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The Karlsschrein (English: Shrine of Charlemagne ) is located in Aachen Cathedral and contains the remains of Charlemagne. It was completed in 1215 in Aachen at the command of Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor. Charlemagne's remains had been in the Palatine Chapel of the cathedral until 1165, when Frederick Barbarossa placed the remains in a sarcophagus beneath the floor of the cathedral.
Frederick II personally carried out the transfer of the bones and the sealing of the shrine on 27 July 1215, [1] the first anniversary of the Battle of Bouvines, which had spurred him to seek the German throne. Two days before, he had been crowned again and finally as the King of the Romans at Aachen.
The Shrine is part of the late 12th century shrine tradition. It has the form of a naved church, without a transept. It is an oak box 2.04 metres long, 0.57 metres wide, and 0.94 metres high (80.3in by 22.4in by 37.0in), decorated with gilt silver, gilt copper, filigree, precious stones, and enamel. The double step of the base is adorned with enamel plates, engravings, filigree, and silver stamped with floral designs. The two long sides each show an arcade of eight archways resting on double columns, in which the kings and emperors of the realm are enthroned.
The front gable end shows Charlemagne enthroned, with Pope Leo III standing to his right and Archbishop Turpin of Rheims to his left. A half-figure of Christ is located in a medaillon above Charlemagne. [1] The ornamentation is mostly geometric and floral. [2]
On the rear gable end the Madonna with Christ is enthroned between the Archangels Michael and Gabriel. Three half-figures, the personifications of Faith, Hope, and Love, are depicted above. [1]
The two surfaces of the roof show four reliefs with scenes from the romanticised life of Charlemagne. A crest of gilded copper, with five towers, decorates the ridge and gable of the roof.
Each of the long sides of the shrine depicts eight enthroned emperors. Shown on its right side, as viewed from the front gable end, are the following (from left to right): Henry II, Otto III, Otto I, Otto II, Charles the Fat, an unnamed Emperor, Henry VI, and Frederick II. Depicted on the opposite side are Henry III, Zwentibold, Henry V, Henry IV, Otto IV, Henry I, Lothair I, and Louis the Pious.
The composition is determined by Hohenstaufen imperial thought. [3] Charlemagne is enthroned on the front between the representatives of the church at a location which is reserved on all other shrines for Christ alone. He himself, Emperor Charlemagne, is the viceroy of Christ, towering over the Pope and the archbishop. On the two long sides of the shrine, otherwise reserved for Prophets and Apostles, sixteen Holy Roman Emperors and Kings are enthroned, the roof reliefs continue the imperial character of the composition. These show the legendary life of Charlemagne, based on the Historia Karoli Magni et Rothalandi , allegedly written by Archbishop Turpin of Rheims (c. 748–749). However, modern research has revealed that the Historia Karoli was actually composed around 1130–1140 in France.
In 1874, the Aachen Stiftkapitel allowed a scientific investigation of the remains of Charlemagne to be carried out by Hermann Schaaffhausen (1816–1893), an anthropologist from Bonn. From the remains Schaafhausen determined a height of 2.04 metres (6'7"). This height, which was especially rare in the Middle Ages, was reported by Einhard, "for it is known that in height he measured seven of his feet" (nam septem suorum pedum proceritatem eius constat habuisse mensuram). The right collarbone had broken and rehealed. No historian mentions this injury. The skull shows a dolichocephalic form (elongated), the seams closed without a trace, which is a sign of old age. The findings indicate the authenticity of the remains.[ citation needed ]
However, according to a more recent article, estimates of Charlemagne's height done by different methods (but all based on the dimensions of his left tibia) range from 1.79 metres to 1.92 metres and average 1.84 metres (6'0). That would still make Charlemagne very tall by the standards of his time. [4] [5]
On 30 January 1983, during a vespers service, the sealed zinc box with the remains of Charlemagne was taken out of the shrine and opened. In the evening of the same day, the box was resealed and the remains were put in a provisional wooden shrine. At night, the Karlsschrein itself was brought into the cathedral goldsmiths' workshop, where the goldsmiths Gerhard Thewis and Peter Bolg worked for five years under the scholarly direction of Herta Lepie on the conservation of the artwork. Here, care was taken that apart from this conservation a restoration or renovation was not made – as frequently happened in the repair of artworks in the past – which would have irreversibly changed the shrine or damaged its original form.[ citation needed ]
Aachen is the 13th-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia and the 27th-largest city of Germany, with around 261,000 inhabitants.
Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and Emperor of what is now known as the Carolingian Empire from 800, holding these titles until his death in 814. He united most of Western and Central Europe, and was the first recognised emperor to rule from the west after the fall of the Western Roman Empire approximately three centuries earlier. Charlemagne's reign was marked by political and social changes that had lasting influence on Europe throughout the Middle Ages.
The Shrine of the Three Kings, Tomb of the Three Kings, or Tomb of the Three Magi is a reliquary traditionally believed to contain the bones of the Biblical Magi, also known as the Three Kings or the Three Wise Men. This shrine is a large gilded and decorated triple sarcophagus situated above and behind the high altar of Cologne Cathedral in western Germany. Built approximately from 1180 to 1225, it is considered the high point of Mosan art by various historians and scholars, and ranks amongst the largest reliquary in the Western world.
Aachen Cathedral is a Catholic church in Aachen, Germany and the cathedral of the Diocese of Aachen.
The Palatine Chapel in Aachen is an early medieval chapel and remaining component of Charlemagne's Palace of Aachen in what is now Germany. Although the palace itself no longer exists, the chapel was preserved and now forms the central part of Aachen Cathedral. It is Aachen's major landmark and a central monument of the Carolingian Renaissance. The chapel held the remains of Charlemagne. Later it was appropriated by the Ottonians and coronations were held there from 936 to 1531.
The Imperial Crown of the Holy Roman Empire, a hoop crown (Bügelkrone) with a characteristic octagonal shape, was the coronation crown of the Holy Roman Emperor, probably from the late 10th century until the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806. The crown was used in the coronation of the King of the Romans, the title assumed by the Emperor-elect immediately after his election. It is now kept in the Imperial Treasury at the Hofburg in Vienna, Austria.
The Palace of Aachen was a group of buildings with residential, political, and religious purposes chosen by Charlemagne to be the center of power of the Carolingian Empire. The palace was located north of the current city of Aachen, today in the German Land of North Rhine-Westphalia. Most of the Carolingian palace was built in the 790s but the works went on until Charlemagne's death in 814. The plans, drawn by Odo of Metz, were part of the program of renovation of the kingdom decided by the ruler. Today much of the palace is ruined, but the Palatine Chapel has been preserved and is considered a masterpiece of Carolingian architecture and a characteristic example of architecture from the Carolingian Renaissance.
Imperial cathedral is the designation for a cathedral linked to the Imperial rule of the Holy Roman Empire.
The Proserpina sarcophagus is a Roman marble sarcophagus from the first quarter of the third century AD, in which Charlemagne was probably interred on 28 January 814 in Aachen cathedral. It is displayed today in the Aachen Cathedral Treasury.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Aachen, Germany.
The Barbarossa Chandelier was made on the order of Emperor Frederick I, nicknamed Barbarossa, and his wife Beatrice sometime between 1165 and 1170 and was installed under the cupola of the Palatine Chapel in Aachen Cathedral. The chandelier was a donation in honour of Mary, Mother of God, the patroness of Aachen Cathedral and simultaneously represented a tribute to the builder of the cathedral, Charlemagne.
The Marienschrein in Aachen Cathedral is a reliquary, donated on the order of the chapter of Mary around 1220 and consecrated in 1239. Along with the Karlsschrein, the artwork, which is from the transitional period between romanesque and gothic, is among the most important goldsmith works of the thirteenth century.
The Noli me tangere casket was a small silver-gilt casket made in 1356 for the Aachen Cathedral Treasury. It measured 15.2 cm in length, 3.7 cm in height and 4.8 cm in width. The casket was kept in the Marienschrein together with the key relics of the cathedral until the nineteenth century and the casket remained in the possession of the cathedral treasury until its destruction during the Second World War.
The Throne of Charlemagne is a throne erected in the 790s by Charlemagne, as one of the fittings of his palatine chapel in Aachen and placed in the Octagon of the church. Until 1531, it served as the coronation throne of the King of the Romans, being used at a total of thirty-one coronations. As a result, especially in the eleventh century, it was referred to as the totius regni archisolium. Charlemagne himself was not crowned on this throne, but instead in the Old St. Peter's Basilica in Rome by Pope Leo III in 800 AD.
The Bust of Charlemagne is a reliquary from around 1350 which contains the top part of Charlemagne's skull. The reliquary is part of the treasure kept in the Aachen Cathedral Treasury. Made in the Mosan region, long a centre of high-quality metalwork, the bust is a masterpiece both of late Gothic metalwork and of figural sculpture.
The Liuthar Gospels are a work of Ottonian illumination which are counted among the masterpieces of the period known as the Ottonian Renaissance. The manuscript, named after a monk called Liuthar, was probably created around the year 1000 at the order of Otto III at the Abbey of Reichenau and lends its name to the Liuthar Group of Reichenau illuminated manuscripts. The backgrounds of all the images are illuminated in gold leaf, a seminal innovation in western illumination.
The Aachen Cathedral Treasury is a museum of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Aachen under the control of the cathedral chapter, which houses one of the most important collections of medieval church artworks in Europe. In 1978, the Aachen Cathedral Treasury, along with Aachen Cathedral, was the first monument on German soil to be entered in the List of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The treasury contains works from Late Antique, Carolingian, Ottonian, Staufen, and Gothic times. The exhibits are displayed in premises connected to the cathedral cloisters.
The Ambon of Henry II, commonly known as Henry's Ambon (Heinrichsambo) or Henry's Pulpit (Heinrichskanzel) is an ambon in the shape of a pulpit built by Henry II, Holy Roman Emperor in the Palatine chapel in Aachen between 1002 and 1014. It is among the most significant artworks of the Ottonian period.
The Talisman of Charlemagne is a 9th-century Carolingian reliquary encolpion that may once have belonged to Charlemagne and is purported to contain a fragment of the True Cross. It is the only surviving piece of goldwork which can be connected with Charlemagne himself with some degree of probability, but the connection has been seriously questioned. The talisman is now kept in Rheims in the Palace of Tau.
The rich iconography of Charlemagne is a reflection of Charlemagne's special position in Europe's collective memory, as the greatest of the Frankish kings, founder of the Holy Roman Empire, unifier of Western Europe, protector of the Catholic Church, promoter of education and of the Carolingian Renaissance, fictional precursor of the crusades, one of the Nine Worthies, a (contested) Catholic saint, and a national icon in Andorra, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands and Switzerland.
50°46′29″N6°05′04″E / 50.7747°N 6.0844°E
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