Buxheim Charterhouse
Monastery Buxheim is a former Carthusian monastery and today's branch of the Salesians of Don Bosco. It is located in the Upper Swabian Buxheim near Memmingen in Bavaria and belongs to the Diocese of Augsburg. The monastery was probably founded in 1100 as a collegiate, given in 1402 to the Carthusian convent of Maria Saal and used until 1812 as such. From 1548 it was the only Reichskartause of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation.
Today, parts of the monastery by the German Kartausenmuseum, by the Salesians of Don Bosco as well as from the adjacent high school be used as a boarding school and day care center. The monastery buildings are largely intact. In the monastery church is seen with the Buxheimer choir stalls one of the most expressive choir stalls of the Baroque.
- 2.1 monastery
- 2.2 monastery church
History
The town was founded in the 7th century AD by the Alemanni. They named their home after the creek with the Celtic name Bux, which feeds the Iller. In the 10th century gave Luitgard, probably the sister of Bishop Ulrich, the location of the Augsburg Cathedral. The donation was accompanied by the obligation to establish in Buxheim a collegiate for priests, which came into service in 1100. 1402 handed Propst Heinrich von Ellerbach the poor provost, who was standing at the edge of subsistence, the Carthusians. From the Grande Chartreuse, the order line, in 1406 received the Charterhouse the name Maria Saal. As a farming community with about 250 residents Buxheim fell under the jurisdiction of the Charterhouse. The monastery was with his possessions to the main employer for the population. In the confusion of the Peasants' War (1524 /25) the monastery residents had experienced the first looting of their otherwise cut off from the outside world hideaway. Escape -like they left their Charterhouse. Only two monks and two lay brothers lived in 1543 in the sprawling monastery complex.
Protestantism
The monastery was initially under the protection of the imperial city of Memmingen. Together with the Prior of Buxheim the city had held the lower courts. In the course of the Smalcald War ( 1546/47 ) occupied in 1546 the Protestant become imperial city of Memmingen, the monastery and told the Catholic celebration of Mass, the Divine Office and the wearing of religious clothing. Another Protestant coercive measure was the obligation to participate in Protestant sermons. The following year, the city was to abandon their hostile orden arrangements. At the Diet of Augsburg in 1548 reached the prior of the monastery, Dietrich Loher, the withdrawal of Memminger and the rank of direct imperial prelates. King Ferdinand turned the monastery under the protection of the Habsburgs and the Holy Roman Empire.
Secularization
Buxheim was until the secularization 1802/3 the only Reichskartause. 1803, the Charterhouse to the Count of Ostein, who had made the Convention, but no more novices were taken. The last monk died in 1860. Monastery 1809 fell by inheritance to the Count of Waldbott Bassenheim, who used the plant from 1812 onwards as a castle. In 1916 the state took over the building in 1926 it came into the possession of the Salesians. During the Second World War, part of the monastery was used by the staff of the NSDAP Reich leader Alfred Rosenberg. Also looted art was deposited there. 1947 the Salesians opened a boarding school, which marianum, which was converted in 1964 into a full-fledged high school.
Description
Monastery
After the takeover by the Carthusians, the economic situation has developed well, mid-15th century, the old Collegiate extended to 1516 originated twenty-two monk houses along the cloister. Parts of the medieval monastery complex were transformed by the brothers carpenter from Wessobrunn in the style of Baroque and Rococo in the 18th century. Dominic and Johann Baptist Zimmermann designed to 1713, the monastery church, the refectory and the cloister, in 1727 the parish church next to the monastery and 1738-1741, the St. Anne's Chapel in the cloister of the monastery. The monastery included several outbuildings and fish ponds.
Abbey
The monastery church of St. Mary is a Baroque hall church. The priest chancel was probably built in the 13th century, grown the brothers choir in 1450. The largest church treasury is the baroque choir stalls, the Ignaz Waibl created in the years 1687-1691. Between 1709 and 1711 in Baroque style was carried on, with the brothers Zimmermann received the orders and ran. After the secularization of priests choir served the Counts of Bassenheim as grave church. The Free State of Bavaria acquired in 1916 the church building. The Salesians of Don Bosco in 1955 received the right to use and began extensive renovations in the church. With the return of the stalls began the restoration measures in the 80s of the 20th century.