Lower arch

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Coordinates: 47 ° 29 '57.8 "  N , 8 ° 43' 35.7"  E ; CH1903:  six hundred and ninety-seven thousand and forty-one  /  261,754

View from Marktgasse to the east facade of the Lower Arch (drawing by Emanuel Labhardt , around 1860).

The lower arch , also known as the Käfigtor , Käfigturm , Zeittor , Zeitbogen or Zeitglocken ( tower ) due to its later use , was the old west gate of the city of Winterthur . After the construction of the new lower gate at the entrance to the western suburb, the gate tower was used as a prison from 1340 to 1814; In 1529 he received a roof turret with an hour bell and a clock with a large dial on the east side to read the equinox hours and a smaller one below to represent astronomical hoursApparitions. During the redesign of 1669, the tower was reduced in height and provided with a baroque facade painting, which surrounded the dials with a columnar architecture and the half-figures of the Greek mathematicians Euclid and Ptolemy .

By resolution of the municipal assembly on October 30, 1870, the last two city gates of Winterthur were demolished in the following year with the lower and upper arches ; the then city ​​architect Karl Bareis resigned his office in protest and left the city. The clockwork from the clock tower made of wrought iron by Laurenz Liechti , including the astronomical dial, was first stored in the town hall , later kept in the Mörsburg and is now exhibited in the Lindengut Museum. The rotation of the sun and moon and their aspects , the moon phases and dragon points , the signs of the zodiac and the temporal hours are displayed by means of four pointers .

literature

  • Emanuel Dejung, Richard Zürcher, Hans Hofmann: The Art Monuments of the Canton of Zurich VI: Winterthur / Supplements to the City of Zurich. Basel 1952, p. 31 f.
  • Adolf Schenk: The astronomical clock of the clock tower in Winterthur. Published as the 78th New Year's sheet of the Hülfsgesellschaft Winterthur. Winterthur 1941.

Individual evidence

  1. Unterer Bogen, Marktgasse im Winterthur Glossary.