St. Bernward's Church, Hildesheim

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St. Bernward's Church is a Catholic church in the city of Hildesheim in Lower Saxony, Germany. The name refers to the bishop Bernward of Hildesheim (960-1022) who was canonized by Pope Celestine III.

Hildesheim Place in Lower Saxony, Germany

Hildesheim[ˈhɪldəsˌhaɪ̯m](listen) is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany with 103,804 inhabitants. It is in the district of Hildesheim, about 30 km (19 mi) southeast of Hanover on the banks of the Innerste River, a small tributary of the Leine River. With the Hildesheim Cathedral and the St. Michael's Church Hildesheim has become a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1985.

Lower Saxony State in Germany

Lower Saxony is a German state (Land) situated in northwestern Germany. It is the second-largest state by land area, with 47,624 km2 (18,388 sq mi), and fourth-largest in population among the 16 Länder federated as the Federal Republic of Germany. In rural areas, Northern Low Saxon and Saterland Frisian are still spoken, but the number of speakers is declining.

Germany Federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe

Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central and Western Europe, lying between the Baltic and North Seas to the north, and the Alps to the south. It borders Denmark to the north, Poland and the Czech Republic to the east, Austria and Switzerland to the south, France to the southwest, and Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands to the west.

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History

Saint Bernward's Church Hildesheim St. Bernward.jpg
Saint Bernward's Church
Interior. SaintBernwardHildesheim 013.jpg
Interior.
Altar and retable. SaintBernwardHildesheim 001.jpg
Altar and retable.
Statue of Saint Bernward. SaintBernwardHildesheim 008.jpg
Statue of Saint Bernward.

The church was built by the architect Richard Herzig from Hanover in 1905–1907, in a neoromanesque style. [1] From 1895–1913, Herzig built 43 churches of this style in the diocese of Hildesheim. When St. Bernward's Church was built, the romanesque westwork of St. Andrew's Church, Hildesheim and the Cathedral of Hildesheim served as examples. The church was consecrated by bishop Adolf Bertram on 3 November 1907.

Hanover Place in Lower Saxony, Germany

Hanover or Hannover is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,061 (2017) inhabitants make it the thirteenth-largest city of Germany, as well as the third-largest city of Northern Germany after Hamburg and Bremen. The city lies at the confluence of the River Leine and its tributary Ihme, in the south of the North German Plain, and is the largest city of the Hannover–Braunschweig–Göttingen–Wolfsburg Metropolitan Region. It is the fifth-largest city in the Low German dialect area after Hamburg, Dortmund, Essen, and Bremen.

Adolf Bertram Catholic cardinal

Adolf Cardinal Bertram was archbishop of Breslau and a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church.

During World War II, St. Bernward's Church was heavily damaged by bombs on 22 February 1945 [2] The windows were destroyed, the vault and the roof collapsed. The building could no longer be used for services. Then on 22 March 1945 the church was completely destroyed by incendiary bombs. Only a part of the tower and some walls remained standing. [3]

Bombing of Hildesheim in World War II

The German city of Hildesheim, c. 30 kilometres south of Hanover, was the target of eight Allied air raids in 1944 and 1945 and suffered considerable bomb damage.

The reconstruction was started as early as November 1948. When it was completed, St. Bernward's Church, the first destroyed church of Hildesheim to be rebuilt, was consecrated by bishop Joseph Godehard Machens in 1949.

Description

St. Bernward's Church is a basilica consisting of three naves, but unlike the other churches in Hildesheim, its apse and the altar are in the north of the building. [4] The church facades to the south. The tower, which looks very similar to the tower of the Cathedral, is placed at the southern end.

Basilica building used as a place of Christian worship

The Latin word basilica has three distinct applications in modern English. Originally, the word was used to refer to an ancient Roman public building, where courts were held, as well as serving other official and public functions. It usually had the door at one end and a slightly raised platform and an apse at the other, where the magistrate or other officials were seated. The basilica was centrally located in every Roman town, usually adjacent to the main forum. Subsequently, the basilica was not built near a forum but adjacent to a palace and was known as a "palace basilica".

Apse Semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical vault or semi-dome

In architecture, an apse is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical vault or semi-dome, also known as an exedra. In Byzantine, Romanesque, and Gothic Christian church architecture, the term is applied to a semi-circular or polygonal termination of the main building at the liturgical east end, regardless of the shape of the roof, which may be flat, sloping, domed, or hemispherical. Smaller apses may also be in other locations, especially shrines.

St. Bernward's Church houses several sightworthy pieces of art. The Gothic retable showing various saints and the Coronation of the Virgin dates from 1430. [5] It originally stood in Trinitatishospital, a hospital which was founded in 1230 and destroyed in 1945. There is also a remarkable statue representing Saint Bernward holding a Bernward Cross in his hand. The golden Bernward Cross which was made about 1130 is one of the most famous items in the museum of the Cathedral of Hildesheim.

Gothic art Style of Medieval art developed in Northern France

Gothic art was a style of medieval art that developed in Northern France out of Romanesque art in the 12th century AD, led by the concurrent development of Gothic architecture. It spread to all of Western Europe, and much of Southern and Central Europe, never quite effacing more classical styles in Italy. In the late 14th century, the sophisticated court style of International Gothic developed, which continued to evolve until the late 15th century. In many areas, especially Germany, Late Gothic art continued well into the 16th century, before being subsumed into Renaissance art. Primary media in the Gothic period included sculpture, panel painting, stained glass, fresco and illuminated manuscripts. The easily recognizable shifts in architecture from Romanesque to Gothic, and Gothic to Renaissance styles, are typically used to define the periods in art in all media, although in many ways figurative art developed at a different pace.

Retable appendages placed on the mensa of an altar in a Christian church

A retable is a structure or element placed either on or immediately behind and above the altar or communion table of a church. At the minimum it may be a simple shelf for candles behind an altar, but it can also be a large and elaborate structure. A retable which incorporates sculptures or painting is often referred to as an altarpiece.

Coronation of the Virgin subject in Christian art

The Coronation of the Virgin or Coronation of Mary is a subject in Christian art, especially popular in Italy in the 13th to 15th centuries, but continuing in popularity until the 18th century and beyond. Christ, sometimes accompanied by God the Father and the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove, places a crown on the head of Mary as Queen of Heaven. In early versions the setting is a Heaven imagined as an earthly court, staffed by saints and angels; in later versions Heaven is more often seen as in the sky, with the figures seated on clouds. The subject is also notable as one where the whole Christian Trinity is often shown together, sometimes in unusual ways. Although crowned Virgins may be seen in Orthodox Christian icons, the coronation by the deity is not. Mary is sometimes shown, in both Eastern and Western Christian art, being crowned by one or two angels, but this is considered a different subject.

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Bernward Doors sculpture

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Bernward Column The Bernward Column (German: Bernwardssäule) also known as the Christ Column (German: Christussäule) is a Romanesque bronze column, made c. 1000 for St. Michaels Church in Hildesheim, Germany, and regarded as a masterpiece of Ottonian art.

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Rich Bernward Gospels

The Rich Bernward Gospels are a richly decorated evangeliary in the Hildesheim Cathedral Museum. It was a donation of Bernward, Bishop of Hildesheim, to his foundation St. Michael's, specifically for the altar to Mary in the crypt below the west choir, which was consecrated in 1015 and which he had designated as his tomb.

Bernward Monument

The Bernward Monument is a larger-than-life-sized bronze statue of Bishop Bernward of Hildesheim in the Domhof in Hildesheim. It was made by Ferdinand Hartzer in 1893 for the nine hundredth anniversary of St. Bernward's enthronement as Bishop of Hildesheim. On 7 September 2011, in the course of the renovations of Hildesheim Cathedral it was temporarily relocated to the garden of house 24, Domhof.

Gandersheim Conflict

The Great Gandersheim Conflict was a conflict between the Archbishops of Mainz and the Bishops of Hildesheim concerning the jurisdiction over Gandersheim Abbey. It lasted from 987 to 1030, during the reign of the Ottonian emperors Otto III and Henry II as well as of their Salian successor Conrad II.

Justus Wehmer was a German master builder of the Baroque era. He was the architect of the eighteenth century Hildesheim Cathedral and surrounding buildings. He was also responsible for the design of various town houses and manor houses in Westphalia.

References

  1. ↑ Jens-Uwe Brinkmann: Hildesheim - wie es war, p.68. Düsseldorf 1976.
  2. ↑ .Hermann Seeland: Zerstörung und Untergang Alt-Hildesheims, p.14. Hildesheim 1947.
  3. ↑ Herrmann Seeland: Im Weltkrieg zerstörte Kirchen und Wohlfahrtsanstalten im Bistum Hildesheim, p.27. Hildesheim 1948.
  4. ↑ Anker Twachtmann-Schlichter: Baudenkmale in Niedersachsen, p. 228. Hameln 2007.
  5. ↑ Hans Freter: Schatzkammer Hildesheim, p. 49. Hildesheim 1993.

Coordinates: 52°09′25″N9°56′57″E / 52.15694°N 9.94917°E / 52.15694; 9.94917

Geographic coordinate system Coordinate system

A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are often chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position and two or three of the numbers represent a horizontal position; alternatively, a geographic position may be expressed in a combined three-dimensional Cartesian vector. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation. To specify a location on a plane requires a map projection.

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