of the altar are made of wood and painted with a marble replica that looks deceptively real.

organ

organ

The current church received the first organ in 1767/68, the prospectus was designed by the Braunschweig sculptor Oden. The organ was built by the Wolfenbüttel court organ builder Johann Christoph Hüsemann , and the court painter Heinrich Christoph Piccart was commissioned with the painting. The organ set up above the west gallery was inspected on February 19, 1769 by the organist Broyer. This organ, later listed as a historical monument, had 18 stops . In 1965, the regional church office decided to rebuild the organ, whereby the historical pipe view was retained. The new organ was inaugurated in 1976. It has 17 registers with a total of 1072 pipes .

History since the monastery was dissolved in 1939

The monastery and the associated domain were dissolved by the National Socialist government of the state of Braunschweig in early 1939 and the property was sold to the Reichswerke Hermann Göring . The canons moved to Blankenburg , where the knighthood of the monastery had bought two houses. The New Year's service on January 1, 1939 was the last that could be held in the collegiate church, after which the church was closed. Due to the protests of the population against a rededication of the church building as a community center or cinema, no renovation was made. Finally, in March 1939, the regional church managed to buy back the church and the rectory. In 1941 Steterburg became an independent parish office . The community belongs to the provost of Salzgitter-Lebenstedt and is a member of the parish association "Salzgitter Norden" formed in 2019.

When the canonesses moved to Blankenburg, they were able to take the treasury with them to their new domicile. When he returned to Steterburg in 1952, the treasure was handed over to the evangelical community of Blankenburg and returned to the owner, the knighthood of the former monastery, in 1999. Some pieces were left to the collegiate church, such as a wafer box from 1677 and two goblets from 1608 and 1680.

During the Second World War, the bells of the church had to be given up and were melted down. Only a small bell remained. Donations from the parish made it possible to order two ringing bells and two stop bells at the beginning of 1947 . These were cast in Bockenem and consecrated at Pentecost 1947. The bells bear the inscriptions “Soli Deo Gloria” and “Only God in the heights 'be honor'!”. In December 2005 the church received two new bells.

In the years 1955 to 1957 and 1984 to 1986 the church was renovated inside and out. The interior was designed in light colors again in accordance with the findings about the earlier design. The roof and the ceiling were repaired and the plastering of the ceiling, the cornices and the column capitals were renewed. When the underground air ducts for the heating were laid, several shards of vessels and remnants of tiles from the Reformation period were found, and old foundation walls and paving stones from the earlier church buildings, which had been destroyed several times by fires or wars, were exposed. The sundial on the south side of the collegiate church was reinstalled in 1999. In that year, the collegiate church also received its current pink paint, which corresponds to the original painting, until then the building was painted in a gray color.

literature

  • Wolfgang Cheap: The collegiate church in Steterburg . Ed .: Braunschweigischer Geschichtsverein (=  sources and research on Braunschweigische history . Volume 25 ). Self-published by the Braunschweigischer Geschichtsverein, Braunschweig 1982.
  • Church buildings in Salzgitter . In: Department for Public Relations of the City of Salzgitter (Ed.): Salzgitter Forum . tape 12 , 1986, DNB  880735341 , p. 66-67 .
  • Gesine Schwarz, Jutta Brüdern (pictures): The knight seats of the old country of Braunschweig . Ed .: Knighthood of the former State of Braunschweig. MatrixMedia-Verlag, Göttingen 2008, ISBN 978-3-932313-27-1 , p. 319-326 .
  • Hartmut Alder: Chronicle of Thiede . Waisenhaus Druckerei GmbH Braunschweig, Salzgitter 1991.
  • Hartmut Alder: If you walk across the fields, you come to Steterburg . Chronicle of a place full of history. Pro Art publishing house, Salzgitter-Steterburg 2008.

Web links

Commons : Stiftskirche Steterburg  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wolfgang Billig: Stiftskirche Steterburg , pp. 45–46
  2. ↑ Wolfgang Billig: Stiftskirche Steterburg , p. 67
  3. ^ Wolfgang Billig: Stiftskirche Steterburg , pp. 46–56
  4. ↑ Hartmut Alder: Chronik Steterburg , p. 62
  5. ↑ Hartmut Alder: Chronicle Steterburg , p. 72
  6. ^ Wolfgang Billig: Stiftskirche Steterburg , p. 127ff
  7. ↑ Wolfgang Billig: Stiftskirche Steterburg , p. 100, p. 131–132
  8. ^ Wolfgang Billig: Stiftskirche Steterburg , p. 140
  9. ↑ Hartmut Alder: Chronik Steterburg , p. 212
  10. ^ Parish association Salzgitters Norden is founded , Salzgitter-Zeitung from January 15, 2019
  11. ↑ Hartmut Alder: Chronik Steterburg , pp. 176f, 215

Coordinates: 52 ° 11 ′ 37 ″  N , 10 ° 28 ′ 24 ″  E