Wenzel Melweiß

Wenzel Melweiß (* around 1440 in the Netherlands ; † after 1498 in Dettingen) was a Dutch theologian living in Württemberg . Between 1481 and 1498 he was the provost of the brothers who lived together in Herrenberg.

Life

It is not known where Wenzel Melweiß studied. He came to Württemberg when Count Eberhard im Bart founded a Fraterherrenhaus at the Amandus parish church in his residence town Urach in 1479 . This happened after the count had previously met the brothers from living together in the Butzbach monastery and decided to settle them in his country. It is possible that Wenzel Melweiß came to Urach from Butzbach. Eberhard im Bart had probably intended from the beginning to replace the canon monastery that existed in Herrenberg with the Fraterherrenstift. The opportunity arose when the provost of the Canons' Monastery, Leonhard Nötlich, died in early 1481. Eberhard im Bart informed the canons of his plans for the monastery and apparently tried in vain to get the canons to renounce their benefices . Without hesitation, he turned to Pope Sixtus IV with the request to confirm Wenzel Melweiß as provost of the Herrenberger Stift and to reorganize it. The Pope complied with the request: on March 17, 1481 he appointed Melweiß provost and on March 23, he ordered two bulls to convert the secular canon monastery into a fraternal monastery. In it he explicitly referred to the resistance that had flared up in Herrenberg. The cops did not remove the resistance of the canons, which from then on was directed primarily against the provost who was forced upon them.

In 1481 Melweiß initiated the construction of the provost house for the fraternity that was to be established. The building, completed in 1483, also included a refectory and dormitory. The investiture of Wenzel Melweiß did not take place until May 20, 1482. To support the provost, Count Eberhard took part in the celebration. Since the situation did not change after that, the Pope commissioned the abbot of the Blaubeuren monastery and the provost of the Holy Cross monastery in Stuttgart, Wenzel Melweiß, to support and force the canons to decide either to join the fraternal lords or against an appropriate one Pension to waive their benefices. Only one, Caspar Rockenbuch, a brother of the Abbot von Bebenhausen , joined the brothers from their common life. The other canons finally accepted a pension of 50 fl . Almost all of them stayed in Herrenberg and expressed their discomfort. In any case, they incited the leading class of the city against Melweiß from the start. The new provost was not greeted with the usual debut present, although even the master builder of the provost received three measure of wine as a present. When in 1488 Wenzel Melweiß appointed a new pastor according to the papal bull, there was an obvious discrepancy. The city complained about this to Count Eberhard three times. Another complaint concerned the nuns - apparently the Beguines introduced by Melweiß .

Despite these difficulties, Melweiß managed to leave a lasting work behind in Herrenberg. When he came to Herrenberg, the collegiate church was not yet finished. Above all, the vault was missing, and the masonry - because the church was open - had damage in certain places that had to be repaired. In 1488, Melweiß commissioned master mason Hans von Ulm with this work . The work continued until 1493. In this way the Church was essentially completed. Further work could not be continued at first, partly because the city did not contribute to the construction costs.

In Herrenberg they knew that as long as Count or Duke Eberhard lived, the unpopular provost could not be harmed. As soon as the duke died on February 25, 1496, a messenger was sent to Stuttgart with the request to replace the provost. But Eberhard's successor, Eberhard II , also stuck to Melweiß. After the early removal of Eberhard II at the end of March 1498, the situation changed. The Regency Council, which led the government for the minor Duke Ulrich , apparently wanted to avoid this problem and forced Melweiß to resign from his office. Melweiß spent his old age in one of the Dettingen, probably in Dettingen near Rottenburg. Since there were only the hermits living under the leadership of the Franciscans , this is to be seen as an expression of deep resignation. Apparently the General Chapter of the Brothers of Living Together had also dropped the Herrenberg provost. The resigned Melweiß saw no choice but to forego community life among brothers and be content with the loneliness of a hermit.

Notes and individual references

1. ↑ According to the Herrenberger Chronik by Gottlieb Friedrich Hess , who knew the chronical records of the monastery that have been lost today, it is about Dettingen near Rottenburg , where there were tertiary hermits . In contrast, W. Schmidt claims in the parish and collegiate church of St. Marien that it would be Dettingen an der Erms , where there was a Fraterherrenhaus. - Roman Janssen: Provost Johannes Rebmann ... , p. 110
2. ^ Roman Janssen: Provost Johannes Rebmann ... , p. 107/108
3. ↑ The content of these complaints, which were dismissed, is unknown.
4. ^ Roman Janssen: Provost Johannes Rebmann ... , p. 108
5. ^ Roman Janssen: Provost Johannes Rebmann ... , pp. 108-110
6. ^ Roman Janssen: Provost Johannes Rebmann ... , p. 110

literature

• Roman Janssen: Provost Johannes Rebmann († 1517) and the unity of the collegiate church choir . In: Roman Janssen; Oliver Auge (ed.): Herrenberg personalities from eight centuries , Herrenberg 1999, ISBN 3-926809-09-4 (= Herrenberger Historische Schriften, Vol. 6), pp. 107–116
• Gerhard Faix: “Not being a monk and still living like a monk”. The brothers from living together in Herrenberg . In: Roman Janssen, Harald Müller-Baur (ed.): Die Stiftskirche in Herrenberg 1293-1993 , Herrenberg 1993, ISBN 3-926809-06-X (= Herrenberger Historische Schriften, Vol. 5), pp. 51-78