Wilhadi Chapel

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The Wilhadi chapel below the cathedral in the city map of Braun and Hogenberg from 1598

The Wilhadikapelle (also called Willehadikapelle , Wilhadikirche or simply St. Wilhadi ) was - next to the Bremen Cathedral  - one of the oldest church buildings in Bremen . It was built in the 9th century as a burial chapel for Willehad , the first bishop of Bremen, profaned in the 16th century and demolished in the 19th century.

history

The Wilhadikapelle was built at the beginning of the 9th century by Bishop Willerich for his predecessor Willehad, who died in 789, directly south of the cathedral in the area of ​​the fortified cathedral district. This first Wilhadikirche, of which no images have survived, served as the chapel of the cathedral castle and as a place of worship for Willehad until Bishop Ansgar had the saint's remains embed in the cathedral (his grave is now considered lost).

In 1013, the small, largely wooden building was destroyed by fire. As a result, Bishop Unwan had St. Wilhadi rebuilt as an initially towerless, single-nave Romanesque stone building with a length of 27 meters, a width of 7.40 meters and a semicircular apse . Bishop Adalbert I founded the provosts (here: monasteries) St. Wilhadi and St. Stephani in 1050 . In 1139, Bishop Adalbert II transferred the sanctuary of the now defunct Stephani Probstei to the collegiate monastery of St. Wilhadi on the Steffensberg northwest of the market settlement. The newly built church there was initially called St. Wilhadi and St. Stephani or St. Wilhadi for short . In addition to the Stephaniviertel , its parish also included the villages of Utbremen and Walle . It was only with the Reformation that the name St. Stephani caught on.

The Wilhadikapelle in the cathedral district was from 1187 the same year, based on a poor foundation of the patron saint of Archbishop Hartwig II. Founded Ansgaristift assumed. This they exchanged in 1221 with the cathedral chapter to built by the private citizen Gerhard von Kemnade Jacobi Church .

After a dispute with the Church of Our Lady , the cathedral chapter decided in 1287 that pilgrims and other travelers who had died in the city of Bremen were to be buried in the cemetery of the Wilhadi Chapel and that their funeral masses were to be read in the chapel.

In the meantime she had received a tower. When it burned down around 1300, the church was extended to a handsome three-aisled church with a Gothic choir and a length of 37.80 meters and a width of 19.60 meters. A new tower with a square floor plan and a pyramid roof was built on the west side . After the expansion, it became the parish church for lay people living in the cathedral district and remained so in Bremen until the Reformation . They are entertained by the cathedral's Latin school.

In the course of the Reformation, St. Wilhadi was closed in 1527 and used as an armory . When the Bremen council converted the former St. Katharina's monastery church into the municipal arsenal at the end of the 16th century , the Wilhadikapelle was used as a hop store, which is why the chapel was also known as “ Hoppenkarke ” ( Low German for “hop church”). The building was later used as a packing house and wine store. The walls fell into disrepair, so that in 1726 the tower, which was in danger of collapsing, had to be removed. The bell of the chapel, cast by Berend Klinge in 1456, was hung in the tower of the Easter gate , which was subsequently also called "The Bell". In 1820 parts of the nave were demolished and in 1860 - on the occasion of the construction of the New Stock Exchange on the market square - the rest of the building, as well as all the neighboring houses in the district. During the demolition work, the foundations of the former apse and a richly decorated Romanesque capital were found.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bremen document book August 27, 1139 : Archbishop Adalbero (II.) Relocates the Wilhadikapitel to the Stephaniberg and grants the church, which the citizens of Bremen have promised to build there, the parish right within the city for all citizens who live from the Elverici house to Stephaniberg, as well as for the villages of Utbremen and Walle.
  2. ↑ Founding document of the Ansgari chapter from May 1, 1187 (Latin)
  3. ↑ Monuments of the history and art of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen → Third section: The Bremen churches → Second part: The parish and religious churches → p. 24 ff., Die Kirch St. Anscharii , p. 26/27
  4. ↑ To Weser and Jade - 12th century. Retrieved October 30, 2010 .
  5. ^ Herbert Black Forest: The Great Bremen Lexicon. 2nd, updated, revised and expanded edition. Edition Temmen, Bremen 2003, ISBN 3-86108-693-X , p. 987.
  6. ^ Herbert Black Forest: The Great Bremen Lexicon. 2nd, updated, revised and expanded edition. Edition Temmen, Bremen 2003, ISBN 3-86108-693-X , p. 653.
  7. ^ Rudolf Stein: Romanesque, Gothic and Renaissance architecture in Bremen . Hauschild Verlag, Bremen 1962, p. 20 .

literature

Coordinates: 53 ° 4 ′ 31 ″  N , 8 ° 48 ′ 29 ″  E