A wayside cross is a cross by a footpath, track or road, at an intersection, along the edge of a field or in a forest. It can be made of wood, stone or metal. Stone crosses may also be conciliation crosses. Often they serve as waymarks for walkers and pilgrims or designate dangerous places. [1]
Wayside crosses spread mainly in the 17th century in Italy. [2] Most of them were erected in previous centuries by the local population as a sign of their faith. Several of them were put up at places where an accident or a crime took place. The custom of placing an "accident cross" at spots on the roadside where people have been killed has, meanwhile, spread worldwide. Special forms of cross are the conciliation cross and the plague cross. Many wayside crosses, however, simply act as waymarks to indicate difficult or dangerous spots or to mark intersections. On walking maps, wayside crosses and shrines are displayed in order to aid orientation. On many crosses there is an inscription which may indicate why the cross was erected and by whom.
In some regions wayside crosses are mostly made of wood (e. g. in the Alps). They vary in size from small, inconspicuous crosses to great crosses hewn from stout beams. On many crosses, a skillfully carved figure of Jesus Christ is displayed. In many cases, when a wooden cross became rotten or dilapidated over the decades, it was restored or replaced with a new one on the same spot.
In many regions of Europe, wayside crosses are made of stone, and consequently last much longer. That said, many such stone crosses in the Rhineland region of Germany were lost during French occupation (1794–1814), because wayside crosses were banned in the wake of the strict secularisation that was imposed. Only a few crosses were able to be hidden by the local population and thus avoid destruction. Originally these stone crosses were short and stocky in shape and, with a height of about half a metre, considerably smaller than their wooden counterparts. In the 19th century (at least in the Rhineland) much larger stone crosses were put up.
By the North Loop of the Nürburgring racing circuit in Germany there was a centuries-old stone cross called the Schwedenkreuz ("Swedish Cross").
In 1594, the fortress city of Raab (present day Győr in Hungary) was recaptured from Ottoman Empire by Baron Adolf von Schwarzenberg. In commemoration, the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II decreed that crucifixes be set up on all the main roads and crossing points of the empire, bearing the inscription: "Praise and thanks to the Lord God". Some of those that survive in Austria and Germany are known as Raaberkreuze ("Raab cross") or Türkenkreuz ("Turk's cross"). [3]
In the UK a large number of medieval examples survive, rarely with a medieval cross, but often with an octagonal base and truncated or missing shaft. All are Grade II as listed buildings. They were used for travelers to pray at for a safe journey. There are two in Ashton Keynes, Wiltshire, one of which is beside the river Thames, presumably because it is a good route to Oxford and London. Two more medieval relics there are: a preaching cross and a central or market cross.
In Münsterland in north Germany, crosses called Hofkreuze ("farmyard crosses") may be found. They belong to farms and usually stand by a public right of way near the farm entrance. Votive crosses are erected by people in gratitude for being rescued from death, such as war, sickness, infection or other life-threatening danger. Other so-called "weather crosses" or "hail crosses" were set up to ward off natural disasters or extreme weather.
Hesse or Hessia, officially the State of Hesse, is a state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt, which is also the country's principal financial centre. Two other major historic cities are Darmstadt and Kassel. With an area of 21,114.73 square kilometers and a population of over six million, it ranks seventh and fifth, respectively, among the sixteen German states. Frankfurt Rhine-Main, Germany's second-largest metropolitan area, is mainly located in Hesse.
Marburg is a university town in the German federal state of Hesse, capital of the Marburg-Biedenkopf district. The town area spreads along the valley of the river Lahn and has a population of approximately 76,000.
The Externsteine is a distinctive sandstone rock formation located in the Teutoburg Forest, near the town of Horn-Bad Meinberg in the Lippe district of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The formation is a tor consisting of several tall, narrow columns of rock which rise abruptly from the surrounding wooded hills.
Brixen is a town and commune in South Tyrol, northern Italy, located about 40 kilometres (25 mi) north of Bolzano.
Ashton Keynes is a village and civil parish in north Wiltshire, England which borders with Gloucestershire. The village is about 5 miles (8 km) south of Cirencester and 3.5 miles (5.6 km) west of Cricklade. At the 2011 census the population of the parish, which includes the hamlet of North End, was 1,400.
A hall church is a church with a nave and aisles of approximately equal height. In England, Flanders and the Netherlands, it is covered by parallel roofs, typically, one for each vessel, whereas in Germany there is often one single immense roof. The term was invented in the mid-19th century by Wilhelm Lübke, a pioneering German art historian. In contrast to an architectural basilica, where the nave is lit from above by the clerestory, a hall church is lit by the windows of the side walls typically spanning almost the full height of the interior.
Steeple Ashton is a village and civil parish in Wiltshire, England, 3 miles (4.8 km) east of Trowbridge.
Minety (/'maɪn.tiː/) is a village in north Wiltshire, England, between Malmesbury – 6 miles (9.7 km) to the west – and Swindon. It takes its name from the water mint plant found growing in ditches around the village, and has previously been known as Myntey. It has a primary school and a successful rugby club.
Klotten is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Cochem-Zell district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Cochem, whose seat is in the like-named town. It is a winemaking centre.
A calvary is a type of monumental public Christian cross, sometimes encased in an open shrine. Usually a calvary has three crosses, that of Jesus Christ and those of impenitent thief and penitent thief.
A wayside shrine is a religious image, usually in some sort of small shelter, placed by a road or pathway, sometimes in a settlement or at a crossroads, but often in the middle of an empty stretch of country road, or at the top of a hill or mountain. They have been a feature of many cultures, including Chinese folk religious communities, Catholic and Orthodox Europe and some Asian regions.
Conciliation cross, also known as roadside cross or penitence cross, is a stone cross, which was set up in a place where a murder or accident had happened. It occurs mainly in Central Europe.
All Saints Church was built around 1250 at Leigh, north Wiltshire, England, and was originally on a site half a mile to the north of its current location. In 1896, the nave, porch and bell tower were moved from their original location and a new church was built, which is now Grade II* listed. The chancel and the east gable of the old nave remain in the old churchyard as All Saints Chancel.
A summit cross is a Christian cross on the summit of a mountain or hill that marks the top. Often there will be a summit register (Gipfelbuch) at the cross, either in a container or other weatherproof case.
A cave castle or grotto castle is a residential or refuge castle that has been built into a natural cave. It falls within the category of hill castles. Unlike other types, such castles can only be assaulted from the front, or by drilling through the rock above; the gateway is usually located in the middle of a rock face, which makes it much more difficult to penetrate. Archaeological discoveries have revealed that caves were used as places of refuge as early as the Stone Age. The first medieval cave castles emerged in the 11th and 12th centuries. In the 14th and 15th centuries this type became more widespread, especially in certain parts of France and Switzerland.
The basalt cross is a particular type of stone cross found in the Eifel mountains of Germany, bearing witness to the piety of the local population in times past. These crosses indicate their beliefs as well as the wealth and standing of the people who erected them. Details such as accidents, occupations and prayer requests have survived, thanks to the extremely weather-resistant material of which the crosses are made. Their geographic distribution is centred on the basalt quarries of Mayen and Mendig, and covers an area with a radius of approximately 30 kilometres between the Rhine, Ahr and Moselle rivers. The exact number of monuments is not known. Local historian, Kurt Müller-Veltin, estimates that there are about 4,500 wayside crosses and about 6,000 grave crosses. The conservation of these monuments is undertaken by the Rhenisch Society for Monument Conservation.
Stone crosses in Central Europe are usually bulky Christian monuments, some 80–120 cm (31–47 in) high and 40–60 cm (16–24 in) wide, that were almost always hewn from a single block of stone, usually granite, sandstone, limestone or basalt. They are amongst the oldest open-air monuments. A larger variant of the stone cross, with elements of a wayside shrine is called a shaft cross (Schaftkreuz).
The Marienstiftskirche is a Lutheran three-aisled hall church in Lich, Middle Hesse, Germany. It was built between 1510 and 1537, making it the last Late Gothic hall church to be built in Hesse. The architectural style straddles the transition between Gothic and Renaissance. It is a Hessian heritage site and contains objects of national art historical significance. The neighbouring Stadtturm, with its historic triple peal serves as a clocktower for the Marienstiftskirche.
The Civic Archives in Bozen-Bolzano are the municipal archive of the city of Bolzano in South Tyrol, Italy. They are located in the old town hall and store documents from over 700 years of civic and regional history.
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