Coat of Arms, Laach
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ANDERNACH AND SINZIG
Andernach
Andernachis one of the oldest cities in the Rhine valley, and grew up out of one of Drusus's camps, which was built here when the town was known asAntonacum.
This was its early history, as given by Ammien Marcellin; and a later authority mentions it as the second city of the electorate of Trèves (Die Andre Darnach).
In the records of Drusus's time, there is a reference to a château here, which was the fiftieth he had built upon the banks of the Rhine.
The kings of Austrasia had their palace here as well, so the place became a political and strategic city of very nearly the first rank.
In the middle ages Andernach shone brilliantly among the centres of commerce in the Rhine valley.
Charles V. was responsible for a battle between{200}the inhabitants of Linz and those of Rhieneck and Andernach, in which nearly all the latter were massacred.
To soften any hard feeling that might still exist, a sermon was always preached, up to the last century, in the market-place, on St. Bartholomew's Day, urging the people to forgive their enemies. The records tell, however, that on one occasion an unfortunate inhabitant of Linz was discovered in Andernach, and that he was forthwith put to death in most unchristianlike fashion.
GENERAL VIEW of ANDERNACHGENERAL VIEWof ANDERNACH
GENERAL VIEW of ANDERNACHGENERAL VIEWof ANDERNACH
GENERAL VIEWof ANDERNACH
The Gate of Coblenz at Andernach is generally regarded as an ancient Roman work, though not of the monumental order usual in works of its kind.
The present fortifications date from the fifteenth century, as does the picturesque watch-tower by the waterside.
With Andernach is identified the tradition of a Count Palatine, who, returning from the Holy Wars, was persuaded by a false friend that his lady had proved faithless; and, without listening to excuse, drove her forth to the woods. In the forest she found shelter with her youthful son, lodging in caves and living on fruits and herbs for many years. One day her husband, having lost his companions in{201}the chase, came by accident upon her place of concealment. The wife of his bosom, carefully nurtured in her youth, but now living unattended in the wilds, and his son, now grown into a fine youth, excited his pity. Listening to the truth, he took home the innocent victims of perfidy, and retaliated upon the traducer by hanging him from the highest tower of his castle. After her death, the countess became St. Genofeva, and is the patroness of the parish church of St. Genevieve, which is a lofty structure with four towers which rise high above the surrounding buildings in a fashion which would be truly imposing were the church less overornamented in all its parts.
The actual foundation of the church dates from Carlovingian times, and a tenth-century church is visibly incorporated into the present fabric, but in the main the present structure is of the thirteenth century.
The façade, as is the case with most of the Romano-Byzantine churches on the Rhine, is flanked by two fine towers, showing some slight traces of the incoming ogival style.
Flanking the apside are two other towers, somewhat heavier and thoroughly Romanesque in motive.
The southern doorway is surrounded by a{202}series of remarkably elaborate and excellent sculptures, showing delicate foliage, birds, and human figures disposed after the best manner of the Romanesque. The northern doorway is decorated in a similar manner, with an elaborate grouping of two angels and the paschal lamb in the tympanum. To the right of this portal is a curious coloured bas-relief set in the wall. It represents the death of the Virgin, and dates from the early sixteenth century.
The interior is divided into three naves by two ranges of pillars, square and very short. The arcades between the aisles and the nave are rounded, but the vaulting is ogival.
The second range of pillars forms an arcade quite similar to the lower one, but the pillars are of black marble. A modern balustrade, which has been added, is frightful in its contrast with the more ancient constructive details.
Above all are six windows on a side, which in plan and proportions resemble those of the side aisles.
The choir is in effect a cul-de-four, and is lighted by five windows placed rather high up. Below are a series of niches, in which are placed modern statues, about as bad as{203}can be imagined, even in these degenerate architectural times.
The gallery behind the second tier of columns is known as themannshaus, being intended for the male portion of the congregation, the women sitting below.
The pulpit came from the old abbey of Laach.
On the left of the grand nave is the tomb of a knight of Lahnstein, who died in 1541.
There is another legend connected with Andernach which may well be recounted here.
One day, during the minority of the Emperor Henry IV., the tutors of the prince, the proud Archbishop Annon of Cologne and the Palatine, Henry the Furious, held a meeting with certain other seigneurs at Andernach. The same day the inhabitants of Güls, a village near Coblenz, lodged a complaint before the Palatine concerning the exactions of the provost of their village. This last, himself, followed the deputies, magnificently clothed and mounted upon a richly caparisoned horse, counting upon his presence to counteract the impression they might make. Among the collection of wild beasts which had been gathered together for the amusement of the princes{204}was a ferocious bear. When the provost passed near him, the animal sprang upon him and tore him to pieces, whereupon it was supposed that the venerable archbishop had exercised a divine power, and delivered up the oppressor to the fury of a wild beast. Like most of the Rhine legends, it is astonishingly simple in plot, and likewise has a religious turn to it, which shows the great respect of the ancient people of these regions toward their creed.
Sinzig
Between Andernach and Bonn is the tiny city of Sinzig, famous for two things,—its charmingly disposed parish church and the wines of Assmanhaus.
The town was the ancient Sentiacum of the Romans, constructed in all probability by Sentius, one of the generals of Augustus.
The church at Sinzig, in company with St. Quirinus at Neuss, has some of the best mediæval glass in Germany.
This small, but typically Rhenish, parish church has also a series of polychromatic decorations which completely cover its available wall space.
There is a vividness about them which may be pleasing to some, but which will strike many as being distinctly unchurchly.
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Sinzig
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As a Christian edifice, the church at Sinzig, with its central tower and spire, is only remarkable as typifying the style of Romano-ogival architecture which developed so broadly in the Rhine valley at the expense of the purer Gothic.{208}
TRÈVES
Southwesterlyfrom Coblenz, between the Rhine and Metz, is Trèves, known by the Germans as Trier. Situated at the southern end of a charming valley, which more or less closely follows the banks of the Moselle, it has the appearance of being a vast park with innumerable houses and edifices scattered here and there through the foliage. The city contains many churches, of which the cathedral of St. Pierre et Ste. Hélène is the chief.
At one time theAugusta Trevirorumof the Romans was "the richest, the most fortunate, the most glorious, and the most eminent of all the cities north of the Alps," said an enthusiastic local historian.
The claim may be disputed by another whose civic pride lies elsewhere, but all know that Trèves, as the flourishing capital of theGaulois belges, actually rivalled Rome itself.{209}
Augustus established a Roman colony here with its own Senate, and many of the Roman emperors of the long line which followed made it their residence during their sojourn in the north.
From the Augusta Trevirorum of the Romans, the city became in time, under the later Empire, Treviri, from which the present nomenclature of Trèves and Trier comes. It was one of the sixty great towns which were taken from the Romans by the Franks and the Alemanni.
The Roman bridge over the Moselle, built probably by Agrippa, existed until the wars of Louis XIV., in 1669, when it was blown up; and all that now remains of the original work are the foundations of the piers, which were built upon anew in the eighteenth century.
As a bishopric, and later as an archbishopric, the see is the most ancient in Germany, having been founded in 327 by the Empress Hélène.
In the twelfth century it became an archbishopric and an electorate, but during the fourteenth century, because of continual struggles between the municipality and the Church, the archbishops removed to Coblenz.{210}
In the cathedral rests the Holy Coat of Trèves, one of the most sacred relics of the Saviour extant, and supposedly the veritable garment worn by him at the crucifixion,—the seamless garment for which the soldiers cast lots (John xix. 23, 24).
When exposed to public view, which ceremony used to take place only once in thirty years, the holy robe is placed upon the high altar, which has previously been dressed for the occasion. The altar is approached by many steps on each side, and there are several steps at intervals in the aisles, so that the appearance of the long line of pilgrims on their way down the side aisles and up to the altar is most picturesque. As many as twenty thousand pilgrims are said to have paid their devotions to this relic in a single day. They come in processions of hundreds, and sometimes thousands; and are of all classes, but mostly peasants. The lame, the blind, and the sick are included in their ranks, and it is noticeable that the majority are women. They are constantly arriving, pouring in at several gates of the city in an almost continual stream, accompanied by priests, banners, and crosses, and alternately singing and praying. There are many of them heavily laden, their{211}packs on their backs, their bright brass pans, pitchers, and kettles of all shapes in their hands, or slung on their arms, while their fingers are busily employed with their beads. Wayworn and footsore, fatigued and hungry, they yet pursue their toilsome march, intent upon the attainment of the one object of their pilgrimage. It is curious and picturesque to see their long lines of processions in the open country, wending their slow way over the hills, and to hear their hymns, mellowed by distance into a pleasant sound across the broad Rhine. From Germany, Belgium, Holland, France, Hungary, and even Switzerland and Italy they come, and during the whole of their journeys the pilgrims sing and pray almost continually. The accomplishment of their pilgrimages entitles them, by payment of a small offering, to certain absolutions and indulgences. The pure-minded peasant girl seeks remission of sins, the foodless peasant a liberty to eat what the expenses of this pilgrimage will perhaps deprive him of the means of obtaining. The city is literally packed with pilgrims, and the scene in the market-place at nightfall is in the highest degree interesting and picturesque.
"The Holy Coat of Trèves" is a simple{212}tunic, apparently of linen or cotton, of a fabric similar to the closely woven mummy-cloth of the Egyptians. Undoubtedly it is of great antiquity, which many sacredreliquesmay or may not be, judging from their appearances. In appearance it is precisely the same as is that worn by the modern Arab.
This form of tunic, then, has come down from the ages with but little change in the fashions, and seems to be worn by all classes in the East. In colour the relic may originally have been blue, though now of course it is much faded; in fact, is a rusty brown.
The history of this holy robe, according to a Professor Marx, who wrote an account of it which had the approval of the Archbishop of Trèves, is authenticated as far back as 1157 by written testimony, it having been mentioned as then existing in the cathedral of Trèves by Frederick I. in a letter addressed to Hillen, Archbishop of Trèves in that year. Its earliest history depends wholly on tradition, which says that it was obtained by the Empress Hélène in the year 326, while in the Holy Land, whither she went for the express purpose of obtaining relics of our Saviour and his followers; that she gave it to the see of Trèves, and that it was deposited{213}in the cathedral of that city; that it was afterward lost, having been hidden in disturbed times within the walls of the cathedral, and rediscovered under the Archbishop John I., in 1196; that it was again hidden for the same reason, brought to light, and exposed to the wondering multitude in 1512, on the occasion of the famous Diet of Trèves, under the Emperor Maximilian. "Since this last epoch," says the author of the work already quoted, "the history of the Holy Robe has been often discussed, written, and sung, because it has been often publicly exposed, and at short intervals, whenever political troubles have not prevented."
At Trèves is an ancient tomb to Cardinal Ivo, with heavily sculptured capitals surmounting four small columns, whose pedestals are crouching lions. But for the crudity of the sculpture, and the weird beasts at its base, one might almost think the tomb a Renaissance work.
The cardinal died in 1142, and the work is unquestionably of the Romanesque period. It is reminiscent, moreover, of the southern portal of the Cathedral of Notre Dame of Embrun in the south of France; indeed, a drawing of one might well pass for the other{214}were it not labelled, though to be sure there is a distinct difference in detail.
Among the treasures of Trèves is a censer, one of the most elaborate ever devised. It is in the form of an ample bowl, with its cover worked in silver in the form of a church on the lines of a Greek cross. The device is most unusual, but rather clumsily ornate.
TRÈVES CATHEDRALTRÈVES CATHEDRAL
TRÈVES CATHEDRALTRÈVES CATHEDRAL
TRÈVES CATHEDRAL
There are two curious statues in the portal of Notre Dame; one representing the Church and the other the synagogue; the one with a clear, straightforward look in her eyes, the other blindfolded and with the crown falling from her head. The symbol is frequently met with, but the method of indicating the opposition of the new religious law to that of the old is, in these life-size statues, at Trèves, perhaps unique. The figures are somewhat mutilated, each lacking the arms, but in other respects they stand as originally conceived.
The cathedral of St. Pierre et Ste. Hélène is situated in the most elevated portion of the city, and, like the cathedral at Bonn, above Cologne, presents that curious pyramidal effect so often remarked in Rhenish churches.
There is no very great beauty in the outlines of this church, which is a curious jumble{215}of towers and turrets; but there are some very good architectural details, quite worthy of a more splendid edifice. Ste. Hélène, the mother of Constantine, herself placed the first stone in the easterly portion of the present church, a fact which was only discovered in the seventeenth century, when the foundations were being repaired. It is supposed originally to have been a part of the palace of the Empress Hélène, afterward converted into a house of God.
One notes in the interior a remarkably beautiful series of Corinthian columns with elaborately carved capitals of the eleventh century. In later years these have been flanked by supporting pillars which detract exceedingly from the beauty of the earlier forms.
In parts the edifice is frankly French Gothic, Byzantine, and what we know elsewhere as Norman,—a species of the Romanesque.
In 1717 the church suffered considerably by fire, but it was repaired forthwith, and to-day gives the effect of a fairly well cared for building of three naves and a double choir.
There are sixteen altars, some of which are{216}modern, and two organs, cased as usual in hideous mahogany.
PULPIT TRÈVES
The high altar and the pulpit are excellently sculptured, and there are some notable monuments to former archbishops and electors.{217}
Beneath the church are vast subterranean passages, and a great vault where repose the ancient regents of the province.
Architecturally, Trèves's other remarkable church (Notre Dame) quite rivals the cathedral itself in interest. It is one of the best examples of German mediæval architecture extant.
In the year 1227 when St. Gérêon's at Cologne, one of the earliest examples of ogival vaulting in Germany, was just finished, there was commenced the church of Notre Dame at Trèves. It was the first church edifice in Germany to consistently carry out the Gothic motive from the foundation stones upward.
For fifty years the well-defined Gothic had been knocking at the gateway which led from France into Germany, and at last it was to enter at a period when the cathedrals at Soissons and Laon had already established themselves as well-nigh perfect examples of the new style.
The first foundation stone was laid in 1227, and the work was completed in less than twenty years. The general plan is grandiose and it has a central cupola—replacing a tower which was in danger of subsiding—held aloft by twelve hardy columns, on which{218}are ranged in symmetrical order statues of the apostles.
The plan is unusual and resembles no Gothic structure elsewhere, hence may be considered as a type standing by itself.
The exterior shows little or nothing of the highly developed Gothic which awaits one when viewing the interior. There are no flying buttresses, the walls seemingly supporting themselves, and yet they are not clumsy. The piers of the chapel somewhat perform the functions of buttresses, and that perhaps makes possible the unusual arrangement.
The church of St. Gangolphe, on the market-place, has a singularly beautiful and very lofty tower, which gives to whoever has the courage to make its rather perilous ascent one of the most charming prospects of the valley of the Moselle possible to imagine.
The chief of Trèves's other churches are: the church of the Jesuits, since ceded to the Protestants; St. Gervais, which has a tomb to Bishop Hontheim, a most learned man and a great benefactor of Trèves in days gone by; St. Antoine; and St. Paul.
The country around Trèves, on the Moselle,—the famous Trèves Circle,—ranks high as a wine-growing region, though your true German{219}wine-drinker calls all Moselle wine "Unnosel Wein."
These wines of the Moselle are, to be sure, secondary to those of the vineyards of the Rhine and the Main, but the varieties are very numerous.
A Dutch burgomaster once bought of the Abbey of Maximinus—a famous wine-growing establishment as well as a religious community—a variety known as Gruenhaüser, in 1793, for eleven hundred and forty-four florins a vat of something less than three hundred gallons. It was known as the nectar of Moselle, and "made men cheerful, and did good the next day, leaving the bosom and head without disorder." Such was the old-time monkish estimate and endorsement of its virtues.
Coat of Arms, Trèves
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BONN
Bonnin the popular mind is noteworthy chiefly for its famous university, and for being the birthplace of Beethoven.
The city was one of the fifty fortresses built by Drusus on the Rhine, and the only Rhenish city, with the exception of Cologne, which has kept its Roman appellation. It is mentioned by Tacitus both asBonnaandBonensia castra.
The cathedral is as famous as the university. It was funded by the mother of Constantine the Great, who, according to tradition, consecrated the primitive church here in 319.
Really, it is not a very stupendous pile, the present cathedral, but it looks far more imposing than it really is by reason of its massive central tower and steeple.
It is one of the most ancient and most remarkable of the cathedrals on the banks of the Rhine.
GENERAL VIEW of BONNGENERALVIEWof BONN
GENERAL VIEW of BONNGENERALVIEWof BONN
GENERALVIEWof BONN
{221}The effect of its five towers is that of a great pyramid rising skyward from a broad base.
In the main, it is a construction of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, but it is known beyond doubt that the choir and the crypt were built in 1157. To-day there are visible no traces of even the foundations of the primitive church.
Apse, Bonn Cathedral
There are two polygonal apsides, more noticeable from without than within.{222}
The main portal, or the most elaborate at least, is that of the north façade.
The interior is not as sombre and sad as is often the case with a very early church. To enter, one ascends eight steps to the pavement, when the rather shallow vista of the nave and choir opens out broadly.
There are a series of white marble statues representing the birth and baptism of Christ, and some paintings of notable merit, including an "Adoration."
In the crypt, already mentioned, are the bones of the martyrs, Cassius, Florentinus, and Malusius.
The chief interest of the interior, outside of the constructive elements of the fabric, centres in a great statue of St. Hélène in bronze, which is placed in the middle of the grand nave. It is a fine monument, and was cast in the seventeenth century as a somewhat tardy recognition of the founder of the church at Bonn.
At the western extremity of the nave is the Gothic tomb of Archbishop Englebert, and another of Archbishop Robert.
The choir is somewhat raised above the pavement of the nave, being placed upon the vaulting of the crypt. The walls of the choir{223}are hung with gilded Cordovan leather, which is certainly rich and beautiful, though it has been criticized as being more suitable to a boudoir than a great church.
At the foot of the choir, to the right, is a tabernacle, a feature frequently met with in German churches. It is of Renaissance design and workmanship, and is ungainly and not in the best of taste.
Behind the great pillars of the choir are found, back to back, two imposing altars, to which access is had by mounting a dozen more steps, far above the pavement of the nave. They are most peculiarly disposed, and are again a Renaissance interpolation which might well have been omitted.
In this dimly lighted cathedral, as well as in many other churches of Germany, you may at times hear that hymn known as "Ratisbon," the words of which begin:
"Jesus meine ZuversichtLebt, und ich soll mit ihm leben."
There is a legend—or it may be a true tale—connecting these verses with a German soldier who died at the fateful battle of Jena.
Fleeing from the French, he had fallen into{224}the waters of the Saale. Recovering himself, he crawled out, only to find his pursuers on the bank, their firearms levelled at his head. His first thought was to thank God for his safety from the flood, and, kneeling, he played upon his bugle the familiar air to which the hymn, "Jesus meine Zuversicht," is sung. Deeply moved, his pursuers dropped their guns, but, just as the last notes of the tune were dying away, another detachment came up, and one of its members fired a shot which ended the life of the devout Prussian.
There is heard here also a legend, of the time of the Crusades, concerning the Siebengebergen,—the Seven Mountains,—which lie just back of Bonn.
Stimulated by religious fervour, the overlord of a castle perched upon one of the Seven Mountains, enlisted in the army of the Crusaders, and fought gallantly in the very forefront of those who sought to plant the Cross upon the walls of the Holy City. After a prolonged absence, he returned to find that a rival had won the love of his lady, who, to escape his wrath, had fled to a convent.
The usurper of affections escaped, but the injured husband met near Godesberg, in his old age, a youth in whom he thought he recognized{225}the likeness of his wife. Questioning the boy, he visited the sin of the mother upon the child, and slew him on the highroad, on the spot where the Hoch Kreuz now stands,—a monument which tradition says was erected to warn weak wives and faithless friends.
Drachenfels, whose fame to English ears has mostly been made by Byron's verses, lies not far south of Bonn. Byron's "peasant girls with deep blue eyes" are mostly engaged in husbandry to-day, instead of poetically and leisurely gathering "early flowers."
"The castled crag of DrachenfelsFrowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine,"
and is still one of the tourist sights of the Rhine, and as such it must be accorded its place.
Bonn was formerly the residence of the Electors of Cologne, after their removal from that city in 1268, at which time it was also the shelter of Archbishop Englebert, who had fled from Cologne.{226}
GODESBERG AND ROLANDSECK
Godesberg
Withinfull view of the Seven Mountains, on the opposite bank of the Rhine, is Godesberg,—"a cheerful village with a castle which is a splendid ruin," say the guide-books.
They might go a bit further and recount something of its political and religious history, although usually they do not, but rush the tourist up-river to Coblenz, giving him only a sort of panoramic view of this portion of the Rhine.
Originally acastellum romain, the "cheerful village," known to the ancients as Ara Ubiorum, came under the control, in 1210, of the Archbishop Theodoric of Cologne, who built a chapel to St. Michael on the ancient ruins, which, according to tradition, had endured from the times of Julian the Apostate.{227}
For many centuries there was a château here which served as the country-house of many of the archbishop-electors of the Empire, until destroyed by a thunderbolt. In 1593 it was pillaged by the troops of the Archbishop Ernest, and to-day only a great, lone, round tower remains intact.
For the rest it is a fine ruin and a picturesque one.
Rolandseck
But a short distance above Godesberg is Rolandseck; opposite which is the island of Nonnenwerth, with which it is associated in a famous legend.
The chivalrous Roland sought the love of some fair being, whose beauty and whose virtues should deserve and retain the heart of so brave and gallant a young knight. Nor did he look about in vain, for Hilda, the daughter of the lord of the Drachenfels, was all that dreams had pictured to his youthful fancy as worthy of an ardent soul's devotion, and soon he was made happy by a confession from the maiden that his passion was returned. Lost in a dream of first love, the knight forgot the world and its struggles, and, in the expectation of an early day for his wedding{228}with his mistress, he lived a life of perfect joy,—now gazing with Hilda upon the windings of the Rhine; now watching her as she stooped gracefully to tend the flowers which peace allowed to flourish under the walls of her father's stronghold.
But Roland lived in times when love was but the bright, transient episode of a life of war. The laws of chivalry forbade a true knight's neglect of duty, and, in the very week in which he was to be wedded, the summons came for him to take the field.
The war was long, and it was three years before Roland left the camp. When he reached the home of his mistress, he received a frightful welcome. The castle was in ruins; its lord was slain; and Hilda, deceived by reports of Roland's death, had taken the veil in the neighbouring convent of Nonnenwerth!
Over the bright path of the young knight a dark and lasting shadow was cast. His early hopes were shattered; the joy of his existence had fled; his spirit bent beneath the weight of his evil fortune. But his faith and constancy were beyond the control of Fate. Retiring to his castle of Rolandseck, he made himself a seat within a window, from which he could look down upon the island of Nonnenwerth and the convent that held his beloved Hilda. Whether she heard of his return tradition does not say; but the rumour of such constancy was perhaps wafted through the nunnery walls. Be that as it may, it is chronicled that, after Roland's watch had been for three years prolonged, he heard one evening the tones of the bell that tolled for a passing soul, and next day the white figures of the nuns were seen bearing a sister to her last home. It was the funeral of Hilda.
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Convent of Nonnenwerth
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The isle of Nonnenwerth and its convent are still there opposite the grim, gaunt, ruined gateway of Rolandseck, a brilliant jewel in an antique setting; and, while neither the conventual buildings nor the ruined château show any unusual architectural features, they are characteristic of the feudal and religious architecture of the middle ages.
Architects of to-day do not build with the same simplicity and grace that they did of old, and these little out-of-the-way gems of architecture are far more satisfying than are similar erections of to-day.
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COLOGNE AND ITS CATHEDRAL
Nostranger ever yet entered Cologne without going straight to see its mighty Gothic cathedral. Three things come to him forcibly,—the fact that it was only completed in recent years, the great and undecided question as to who may have been its architect, and the "Legend of the Builder," as the story is known.
There are two legends of the cathedral and its builders which no visitor will ever forget.
The Architect of Cologne
Mighty was Archbishop Conrad de Hochsteden, for he was lord over the chief city of the Rhine, the city of Cologne; but his thoughts were troubled, and his heart was heavy, for, though his churches were rich beyond compare in relics, yet other towns not half so large or powerful as his had cathedrals whose fame extended over Europe, and whose{233}beauty brought pilgrims to their shrines, profit to the ecclesiastics, and business to the townspeople. After many sleepless nights, therefore, he determined to add to his city the only thing wanting to complete it, and, sending for the most famous architect of the time, he commissioned him to draw the plans for a cathedral of Cologne.
GENERAL VIEW of COLOGNEGENERALVIEWofCOLOGNE
GENERAL VIEW of COLOGNEGENERALVIEWofCOLOGNE
GENERALVIEWofCOLOGNE
Now the architect was a clever man, but he was more vain than clever. He had a vague idea of the magnificence which he desired to achieve without a clear conception of how he was to do it, or without the will to make the necessary sacrifices of labour, care, and perseverance. He received the commission with great gladness, and gloated for some days upon the fame which would be his as the builder of the structure which the archbishop desired; but when, after this vision of glory, he took his crayons to sketch out the design, he was thrown into the deepest despondency. He drew and drew, and added, and erased, and corrected, and began again, but still did not succeed. Not a plan could he complete. Some were too mean, others too extravagant, and others, when done and examined, were found to be good, but not original. Efforts of memory instead of imagination,{234}their points of excellence were but copies of other cathedrals,—a tower from one, a spire from another, an aisle from a third, and an altar from a fourth; and one after another they were cast aside as imperfect and useless, until the draughtsman, more than half-crazed, felt inclined to end his troubles and perplexities by a plunge into the Rhine.
In this mood of more than half-despair, he wandered down to the river's edge, and, seating himself upon a stone, began to draw in the sand with a measuring rod, which served as a walking-stick, the outlines of various parts of a church. Ground-plans, towers, finials, brackets, windows, columns, appeared one after another, traced by the point of his wand; but all, one after another, were erased as unequal and insufficient for the purpose, and unworthy to form a part of the design for a cathedral of Cologne. Turning around, the architect was aware that another person was beside him, and, with surprise, the disappointed draughtsman saw that the stranger also was busily making a design. Rapidly on the sand he sketched the details of a most magnificent building, its towers rising to the clouds, its long aisles and lofty choir stretching away before the eye of the startled architect,{235}who mentally confessed that it was indeed a temple worthy of the Most High. The windows were enriched by tracery such as artist never had before conceived, and the lofty columns reared their tall length toward a roof which seemed to claim kindred with the clouds, and to equal the firmament in expanse and beauty. But each section of this long-sought plan vanished the moment it was seen, and, with a complete conviction of its excellence, the architect was unable to remember a single line.
"Your sketch is excellent," said he to the unknown; "it is what I have thought and dreamed of,—what I have sought for and wished for, and have not been able to find. Give it to me on paper, and I will pay you twenty gold pieces."
"Twenty pieces! ha! ha! twenty gold pieces!" laughed the stranger. "Look here!" and from a doublet that did not seem big enough to hold half the money, he drew forth a purse that certainly held a thousand.
The night had closed in, and the architect was desperate. "If money cannot tempt you, fear shall force you;" and, springing toward the stranger, he plucked a dagger from his girdle, and held its point close to the breast{236}of the mysterious draughtsman. In a moment his wrists were pinioned, as with the grasp of a vise, and squeezed until he dropped his weapon and shrieked in agony. Falling on the sands, he writhed like an eel upon the fisherman's hook; but plunged and struggled in vain. When nearly fainting, he felt himself thrown helpless upon the very brink of the stream.
"There! revive, and be reasonable. Learn that gold and steel have no power over me. You want my cathedral, for it would bring you honour, fame, and profit; and you can have it if you choose."
"How?—tell me how?"
"By signing this parchment with your blood."
"Avaunt, fiend!" shrieked the architect; "in the name of the Saviour I bid thee begone." And so saying, he made the sign of the cross; and the Evil One (for it was he) was forced to vanish before the holy symbol. He had time, however, to mutter: "You'll come for the plan at midnight to-morrow."
The architect staggered home, half-dead with contending passions, and muttering: "Sell my soul," "To-morrow at midnight," "Honour and fame," and other words which{237}told the struggle going on within his soul. When he reached his lodgings, he met the only servant he had going out wrapped in her cloak.
"And where are you going so late?" said her surprised master.
"To a mass for a soul in purgatory," was the reply.
"Oh, horror! horror! no mass will avail me. To everlasting torments shall I be doomed;" and, hurrying to his room, he cast himself down with tears of remorse, irresolution, and despair. In this state his old housekeeper discovered him on her return from her holy errand, and, her soul being full of charity and kindly religion, she begged to know what had caused such grief; and spoke of patience in suffering, and pardon by repentance. Her words fell upon the disordered ear of the architect with a heavenly comfort; and he told her what had passed.
"Mercy me!" was her exclamation. "Tempted by the fiend himself!—so strongly, too!" and, so saying, she left the chamber without another word, and hurried off to her confessor.
Now the confessor of Dame Elfrida was the friend of the abbot, and the abbot was the{238}constant counsellor of the archbishop, and so soon as the housekeeper spoke of the wonderful plan, he told her he would soon see her master, and went at once to his superior. This dignitary immediately pictured to himself the host of pilgrims that would seek a cathedral built with skill from such wonderful sketches, and (hoping himself one day to be archbishop) he hurried off to the bewildered architect.
He found him still in bed, and listened with surprise to the glowing account of the demon's plan.
"And would it be equal to all this?"
"It would."
"Could you build it?"
"I could."
"Would not pilgrims come to worship in such a cathedral?"
"By thousands."
"Listen, my son! Go at midnight to the appointed spot; take this relic with you;" and, so saying, the abbot gave him a bone of one of the Eleven Thousand Virgins. "Agree to the terms for the design you have so long desired, and when you have got it, and the Evil One presents the parchment for your signature, show this sacred bone."{239}
After long pondering, the priest's advice was taken; and, in the gloom of night, the architect hurried tremblingly to the place of meeting. True to his time, the fiend was there, and, with a smile, complimented the architect on his punctuality. Drawing from his doublet two parchments, he opened one, on which was traced the outline of the cathedral, and then another written in some mysterious character, and having a space left for a signature.
"Let me examine what I am to pay so dearly for."
"Most certainly," said the demon, with a smile, and a bow that would have done honour to the court of the emperor.
Pressing it with one hand to his breast, the architect with the other held up the holy bone, and exclaimed: "Avaunt, fiend! In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Virgins of Cologne, I hold thee, Satan, in defiance;" and he described the sign of the cross directly against the devil's face.
In an instant the smile and the graceful civility were gone. With a hideous grin, Satan approached the sacred miracle as though he would have strangled the possessor; and, yelling with a sound that woke half the sleepers in Cologne, he skipped round and{240}round the architect. Still, however, the plan was held tightly with one hand, and the relic held forward like a swordsman's rapier with the other. As the fiend turned, so turned the architect; until, bethinking himself that another prayer would help him, he called loudly on St. Ursula. The demon could keep up the fight no longer; the leader of the Eleven Thousand Virgins was too much for him.
"None but a confessor could have told you how to cheat me," he shrieked in a most terrible voice; "but I will be revenged. You have a more wonderful and perfect design than ever entered the brain of man. You want fame,—the priest wants a church and pilgrims. Listen!That cathedral shall never be finished, and your name shall be forgotten!"
As the dreadful words broke upon the architect's ear, the cloak of the Tempter stretched out into huge black wings, which flapped over the spot like two dark thunderclouds, and with such violence that the winds were raised from their slumber, and a storm rose upon the waters of the Rhine. Hurrying homewards, the relic raised at arm's length over his head, the frightened man reached the abbot's house in safety. But the ominous sentence{241}still rang in his ears,—"Unfinished and forgotten."
Days, months, years passed by, and the cathedral, commenced with vigour, was growing into form. The architect had long before determined that an inscription should be engraved upon a plate of brass shaped like a cross, and be fastened upon the front of the first tower that reached a good elevation. His vanity already anticipated a triumph over the Fiend whom he had defrauded. He was author of a building which the world could not equal, and, in the pride of his heart, defied all evil chances to deprive him of fame. Going to the top of the building to see where his name should be placed, he looked over the edge of the building to decide if it was lofty enough to deserve the honour of the inscription, when the workmen were aware of a black cloud which suddenly enveloped them, and burst in thunder and hail. Looking around, when the cloud had passed away,their master was gone!and one of them declared that amidst the noise of the explosion he heard a wail of agony which seemed to say, "Unfinished and forgotten."
When they descended the tower, the body of the architect lay crushed upon the pavement.{242}The traveller who beholds the building knows of the difficulties which beset its completion, and thousands have since then sought in vain to learn the name of "The Architect of Cologne," although of late years—though with some doubt it is stated—his name and fame appear to have been established.
The Pfaffen Thor
When Archbishop Conrad of Hochsteden, the founder of the cathedral, had been gathered to his fathers, Engelbrecht of Falkenberg reigned over Cologne in his stead; and a fearful tyrant he became.
As in the case of the spiritual lords who ruled over Liège, the crozier of the archbishop became a rod of iron to the citizens, until at length they were goaded to open rebellion. In their contests for liberty, they were led by Hermann Grynn, a townsman who had put aside the peaceful pursuit of his trade to do battle in the good cause of his native city, and to maintain the privileges which his fathers had purchased, not only with their gold, but with their blood.
After numerous contests between the burghers and their oppressors, the cause of the{243}many was triumphant, and the archbishop was glad to agree to terms which he before had spurned. But the truce he sought was hollow and unfaithful, and he was heard to say that, if Hermann Grynn were removed, he would be able to take away the privileges he had surrendered to the townsmen.
This treacherous speech was greedily received by two priests, who determined to advance their own welfare by the downfall of the citizen-patriot. Making the acquaintance of Hermann, whose honest nature suspected no treachery, they wormed themselves into his confidence, and at a fitting opportunity invited him to the cathedral to see its hidden beauties and great store of riches. Leading him from chapel to cloister, and through chamber after chamber, they came at length to a door which they said contained the richest sight of all; and one of them, unlocking the door, invited the citizen to enter. No sooner had he crossed the threshold than the thick portal was closed suddenly upon him, and, at the same moment, he heard the roar of some wild animal, and saw fixed upon him two fierce eyes gleaming with hunger and savage rage.
Hermann Grynn was a man for emergencies.{244}Rapidly twisting his cloak around his left arm, and drawing his short sword, he prepared for the attack; nor had he long to wait. With a growl of triumph, a huge animal sprang upon him with open jaws; but with admirable coolness the hero received his assailant upon the guarded arm, and, whilst the brute ground its teeth into the cloak, he thrust his sword into its heart. Searching around the chamber, he was aware of a window concealed by a shutter, and, opening this, he looked forth into the streets, where a great crowd was collected around a priest, who went along telling some tale which seemed to move the people to deep grief. As the throng drew nearer, he listened eagerly, and heard with surprise "how the good burgess Hermann Grynn, the friend of the people, and the well-beloved ally of the Church, had without advice sought a chamber where a lion was in durance, and had fallen a sacrifice to his unhappy curiosity." Burning with rage and a determination to expose the treachery of the priests, he waited till the crowd came beneath the window from which he looked; and then, dashing the glass into a thousand pieces, he attracted attention to the spot, and, leaning half out of the opening, displayed his well-{245}known cap in one hand and his bloody sword in the other. He was almost too high to be heard, but the faint echo of his war-cry was enough to convince the people of his identity, and with one voice they shouted: "To the rescue!" Forcing their way into the cathedral, they quickly released their leader, and, learning from him the story of cruel treachery, the two priests were ferreted from their hiding-places, and hanged by the neck in the room over the body of the dead lion. To this day the portal they slammed on Hermann Grynn is known as thePfaffen Thor,—the priest's door,—whilst over the gate of the venerable town hall of Cologne may yet be seen, graven in stone, the fight of the citizen-patriot with the hungry lion of the cathedral.
These two legends refer solely to the cathedral. There is, in addition, the rather more familiar one of "St. Ursula and the Eleven Thousand Virgins."
And, besides legends, there is much real symbolism that peeps out wherever one turns. The skulls of the "Three Kings" still grin from under their crowns in the cathedral, as they did when Frederick Barbarossa stormed Milan and brought back these relics of the{246}threeMagi. Beneath the pavement of the cathedral lies buried the heart of Marie de Medici, who, in her fallen fortunes, died at Sternen-Gasse 10, in the house where Peter Paul Rubens was born.
In a rather roundabout way the name of one great in letters is associated with Cologne. Petrarch came here on his way from Avignon to Paris in 1331, and the superb beginnings of the new cathedral inspired him with the most profound admiration. In a letter which he addressed to his friend and protector, Jean Colonna, he said: "I have seen in this city the most beautiful temple; yet incomplete, but which is truly entitled to rank as a supreme work."
It was a fortunate day for the history of the church at Cologne when the Evangelist first preached the gospel in the city of Colonia Agrippina. In those days the primitive church sheltered itself modestly under the shadow of the Roman fortress, whereas to-day the great cathedral rises, stately and proud, high above the fortification of the warlike Teuton—if he really be warlike, as the statesmen of other nations proclaim.
When Charlemagne fixed his official residence at Aix-la-Chapelle, he placed his imperial{247}palace in the diocese of Cologne; the two cities together, by reason of their power and importance, standing as a symbol of mightiness which did much to make the great, unwieldy dominion of the Carlovingian Emperor hang together.
It has been claimed, and there certainly seems some justification for it, that the general plan of the cathedral at Cologne is similar to that of Notre Dame d'Amiens; there is something about the general scale and proportions that makes them quite akin. Perhaps this is due to the particularly daring combination of its lines and the general hardiness of its plan and outline. These features are certainly common to both in a far greater degree than are usually found between two such widely separated examples. At any rate, it is perhaps as safe a conjecture as any, since the hand that traced the plan of Cologne is lost in doubtful obscurity, to consider that there is something more than an imaginary bond between the cathedrals of Amiens and Cologne.
A resemblance still more to be remarked is the great height of the choir and nave. This is most marked at Amiens and still more so at Beauvais. Cologne, as to these dimensions, ranks between the two.{248}
There was once a Romanesque cathedral at Cologne, but a fire made way with it in 1248. Certain facts have come down to us regarding this earlier building, but they appear decidedly contradictory, though undoubtedly it was an edifice of the conventional Rhenish variety. It is supposed that this original cathedral had at least a "family resemblance" to those at Mayence, Worms, and Speyer.
These three great ecclesiastical works in the Rhine valley mark the Hohenstaufen dynasty as one of the most prolific in German church-building. Although they are not as beautiful as one pictures the perfect cathedral of his imagination,—at least no more beautiful than many other hybrid structures,—they show an individuality that is peculiarly Rhenish, far more so than the present cathedral at Cologne or any of the smaller churches of the region.
After the fire in 1248 a new cathedral was planned as a commensurate shrine in which to shelter the relics of the "Three Wise Men of the East," which henceforth were to be known as "The Three Kings of Cologne." From this period on, Cologne began to acquire such wealth and prominence as to mark the era{249}as the "Golden Age" in the civic and ecclesiastical affairs of the city.
Abandoning thebasilicaplan entirely, a great Gothic church was undertaken. In its way it was to rival those Gothic masterpieces of France.
The origin of the plan of the cathedral in fact, as well as in legend, is vague. Some have considered Archbishop Engelbert, Count of Altona and Berg, who was murdered in 1225, as the author, but this can hardly have been so, unless it were conceived before thebasilicawas burned.
Assiduous research has been made from time to time in an effort to discover the identity of the actual designer of the present cathedral: Archbishops Engelbert and Conrad, Albertus Magnus, Meister Gerard, and others have all had the honour somewhat doubtfully awarded to them and again withdrawn.
There is a great painting exhibited at Frankfort called "Religion Glorified by the Arts," by Overbeck, wherein is an ideal portrait of the "Great Unknown of Cologne" pictured as the genius of architecture.
A comparatively recent discovery seems to award the honour to Gerard de St. Trond. A charter of 1257 makes mention of the fact{250}that the chapter of the cathedral had given a house, for services rendered, to one Gerard, "a stone-cutter," who had directed the work of construction; this gift being made some years after the foundations were first laid.
The same architect figures among the benefactors of the hospital of St. Ursula as "the master of the works at the cathedral." Perhaps, then, the name of Gerard de St. Trond deserves to be placed with that of Libergier, the designer of Reims, the greatest Gothic splendour of France.
Engelbert's successor, Conrad of Hochsteden, furthered the plans, whoever may have been their creator, and work on the new edifice was begun a few months after the destruction of the older one.
On August 14, 1248, the foundation-stone of the new structure was laid, forty-four feet below the surface of the ground.
The portion first erected was the choir, and for ages it stood, as it stands in its completed form to-day, as perfect an example of the style of its period as is extant.
For seventy years this choir was taking form, until it was consecrated on September 27, 1322.
The occasion was a great one for Cologne{251}and for the church. The ceremony was attended by much glitter and pomp, both ecclesiastical and civil.
No sooner was the choir completed than it was embellished as befitted the shrine of the three kings.
Coloured glass, stone, and wood-carving, and the art of the gold and jewel smith all blended to give a magnificence to the whole which was perhaps unapproachable elsewhere at the time.
Then, for a time, enthusiasm and labour languished. For nearly two centuries the work was pursued by the prelates and architects in a most desultory and intermittent fashion.
The choir had been completed, and to the westward considerable progress had been made, but there was a gaunt ugly gap between. It would seem as though there were no intention of ever joining the scattered parts, which were linked only by the foundation-stones, for the nave and aisles were left merely covered with temporary roofs.
Then the Reformation came, and that boded no good for the cathedral. The people looked askance at the symbol of such great power in the hands of Rome.{252}
The seventeenth century saw some abortive efforts toward completing the structure, but in the end all came to nought.
In the eighteenth century the choir received its baptism of the Renaissance, and certain incongruous Italian details were added. The stone screens which surrounded the choir proper were demolished and the painted glass of the triforium mysteriously disappeared.
During the French Revolution, Republican troops bivouacked within the walls of Cologne's cathedral, and the chapter fled to Westphalia, leaving behind valuable archives which were destroyed.
The very fact of its profanation may have been the cause which hastened the restoration of the edifice.
Napoleon himself was deeply moved by the state of the "ruine pittoresque," and, upon the advice of an agent of his government, made a somewhat fitful attempt toward putting it in order. Thus the impetus for the work of restoration and completion was given.
After Napoleon had restored the churches of Cologne to their rightful guardians, he transferred the archbishopric to Aix-la-Chapelle, and Bertholet, the new bishop, contemptuously told the people of Cologne to{253}beautify their ruin by planting trees on its site.
The neglect to which the choir had fallen was shocking, and it took an immediate expenditure on the part of the citizens of over thirty thousand marks to merely repair the leaks in its roof. Tom Hood, a supposed humourist, but in reality a sad soul, wailed over Cologne's cathedral when he saw it in the early years of the nineteenth century, and called it "a broken promise to God"; and Wordsworth wrote of it thus:
"Oh! for the help of angels to completeThis temple—Angels governed by a planThus far pursued (how gloriously!) by man."
A rearrangement of the Catholic sees of Germany took place in 1821, and the archbishopric of Cologne was refounded and Count Charles Spiegel zum Desenburg was appointed archbishop.
At this time, also, was undertaken the repair and completion of the cathedral, and thus what had long been a ruin and an unfinished thing was in a fair way to be speedily completed.
The rebuilding of the choir stimulated the{254}desire to carry the entire work to a finish, and a sort of second foundation-stone was laid by Frederick William IV. of Prussia on September 4, 1842, when the newly restored choir was also reopened.