Kirche Kleinseelheim: A Baroque Parish Church in Germany
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.7
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Germany
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern, Modern
- Civilizations
- German, Holy Roman Empire, Kingdom of Prussia
- Site type
- Religious
- Remains
- Church
On this page11 sections
History
Kirche Kleinseelheim is a protected historic church in Kleinseelheim, Germany, within the municipality of Kirchhain. A church stood here by 1296, when the von Bicken family transferred its patronage rights to the Marburg Teutonic Order, a medieval Catholic military and religious order that also held estates and ecclesiastical privileges. A parsonage is securely recorded from 1350.
Medieval parish and pilgrimage setting
The church was dedicated to James the Elder, one of the Twelve Apostles and a medieval patron of pilgrims because of his shrine at Santiago de Compostela. Kleinseelheim lay near the Brabant Road, an old route connecting the trade-fair cities of Cologne and Leipzig. In the late Middle Ages, the church was a subsidiary of Grossseelheim and stood under the central ecclesiastical church and deanery of Amöneburg in the Archdiocese of Mainz. The parish of Grossseelbach also included Kleinseelheim and Schönbach.
Reformation and confessional changes
Johan von Fleckenbühl served as pastor in 1524. From 1527, the Reformation, the sixteenth-century movement that established Protestant churches, brought the congregation into the Evangelical Lutheran confession. The Teutonic Order continued to claim the extensive parish lands, so in 1532 the congregation undertook to employ a clergyman who would celebrate Mass every two weeks. Kleinseelheim was still listed as a subsidiary of Grossseelheim in 1577. The congregation became Reformed, another Protestant tradition distinct from Lutheranism, in 1605 and returned to Lutheranism around 1624.
Rebuilding and modern alteration
Most of the medieval church was renewed in 1665. Older masonry was incorporated into the middle section, while a new choir and western section were constructed. The choir may have been added in 1691 or 1692. The resulting building is an east-oriented Baroque hall church, using the dynamic forms and decorative language associated with the Baroque period.
In 1905, the church was extended westward by one third and its interior was redesigned under the architect August Dauber. These changes gave the building a Neo-Baroque character, particularly through the curved western gable. The interior received a gray paint finish in 1962. A six-year renovation completed on 2 October 1988 repaired damaged roof timbers and the exterior facade, reslated the tower and church roof, installed heating, and restored the 1905 color scheme.
Until 2011, the parish district comprised Grossseelheim, Kleinseelheim, and Schönbach. Since 2012, Kleinseelheim has belonged to the Grossseelheim parish in the Kirchhain church district of the Evangelical Church of Kurhessen-Waldeck. The bells continue to be rung by hand because structural conditions prevent electric operation of the three-bell peal. They are rung twice daily, at 10:00 and 17:00.
Remains
Exterior and roof structure
The church stands at the southeastern edge of Kleinseelheim. Its hall has a three-sided eastern choir and a slated gabled roof. East of the roof’s center rises an octagonal slated roof turret, a small tower built above the roof rather than from the ground. The turret retains Late Gothic forms. Each of its eight shaft sides has two small rectangular sound openings for the bells. Two clock faces point west, while the pointed helmet rises from eight steep gables with finials and ends in a finial knob, a cross, and a gilded copper weathercock. Three small dormers sit on the southern roof slope and four on the northern slope.
The exterior walls are covered with white render. Red sandstone remains visible in the window and door surrounds, the corner ashlar, and the edge of the western gable. The west portal dates from around 1720. Each long side has four tall rectangular windows with segmental arches. Two small oval windows are set above the round west window in the gable, while the historic door-lock fitting carries angels and rocaille ornament, a shell-like decorative motif. Rounded-arch Romanesque windows survive beneath the plaster on the south wall. A rounded-arch north portal with double twisted-rope molding has been walled up, as has the eastern window.
Choir and historic inscriptions
The three-sided choir is otherwise windowless and opens to the nave through a large brown-and-white marbled round arch. Its projecting impost slab, the block from which the arch springs, emphasizes the division between the two spaces. Beside the western window in the north wall, a covered sandstone plaque bears the building inscription of 1665. It names Pastor Ludwig Marschal and the churchwardens Henn Lauer and Curt Deufel, and ends with a dedication of glory to God.
Cemetery features and memorial stones
The cemetery wall behind the church incorporates the old altar slab from the medieval building. Its rubble-stone enclosure has portals renewed in 1722 and 1726. Among the Baroque gravestones is a red-sandstone stone from 1665 bearing a large cross pattée, whose arms widen toward their ends, together with a six-pointed star, a heart pierced by a nail, and a spiral symbolizing life.
Four further gravestones date from 1681 to 1710 and display reliefs known as the “Family under the Cross.” The carved arrangement places husbands and wives and their living and deceased children on either side of a central crucifix. The figures stand or kneel in prayer and mourning dress, with male family members on the side toward which Christ’s head inclines. Infants who died in infancy are shown lying at the feet of the other figures.
Nave and choir interior
The nave has a flat wooden-beam ceiling carried by a longitudinal beam. Two slender columns with braces stand in front of the chancel arch and support the roof turret. The choir has a flat wooden ceiling painted with stars. Red-sandstone slabs cover the floor, while wooden boards lie beneath the pews. A wooden L-shaped gallery with panelled compartments runs along the west and north sides of the nave, resting on square chamfered posts with braces. The organ stands on a convex eastern gallery in the choir.
Furnishings and stained glass
The oldest furnishing is a fifteenth-century Gothic baptismal font. Its octagonal, chalice-shaped basin is made of red sandstone and returned to the church during the renovation of the 1980s after standing outside for a long period. The pulpit, altar cross, and most of the pews date from 1679. The wooden polygonal pulpit has turned free columns at its corners. Its basket beside the southern pier of the chancel arch rests on an octagonal post with a cubical base, and its sounding-board canopy is decorated with gilded pinnacles. The pews have curved ends and leave a central aisle. The two pastors’ stalls in the choir were made in 1679 and 1905.
Three stained-glass windows belong to the 1905 remodeling. The window in the altar area depicts the Baptism of Jesus, while another shows the Ascension of Christ. Above the west portal, the round window presents Christ as the Good Shepherd, holding a staff and raising his hand in blessing.
Bells and organ
The three bells represent several periods in the church’s history. The large bell, sounding B-flat, was cast in 1723 by Johann Christoph and Johannes Schirnbein of Marburg. The middle bell, sounding D, was cast in 1953 by the Rincker Brothers of Sinn. The small bell, sounding E-flat, arrived after the Second World War as a replacement from a bell cemetery. It had originally come from Machlin in the former Deutsch Krone district and was cast in 1566 by Joachim Karstede in Stargard, Pomerania.
Johann Andreas Heinemann built the organ in 1758 with ten stops distributed between one manual, the keyboard played by the hands, and a pedal, the foot-operated keyboard. Peter Dickel rebuilt it in 1846, and his Gamba 8-foot stop survives. The facade pipes were surrendered for military purposes in 1917. Around 1950, Werner Bosch Orgelbau worked on the instrument and replaced the Mixture. Gerald Woehl later restored the organ and reconstructed the lost facade pipes, Quint, and Mixture. Seven of Heinemann’s stops survive.
