Death lamp
A funeral lamp in the narrower sense is a freestanding structure erected in cemeteries in the Middle Ages , which in its upper part contains a lantern open on several sides. The term is often extended to light houses and light niches on buildings in the church and cemetery area, in which a light source can also be introduced. Synonyms for both types of construction are cemetery light , churchyard lantern and (poor) soul light . Also known is the French term Lanternes des morts , which in some travel guides is translated as “death lantern”.
Like other comparable, but mostly smaller monuments ( wayside crosses , Hosanna crosses, etc.), the death lights are a visible expression of the memorial system .
to form
Smaller pillars with tabernacles outside of cemeteries are often referred to as "light pillars", as are free-standing death lamps. To distinguish them, however, these should be referred to as "light sticks". From these, after Franz Hula, wayside shrines developed , in which the tabernacle-like attachment was decorated with reliefs, pictures and small sculptures and no longer illuminated. These two forms of small monuments were used side by side, merged and partly exchanged their function. For example, candles were sometimes placed on structures that were not designed for lighting and lanterns were installed, e.g. B. on the memory of All Souls' Day (poor soul light) . Therefore, in 1970, Hula recommended using the terms "niche" or "tabernacle pillar" in the absence of knowledge. These include plague and sinner crosses as well as similar structures in front of infirmaries and leproseries .
After this differentiation in 1970 by Franz Hula, for example, it was included in the guide to the small and land monument database for Lower Austria and Salzburg in the mid-1990s. Hula's work on funerary lamps and wayside shrines in Austria from 1948 has not yet been updated. However, it has meanwhile been criticized that Hula's systematics and theory for the creation of wayside shrines from lights for the dead only apply to wayside shrines in the Alpine region, especially in Austria, and not to other landscapes, such as B. Francs , can be transferred.
Free-standing death lights
In 1948, Hula referred to these free-standing death lamps as the "oldest form" of the wayside shrine. It is characterized by a polygonal (mostly eight-sided) shaft, a polygonal multi-or mutually open light housing and a polygonal pyramid helmet. Hula also called this funeral lamp the "French type", as the earliest and at the same time most impressive traces of this tradition can be found in western France:
- France
- In Cellefrouin ( Charente ) there is a funeral lamp that probably dates from the 12th century. The lamp was placed over a door that is three feet above the platform shrine is located, and set on fire, and they could be expected to reach via a ladder.
- The village of Ciron ( Indre ) has a better preserved example than Cellefrouin from the end of the 12th century. In contrast to the death lamp by Cellefrouin, which has no opening in the head area, the head of this structure is provided with several openings.
- A cylinder-shaped stele on a square base in the center of today's cemetery in the village of Château-Larcher dates from the beginning of the 13th century . It was lit by means of a burning oil lamp that could be carried to the top of the column via a pulley. It is crowned by a paw cross , which has only been on its top since 1840.
- In the middle of the 13th century, the funeral lamp in Antigny ( Vienne ) was erected on a multi-level platform. The floor plan is square, the lamp was brought to the top via a side door that has four openings and was probably also decorated with a cross.
- The funeral lantern from Cubas , Dordogne, dates back to the 13th century.
- The Fenioux's Lantern ( Charente-Maritime ) is one of the largest examples in Poitou . It was built from eleven round columns that were placed in a circle. Inside there is a spiral staircase with 33 steps that leads to the head. This, too, was built from individual columns that, in contrast to the lower part, have spaces in between to allow light to pass through. In addition to a Latin cross , the helmet was also decorated with four short columns crowned with balls.
- The funeral lamp of Culhat ( Puy-de-Dôme ) even adorns the municipality's coat of arms :
Culhat Coat of Arms
Culhat death lamp
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- The building on the former cemetery above Sarlat Cathedral ( Périgord ), also known as the “Lanterne des Morts” and dated to the 12th century, differs fundamentally from the funeral lamps mentioned above: It is a thick round tower with a much larger diameter than all other funeral lamps . Its basement contains a room (chapel?). The upper floor has four small openings, so it is rather unsuitable for setting up or attaching lights inside.
- Austria
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The concept of the lamps for the dead came to Carinthia , possibly through Cistercian monks , where eight examples are still preserved today, such as the two Gothic columns from the 13th century in Köttmannsdorf and Keutschach am See . Another example is in Lorch , Upper Austria , a district of Enns . The Tutzsäule , a funeral lamp from 1381 decorated with reliefs from the Passion of Christ, stands in front of the Klosterneuburg collegiate church in Lower Austria. Josef Dünninger described it as a plague cross in 1952, and according to Hula it would be a stick of light, but not a lamp for the dead. In 1970, Hula wrote that in some of these cemetery lights, candles were still burning on All Souls' days and were therefore sometimes also referred to as “candle towers”.
A few examples from the beginnings of the Austrian death lamp culture in the middle of the 13th century can still be assigned to the Romanesque , but the majority of the Gothic. The end of the erection of funeral lamps is dated to the early 17th century.
- South-Tirol
- A Gothic funeral lamp from 1483 stands in the middle of the old cemetery in Bressanone.
- In the inner courtyard of the Brixen cathedral cloister there is a Gothic lamp for the dead from around 1500.
- Germany
The oldest funeral lamp in Germany is the funeral lamp erected in 1268 in the cemetery of the Cistercian monastery in Pforta . Occasionally this title is also assigned to the murder column for Bishop Konrad von Querfurt near Würzburg Cathedral . However, according to Hula, the structure erected shortly after the murder is just a stick of light.
Light houses and niches
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There are also lights that were attached to the inner wall of a chapel, church or ossuary , such as. B. in the cloister in Augsburg Cathedral . Death lights attached to the outer wall are called “light bay”.
After the Second World War , death lights were also erected to commemorate the war victims . For example, the death lamp on Paderborn Cathedral only burns on January 17th, March 22nd and March 27th. These were the days of the heaviest air raids on Paderborn in 1945.
See also
literature
- Franz Hula: Medieval cult marks. The lights of the dead of Europe. Karner, Schalenstein u. Cemetery soculus . Self-published, Vienna 1970, pp. 6-9, excerpt
- Guide to the small and land monument database for Lower Austria and Salzburg , category 1520–1540
- Franz Hula: The death lights and wayside shrines of Austria . Publisher Helene Poech, Vienna 1948
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Guide to the small and field monument database for Lower Austria and Salzburg ( Memento of the original from December 16, 2013 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. , Category 1520-1540, accessed September 10, 2012
- ↑ Stefan Popp: wayside shrines in the northern district of Würzburg: inventory and mentality-historical studies on small religious monuments , dissertation, University of Würzburg, 2004, p. 43 ff.
- ↑ Yvonne Leiverkus: Cologne: pictures of a late medieval city , Böhlau, Cologne 2005, ISBN 3-412-23805-8 , p 293, preview in Google Book Search
- ↑ koettmannsdorf.at: Parish Church St. Georg ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 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. , accessed September 11, 2012
- ↑ a b c d e chatel-medieval.fr: lanterne des morts ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed September 11, 2012
- ↑ Death lamp . In: Meyers Konversations-Lexikon . 4th edition. Volume 15, Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig / Vienna 1885–1892, p. 776.
- ↑ a b Josef Dünninger: wayside shrines in Franconia in: Bayerisches Jahrbuch für Volkskunde 4 , 1952, p. 32
- ↑ Guide, p. 33
- ↑ Peter Gerlach: The lamp for the dead from Schulpforta and the French lamp for the dead. peter-gerlach.eu, August 2007, archived from the original on November 10, 2013 ; accessed on December 23, 2017 .
- ↑ diekneite-paderborn.de: The death lamp at the cathedral ( Memento of the original from October 27, 2012 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. , Accessed May 12, 2012
