Marburg: a University Town, Saint Elisabeth's Final Resting Place and the Brothers Grimm

Before we went to Marburg, its appeal for us was two attractions:

• as the place where the Brothers Grimm were professors at the university and,
• the Elisabethkirche, the church built on the grave of St. Elizabeth.

Before we left, we had added a third attraction:

• the picturesque town on the hill
  

We started by getting an overview of the town by going to a look-out point on the hill on the opposite side of the Lahn river. On the hill is a tower built during Germany's Romantic period by a guy of the name Spiegel. The locals call the tower the Spiegelslustturm (literally, Spiegel's passion tower, where "passion" is used in the sense of enjoyment).  From here you can see both the Elisabethkirche and the Landgrave's Palace looking over the town.

We rode a bus up the hill to the Landgrave's Palace.  The ride was a bit nerve-racking, even as as the driver slowly  drove up the steep and narrow streets. Sometimes it seemed like the bus was going to start slipping backwards down the hill!

 The Landgrave's Palace was built in many stages. It started as a castle in the late 800s, and in 911 it belonged to Konrad I, the first Frankish king of East Francia (i.e., Germany) not a member of Charlemagne's descendants.

 It was expanded in four phases over the centuries until it was converted to a palace during the Renaissance period (when castles were becoming obsolete).

It was expanded in two more phases since then, and today it is a museum.

We walked down the hill through the old town below the palace. This was the nicest surprise of the trip. The old town is the site of the old city hall, the old university, and many half-timbered buildings. We started with Kaffee und Kuchen (coffee and cake) at Bückingsgarten, which is perched just below the castle and looks out over the town.

Terrace of the Bückingsgarten

Half-timbered buildings in the old town

Old City Hall

Impressive building on the old city market square

We found a building with a plaque stating that Martin Luther stayed here. He must have been very influential, because the university is the oldest protestant university in the world, founded in 1527 during Luther's lifetime. We also found the building where Jacob Grimm lived. The brothers Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm also studied and were professors at the university here, making the city a popular stop on the German Fairy Tale Road. The first ever winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine also studied here. The current university buildings were built between 1873 and 1891.

On our second day in Marburg we visited the Elisabethkirche. Who was Elizabeth? We have written about Elisabeth of Hungary in earlier blog posts. To recap, at the age of four, Elizabeth was brought to the court of the rulers of Thuringia in Wartburg, Germany, to be betrothed to Ludwg IV, Landgrave of Thuringia. She was raised by the Thuringian court, surrounded by the local language and culture. In 1221, at the age of fourteen, Elizabeth married Ludwig. In the spring of 1226, when Thuringia suffered floods, famine, and plague, Ludwig went to Italy to represent the Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II, at the Imperial Diet. Elizabeth, now nineteen years old, assumed control of affairs at home. When Elizabeth was 20, Ludwig died on his way to the sixth crusade, leaving their son Hermann ruler. Ludwig's brother, Heinrich Raspe, assumed regency, and Elizabeth left the Wartburg for Marburg.

the Elisabethkirche

Around 1223, when Elizabeth was sixteen, the priest and later inquisitor, Konrad von Marburg, was appointed as her confessor, and he had great influence over Elizabeth. She began doing good works, such as distributing alms in all parts of their territory, even giving away state robes and ornaments to the poor. Below Wartburg Castle, she built a hospital with twenty-eight beds and visited the inmates daily to attend to them. After moving to Marburg, Elizabeth built another hospital. When she died, she was buried in the chapel of the hospital.

Grave of St. Elizabeth

Very soon after the death of Elizabeth in 1231, miracles were reported that happened at her grave, especially those of healing.  It was here in 1235, the year Elizabeth was canonized, that construction was started on the church by the Order of the Teutonic Knights. Although there were earlier Gothic churches in Germany, such as the one in Trier with a circular plan, the Elisabethkirche is the first Gothic hall church with a nave and two side aisles. The ceiling of the side aisles is the same height as the nave, which characteristic of German Gothic. Another characteristic is the height of the steeples, which took until 1340 to complete. At the crossing of the choirs is a beautiful rood screen.

Nave of the Elisabethkirche

 

The construction of a golden shrine was started in 1235 and ended in 1249 when the bones were moved from the grave to the shrine. The shrine is a masterpiece of the goldsmiths’ art, and it is still the greatest treasure of the Church. The shrine was decorated with over 850 pearls and precious stones, of which three dozen precious stones from the Mediterranean region and the near east were had carved reliefs. (Under Napoleon, 117 stones, a crucifix, and various parts of figures went missing.) The shrine also has exceptionally fine filigree figures and scenes.The long sides show the 12 apostles, and the roof shows 8 reliefs from the life of Elizabeth. Each side has a gable roof with either Jesus, Mary, or Elizabeth. Elizabeth's shrine became one of the main German centers of pilgrimage of the 14th century and early 15th century. It seems to be as large as the shrine of the three kings in the Cologne cathedral!

Elizabeth's shrine

The cult around the relics of Elisabeth was outlawed by her descendant Landgrave Philipp during the Reformation. However, the church was able to keep its relics because it belonged to the Order of Teutonic Knights, which was in turn answerable to the Holy Roman Emperor. In order to drive the pilgrims out of Marburg, the Landgrave allowed the shrine to be broken open on the 18th May 1539 and the bones to be removed. The chief of the Teutonic Knights protested against this, and he insisted that the Statthalter (Governor for the Landgrave) scatter the remains in the Pilgrims’ Cemetery of the Michelchen Church near the Elisabeth Church. But the Governor hid them in his moated fort in Wommen. In 1547, Philipp was arrested by the Emperor after a defeat in the Schmalkalden war. Philipp was able to use the bones of Elisabeth as a ‘bargaining chip’ to secure his release. He ordered that the bones be transferred to Marburg where, after a short stay, they were transported in 1558 to the chapel of the Elisabethine in Vienna.

There is also some beautiful medieval stained glass in the choir of the church. The Elisabeth window is among them. It represents scenes from the legend of St. Elisabeth. One of the best-known legends says that she used to go down the hill to the town bringing bread from the castle to give to the poor. She would hide the basket of bread under her cloak. Once, her husband, who in this version of the story did not approve of her sharing the wealth, demanded to know what was under her cloak. When she opened her cloak, the basket was filled with roses. 

In another legend, she cared for the poor and sick in the castle, even caring for a leper in her own bed. When her husband heard of this, he was upset, running to her bedroom to throw the poor leper out. When he got there, there was only a crucifix in the bed, and he was forced to admit, "Such a guest is always welcome". 

Elisabeth's story and legends are what make the local history interesting. You might remember the story of Empress Kunigunde, the wife of Emperor Heinrich II, who reigned around 1000 AD, who founded the Bishopric of Bamberg and had the Bamberg Cathedral built, just a half-hour's train ride north of us. Empress Kunigunde was also said to have performed miracles during her lifetime. She was worshiped as a saint, and her relics and a tomb depicting her miracles are displayed in the Bamberg Cathedral.

Americans in the US might have folk-tales and tall tales, but there are very few legends about historic women who were so revered as to have generated stories about their supposed sainthood. It is the centuries of recorded history that make the culture so rich here in Europe. The way Christianity formed layers that built on the pagan traditions that existed in Europe prior to 600 AD, gradually becoming more and more orthodox as time went on, is fascinating to learn about. 

Surrounding the Elisabethkirche are other buildings that belonged to the Order of Teutonic Knights.

Deutsches Haus

 

Mineralogy Museum

The oldest university building was impressive. It was actually built in the Gothic style in the 1500s. You know how many American universities have neo-Gothic architecture? They all want to look like this building.

One last mention of the Brothers Grimm. Throughout the city, there is a trail with stations presenting sculptures that represent the stories that the Brothers Grimm collected. As we took a short cut through the old botanical garden, we stopped by a pond that had a fountain merrily splashing away. The picturesque pond had lily pads, and on the lily pads, small fuzzy birds with long legs were skipping from one to the other, peeping as they went. It turned out that the mommy and daddy birds were on shore, while the kids amused themselves in the water. Floating on the pond was a silver fish. The fish represents the Grimms' tale of the fisherman and his wife. The fisherman caught the fish, who granted wishes for the fisherman's wife. She wished herself into a palace because she wanted to live like the emperor, and then decided that it would be better to live like the pope, made the wish, and ended up back in the fisherman's hut. 

Naumburg Cathedral: Mysterious Master Sculptor

There is a new World Heritage Site north of us in Thuringen (Thuringia). Last year, UNESCO added the Cathedral at Naumburg to its list of World Heritage sites.

Naumburg Cathedral is known for its architecture, sculptures and images, and according to the supporting scientists, it is "a unique testimony to medieval art and liturgy. The harmonic connection between architecture,
sculpture and stained glass windows in the west choir of the cathedral counts among
the most impressive creations of human creativity in the Middle Ages at large.″

East Choir Screen

When Naumburg was nominated to the UNESCO list, the documents said that the choir screens were especially worth preserving.

West Choir Screen

"It is the only Cathedral illustrating in two almost completely preserved choir screen structures from the first half of the 13th century the profound changes in religious practice, perception, and in the reflection of nature and in science observation in the figurative arts. The workshop organization of sculptors and stonemasons which was likely established in the early 13th century and is known under the name of the “Naumburg Master” constitutes one of the decisive conveyors and pioneers of the ground-breaking innovations in architecture and sculpture of the Late Hohenstaufen period in the 2nd half of the 13th century that were first developed at Reims Cathedral and have been lost in other places. The quality of the Naumburg Master’s work has since justified Naumburg’s reputation far beyond its region."

The screen of the east choir is late  Romanesque, and the screen of the west choir is Gothic. The interior of the west choir and its screen were the work of the Naumburg Master, so-called because nobody today knows his name. But his artwork is among the most important of the European Middle Ages. He and his workshop traveled across Europe from Reims around 1225, to Metz in the Holy Roman Empire, and around 1230 he was in Mainz to work on the Cathedral. From there he traveled to Naumburg and worked from about 1245-1250 until construction was finished in 1257. Everywhere the Naumburg Master worked he left behind recognizable art. Other famous Gothic artists, like Tilman Riemenschneider, who lived later and worked around 1500, produced wonderful, but stylized, figures (see our blog). His wooden statue of St. Elisabeth in the Neuenburg Castle (see our blog) is very beautiful and also stylized.  But the Master of Naumburg made very realistic sculptures in the mid 1200s.

 The reliefs along the top of the west screen are more like statues; they are carved from one piece of stone. They depict scenes from the passion of Christ. At the passage through the west screen is a statue of Christ crucified.  On the sides of the passage are statues of Mary and John. The statue of St. John is especially expressive, as you can see in the photo.

Scenes from the passion of Christ

 

St. John on right side of passage

Entrance to west choir

Inside the west choir are the twelve monumental donor portraits that are considered his masterpieces. The most famous are the statues of Uta and her husband Ekkehard II of Meissen (today the city where the first porcelain was produced in Germany). Legend has it that the figure of Uta, with her high collar and medieval head covering, was an inspiration for the Disney portrayal of the evil queen in Snow White.

West choir screen from inside the choir 

Ekkehard II and Uta

Most churches, however old they are, no longer have choir, or "rood", screens. The "rood" refers to the cross that was typically depicted on the congregation side of the screen. Choir screens were meant to hide the altar from the lay person's view, making the ceremony of the mass even more mysterious. After the council of Trent ended in 1563, they were removed from Catholic churches as part of the Counter-Reformation. It is amazing that these screens survived. It is probably due in part to the neglect that churches suffered under the East German communist regime that such architecture survived.

Underneath the late-Romanesque nave is a high-Romanesque crypt, which
"is characterised by its high-quality architectural decoration. The palmette cushion capitals rank among the most beautiful examples of their kind in the Central European area. With the High Romanesque crucifix placed on the well preserved Godehard altar of the crypt (3rd quarter of the 12th century) an impressive furnishing piece complements the built Romanesque structure".
The crypt represents the oldest stone structure on the site.

Wittenberg: Luther the rebel

We went to Wittenberg over Easter, 2017. We decided to go now because this year is the 500th anniversary of the start of the reformation, when the legend says that Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the door of the church.

Statue of Martin Luther on Market Square in Wittenberg

Martin Luther was born in 1483 as the son of a miner. In 1501, he began his studies at the University of Erfurt. Four years later, he completed his Masters degree and then began studying law. In 1505, Luther became an Augustinian monk in Erfurt. Two years later, he became a priest. In 1512, Luther earned his doctorate in theology, and he became a professor at the University of Wittenberg.

Cast-iron door with the 95 theses

Martin Luther did not intend to cause a split in the Catholic Church; he wanted to reform the church. Luther was angry about the sale of indulgences, but he never intended to question the church or the pope. In fact, Luther wrote to  Archbishop Albrecht of Mainz  on October 31, 1517, asking for an academic debate on the issue.  He prepared a collection of 95 arguments and points of criticism as a basis for the debate, his 95 theses. Because Luther wasn't a revolutionary, he is sometimes called the last medieval​ man. 

But Luther is also called the first modern man, because his principles were based on humanist philosophy. His Reformation called on people to take responsibility for their own conscience, and so the function of clergy as a link between the believer and God was unnecessary. The thoughts and actions of every Christian were no longer under the authority of the ecclesiastical hierarchy. This was revolutionary.

Luther questioned how God could be only a a judge who punished every wrong deed. He pondered this until he had a realization that God must be a loving God, not a punishing one. Luther's problem with indulgences was that he saw God also as a father who loves the people he created and who sent his son to pay the price for the sin that was separating them from him.

Through his study of the Bible, Martin Luther developed four key theological pillars. The first is the Holy Scripture. He saw the Bible as the only benchmark of truth, while the Church at the time also relied on additional texts written by the pope and the synod.Secondly, salvation only comes through God's grace and not by good works. This belief made the selling of indulgences obsolete.
Thirdly, Luther concluded that Jesus Christ, through his death on the cross, which paid the penalty for all sin, is the only bridge between humanity and God.
Finally, we are saved by faith alone, believed Luther. Consequentially, the Church lost its power with Luther's teachings and its hierarchies began to crumble. While his work is indeed revolutionary, Luther himself believed he was simply reinstating old, forgotten principles rather than expressing new and unwelcome beliefs.
Luther probably became famous because the theses critical of the church were printed on a leaflet that was in circulation.
Luther was not the first to translate the Bible but he was the first to use the Greek original as the source text instead of the Latin translation. He translated the historical text with great linguistic skill, poeticism and imagery.

Because everyone was responsible for his own conscience, everyone had to be able to read the Bible, and so everyone had to be able to read. This included girls. More information is available at the following link:

http://www.spindleworks.com/library/rfaber/luther_edu.htm

It's just below the surface

 "The need for [pagan] ritual goes deep," Silvia said.  "But it’s also just below the surface," I said.

Scratch the surface of a German and you find a pagan who loves trees, being in the woods and mountains and who loves processions that take place in the dark by torchlight. Hunting has its own rituals associated with honoring the game animals. When a house is built, the first roof support erected is decorated with a branch from an evergreen tree. A German is very close to his pagan roots, as we saw one evening at the “Perchtentreiben.” (roughly pronounced pairk-ten-try-ben) See the Wikipedia article on  Pre-Christian Alpine Traditions.

The Perchtentreiben traditionally takes place between Christmas and the New Year. The Perchten represent devils who are driven out as a way of getting rid of the evils of the old year and of this indeterminate “time between the years.” (see note below)

The roots of the Perchten tradition are not clear, but in recent years, it has become connected with the Krampus, a demonic-looking character who accompanies St. Nicholas as he visits the children, scaring and punishing those who have been bad. The feast of St. Nicholas is celebrated Dec. 6 and is a real tradition here; the children put out their shoes so “der Nikolaus” can fill them with treats.

At a Christmas market in a small town on the first weekend of Advent, we gathered around a roped-off area in the middle of which a fireplace had been set up. A stage occupied one end of the enclosure.

The performance soundtrack started with a passage from the book of Genesis, “The world was without form and the dark was upon the deep, and God said let there be light.” Flames leaped up in the central fire ring. Saint Nicholas, with a long beard and a wise face, wearing his crimson bishop’s robes with mitre and crosier, entered with angels dressed in white, processed around the circle and took their place on the stage.

As the music turned darker, the voice changed to a deep demonic one speaking Latin and saying “Lucifer, great devil,…”. Smoke came from the side of the stage and finally, the lead devil made his entrance. As he stalked around the circle, he carried a staff with a horned animal skull on it (and a sign displaying the name of the group).

 The Perchten, or devils, appeared with impressively fearsome masks with huge horns, wearing ragged robes of furs, and bundles of long hair covering their lower legs so that you could imagine there were actually hooves underneath. 









Some of the figures had red or blue lights in their eyes. All had wild, long hair. Some of them clanked as they entered the circle – they had huge bells tied to the backs of their belts with chains hanging from the belt so that the bells clanked as they moved. The music changed to a heavy-metal soundtrack. They threatened and leered at the onlookers as they entered, pausing to put a clawed hand on top of a pretty girl’s head so that she screamed, or knock a hat off. 

Some of them represented witches, with hooked noses and broomsticks. As the witches surrounded the fire in the middle, they dipped wands in the fire and opened them out to flaming fans. They danced with these, gracefully and slowly, while still moving threateningly. 

A fire breather entered the ring dressed in a dark monk’s robe. More of the devils entered, some with whips made of bundles of horse hair. These they beat on the ground as they mimed fighting with each other. Others moved menacingly around the circle, running toward the onlookers as if to attack and sliding onto their knees at the feet of the spectators. As they stalked around the circle, they reached into the crowd, even into the second and third rows of spectators. Those who thought they were safe were no longer! I was standing behind two other people, but I took off my hat in case they decided to reach in to grab me! The fire breather circled and crossed the area, coming ever closer and breathing his fire just above the heads of the crowd. 

The devils continued circling, clanking, glaring and dancing as one of them used his staff to create a ring of fire on the ground. Some of them gathered around this ring to perform. Then, the church bells started to ring, and St. Nicholas and his angels left the stage to drive the devils off. 

A cage on wheels containing a child-sized devil (or a child?) came from off-stage and into the circle as the devils followed St. Nicholas away. The Ave Maria started to play, the flames went out. Peace was restored, and the spectacle was over. 

The crowd broke up, but a few minutes later, the MC announced that the devils and St. Nicholas would assemble on the stage for pictures. The spell was broken, but it was great fun to be able to see the fantastic masks and costumes up close as St. Nicholas and all the devils assembled. They got a round of applause and, as they made their way out again, paused for pictures with members of the crowd. 

You can see lots of good pictures on the devils' website: Oberpfälzer Schlossteufel

 A highly personal Interpretation

It was a communal rite, watching the forces of darkness with their fearsome faces cavort, fight with each other and leer at the bystanders. Who says that the gods, or forces of nature, aren’t capricious devils? The Old Testament god of the Hebrews was certainly capricious and displayed his might frequently through forces of nature. 

Why do these creatures who represent evil fascinate us so? Because they still have power inside us. Sometimes they are our gods: vanity, lust, pride, irrational and selfish behavior. Silvia said that people need these representations; what are depression and anxiety and panic but our personal demons? On the other hand, they are of the earth, their terrifying faces carved out of trees that grow in the earth, their robes are animal skins, their horns and fangs remind us of predators. We are also of the earth, and not so far removed from the animals biologically. They are eventually driven out by the forces of light to the strains of church bells and the Ave Maria, but we miss them with their fascinating earthiness and passionate behavior. They are also our avatars.

Are they really evil? “For there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” – Shakespeare, Hamlet. You can’t have the light without the dark.

Another thing I posit is that Christianity, especially in the Middle Ages, was a religion centered on aspirations toward a paradisical heaven and the afterlife. “Rejoice and be glad for your reward is great in heaven.” (Really? Do I have to wait until then?) The pleasures and temptations of the flesh were to be denied and denigrated. But we still need to cherish our connection to the earth that supports us and not deny and ignore it. 

Another thing I have concluded is that, in comparison to polytheistic cultures, which have many stories about the gods, the Christians only have one great mythological story, and that’s not enough. It’s like only being able to see one movie in your whole life and having to base your life on that. We need to acknowledge that other stories can be just as powerful and just as valuable in our lives.

The power of these performances is proved when, every year, various church officials protest against these events and encourage their faithful not to participate, even seeking to have the events banned. 

Christians have been brought up to look upon the rites of non-Christian peoples as quaint and meaningless at best: the Hopi Kachina dances, or the Chinese New Year festivals, or the Tibetan festivals with the various demons and gods represented by people in costume. But the Perchtentreiben showed me that even we (nominal) Christians still need to be thrilled by a ritual representing the conflict of the forces of light and darkness. Christians, especially in Germany, are only Christians on the surface. You only need to scratch the surface to find the pagan thirsty for the old rites.

Historical Context (again, highly subjective and personal)

We European descendants in America have no pagan roots in the New World. The Christianity handed down to us by our New World ancestors is relatively pure, relatively free of local pagan influences. The heathen origin of such festivals as Christmas and Easter are legends to us Americans. Because I grew up in such a context, it was easy to believe it when we were taught that Christianity was something new and superior to all else in the world, unaffected by what came before it; that it sprang directly from the teachings of Jesus. (With some accounting for the Jewish civilization in which context Christianity developed 2000 years ago.) There was no locally influenced inflection of Christianity. In other words, for the descendants of Europeans in the Americas, Christianity was not overlaid on any local pagan tradition.

The point I want to make is about the contrast between the Christianity handed down in the New World and Christianity as a veneer over the surface of the pagan traditions here in Germany. The Germanic tribes converted to Christianity between 600 and 800 AD, relatively recently in comparison with the countries occupied by Rome. There was almost no Roman influence north of the Danube and east of the Rhine. Before the Germanic tribes overran the Empire in the 5^th century AD, the Romans had resigned themselves to allowing the German tribes to be German. In the Scandinavian countries (also with Germanic roots) and Slavic countries, the conversion came even later and more slowly. In all these countries, the early churches are decorated with artwork exhibiting a very pagan influence . In Germany, a visit to an early Romanesque-style church reveals such symbols as “Green men” and various devils depicted in the stone work. The stonemasons were still referencing images that the newly converted could understand.

For more on converting the Germans to Christianity and other pagan traditions that are maintained here in Germany, see Richard’s blog Life in Germany.

Summary

The traditions of pagan Germany are still alive in some form in spite of Christianity because the Germanic tribes and their Celtic predecessors have been living  continuously in central Europe for millennia. In many cases, old traditions, including the Perchtentreiben, have been revived, some relatively recently. With the steep decline in church attendance in this country, the old rites and sacred places, however altered, are experiencing a revival of importance.

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Note: It is a very common pagan belief that the ambiguity and uncertainty of the time between the years thins the barriers between worlds and allows the evil spirits to come out – Halloween is based on this very thing. In the Celtic calendar, the new year began on November 1, and the evening before, evil spirits were thought to walk the earth.