Dominican Convent of Mary’s Refuge: A Medieval Dominican Nunnery in Switzerland
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.8
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Switzerland
- Primary era
- Early Modern
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern
- Civilizations
- Holy Roman Empire, Swiss
- Site type
- Religious
- Remains
- Monastery
On this page10 sections
History
The Dominican Convent of Mary’s Refuge is a medieval Dominican nunnery in Weesen, Switzerland, founded on 7 October 1256. It began when a pre-existing community of Beguines, religiously devout lay women who generally lived without permanent monastic vows, joined the Dominican Order, also known as the Order of Preachers. The convent is described as the oldest Dominican nunnery in Switzerland.
Foundation between Oberwesin and Niderwesin
Weesen was first mentioned on 28 August 1232 as two settlements, Oberwesin and Niderwesin. The convent developed between them on territory initially held by the Kyburg and Rapperswil families. In 1259, Count Rudolf IV von Rapperswil gave duties and land at a place called “in den Widen” for construction of the monastery. Because of its connection with the House of Rapperswil, the new community was first supported by the Dominican house in Zurich. Dominican friars from Chur later took responsibility for its pastoral care.
The Bishop of Chur allowed the convent to receive novices freely and to grant indulgences to its benefactors. An indulgence was a remission of temporal punishment associated with sin in Catholic theology, and medieval religious houses commonly received or distributed indulgences in connection with devotion and benefaction. In 1272, Heinrich III, Bishop of Constance, authorized the construction of a chapel and appointed a Dominican priest to celebrate Mass, administer the sacraments, and provide pastoral care. The convent also received permission to bury deceased members in its church.
Church and religious rule
The church was completed in 1278, while the chapel was consecrated in 1288 and received an indulgence. At that time, the convent stood outside the walled town of Weesen. Before 1319, the nuns were apparently required by the local priest to follow the Augustinian Rule, a set of monastic regulations attributed to Augustine of Hippo and used by various Catholic communities. The circumstances of this change are unknown. A document of 1354 explicitly placed the convent under the Dominican rule.
The first church was severely damaged by flooding from the Lauibach stream in 1350. A replacement church was consecrated in 1351 in honor of the Holy Trinity. The convent also expanded its landholdings, receiving additional property in the Durnachtal valley in a transaction sealed at Glarus on 17 June 1353.
Fire, destruction, and renewal
After the Habsburg defeat at Näfels on 9 April 1388, Weesen was burned. The town was rebuilt in the early fifteenth century around the convent, which had originally stood beyond its walls. During the fifteenth century, the community was known as St. Verena. From 1699, it was called Maria Zuflucht, meaning “Mary’s Refuge.”
The convent largely escaped the looting associated with the Swiss Reformation of the 1520s because of its poverty, although iconoclasm, the destruction of religious images, temporarily disrupted monastic life. The nuns spent two years in exile. When they returned, they found the monastery desecrated and devastated.
Monastic life recovered fully during the second half of the seventeenth century. The community continued its tradition of simplicity and poverty despite repeated attempts by pastors of Weesen to challenge its preferential rights. Episcopal safeguards protected the convent. Flooding remained a recurring threat, especially during the eighteenth century, when the monastery was heavily affected three times and sections of its foundations were washed away. The Linth-Maag river correction, a nineteenth-century engineering project that altered the connected river system, reduced flooding and lessened the need for a proposed move to the upper hill of Gmähl. The monastery was nevertheless rebuilt and renewed repeatedly.
Rebuilding and community life
The present complex derives chiefly from rebuilding carried out between 1688 and 1690. This campaign replaced the earlier three-winged arrangement with a closed, compact square and incorporated elements of the original construction and church interior. The church was rebuilt during the same period and richly decorated in the Baroque period. A new organ was completed in the choir in 1822 at a cost of 323 Gulden. It was moved to the gallery in 1884 and replaced by another instrument in 1958.
The convent’s library began to expand during the second half of the seventeenth century, at first with works on asceticism, disciplined religious practice based on self-denial, prayer, and spiritual exercises. Its holdings grew during the eighteenth century, although books were lost when French and Austrian troops were billeted in the convent during and after the Helvetic Republic, the centralized Swiss state established under French influence from 1798 to 1803.
In 1906, the last two nuns of the Dominican convent of St. Katharinental, dissolved in 1860, moved to Weesen. They brought approximately 440 volumes of German ascetic literature. In 1973, the convent acquired about 1,000 volumes from the Redemptorist auxiliary-priest home, including 25 works published before 1900. In 2015, the community comprised nine Dominican nuns and one lay woman. Between 1983 and 2003, six women joined the community, three of whom became nuns at Weesen. The community considered a membership of 16 to 18 nuns ideal for its monastic life.
The convent continues pastoral work and operates a guest house, cloister shop, bakery, and atelier producing candles and icons. It also offers temporary stays for women aged 18 to 40. A wafer bakery was installed in 2002. In 2015, it produced approximately 30,000 brown and 3,000 white Eucharistic wafers each week, with annual production reported at about two million.
The building complex, monastic library, and archives are listed in the Swiss inventory of cultural property of national and regional significance as a Class B object of regional importance. This classification identifies them as objects of regional cultural importance and covers both the buildings and the collections.
Remains
Complex and setting
The convent stands in the middle of Weesen at the foot of a terraced hillside, near the outflow of the Maag, also called the Linth, from Lake Walen. Its original position was outside the town walls, but the rebuilt town grew around it after the fire of 1388. The present monastery forms a closed, compact square, the result mainly of the rebuilding of 1688 to 1690. The church occupies the west wing, while the complex also contains a guest house and enclosed private areas for the nunnery. The earlier church probably stood in the area now occupied by the guest house in the southern wing.
The monastery is built partly on rocky ground, yet a visible crack runs through almost the entire complex. Repeated floods damaged the foundations and led to successive rebuilding and renewal, particularly after the eighteenth-century inundations. The buildings were renewed again in 2005, and plans were made to redesign the gardens.
Church
The church forms the western side of the square monastery and is marked externally by an onion dome. The medieval church was damaged by the 1350 flood of the Lauibach stream, and the church in the present complex was rebuilt between 1688 and 1690. Its interior was richly decorated in the Baroque period, while parts of the earlier construction and church interior were incorporated into the rebuilt complex. The oldest still-visible components are ceiling beams described as approximately 200 years old.
The church’s organ was completed in the choir in 1822, moved to the gallery in 1884, and replaced in 1958. These alterations form part of the building’s later physical history. The church remains integrated into the square monastery rather than standing as a separate structure.
Monastic library
The monastic library occupies two rooms in the northeastern part of the complex. It contains approximately 8,400 works, including 1,466 items in the old stock. That older collection includes six sixteenth-century prints, 61 from the seventeenth century, 350 from the eighteenth century, and 1,049 from the nineteenth century.
The books are in German, Latin, French, Italian, English, Hebrew, and Danish. Approximately 93.6 percent of the old stock concerns theology. Its subjects include asceticism, liturgy, the formal rites and services of Christian worship, hagiography, writing about the lives of saints, music and hymn books, religious rules, church history, biblical literature, patristics, catechesis, homiletics, and other theological disciplines.
The asceticism section contains 715 works, predominantly in German, including early modern prints and writings associated with Christian religious communities. The collection also includes books on medicine and herbalism, fiction, aesthetics, grammar, dictionaries, history, cookery, and domestic work. The reference library lies within the enclosure and is generally not open to the public.
Wafer bakery
The wafer bakery uses hot plates and a passage-baking process. Liquid batter is baked for approximately two minutes, after which the sheets are humidified for several hours before being cut into small round wafers. The bakery produces Eucharistic wafers from wheat flour and water and forms part of the convent’s continuing religious and practical work.
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