Cologne Cathedral

Cologne Cathedral (german: Kölner Dom, officially ', English: Cathedral Church of

Saint Peter

) is a

Catholic

cathedral

in

Cologne

, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is the seat of the Archbishop of Cologne and of the administration of the Archdiocese of Cologne. It is a renowned monument of German Catholicism and Gothic architecture and was declared a World Heritage Site in 1996. It is Germany's most visited landmark, attracting an average of 20,000 people a day. At , the cathedral is currently the tallest twin-spired church in the world, the second tallest church in Europe after

Ulm Minster

, and the third tallest church in the world.
It is the largest Gothic church in Northern Europe and has the second-tallest

spire

s. The towers for its two huge spires give the cathedral the largest façade of any church in the world. The choir has the largest height to width ratio, 3.6:1, of any

medieval

church.

Construction of Cologne Cathedral began in 1248 but was halted in the years around 1560, unfinished. Work did not restart until the 1840s, and the edifice was completed to its original Medieval plan in 1880.

Cologne's medieval builders had planned a grand structure to house the

reliquary

of the

Three Kings

and fit its role as a place of worship for the Holy Roman Emperor. Despite having been left incomplete during the medieval period, Cologne Cathedral eventually became unified as "a masterpiece of exceptional intrinsic value" and "a powerful testimony to the strength and persistence of Christian belief in medieval and modern Europe". Only the telecommunications tower is higher than the Cathedral.

History

Ancient site

When construction began on the present Cologne Cathedral in 1248 with

foundation stone

, the site had already been occupied by several previous structures. The earliest may have been for grain storage and possibly was succeeded by a Roman temple built by Mercurius Augustus. From the 4th century on, however, the site was occupied by Christian buildings, including a square edifice known as the "oldest cathedral" that was commissioned by Maternus, the first bishop of Cologne. A free-standing baptistery dating back to the 7th century was located at the east end of the present cathedral but was demolished in the 9th century to build the second cathedral. During excavations of the present cathedral, graves were discovered in the location of the oldest portion of the building; including that of a boy that was richly adorned with grave goods and another of a woman, popularly thought to be Wisigard. Both graves are thought to be from the 6th century. Only ruins of the baptistery and the octagonal

baptismal font

remain today.

The second church, called the "Old Cathedral", was completed in 818. It was destroyed by fire on 30 April 1248, during demolition work to prepare for a new cathedral.

Medieval beginning

In 1164, the Archbishop of Cologne, Rainald of Dassel, acquired the relics of the

Three Kings

which the Holy Roman Emperor,

Frederick Barbarossa

, had taken from the

Basilica of Sant'Eustorgio

, Milan, Italy. (Parts of the relics have since been returned to Milan.) The relics have great religious significance and drew pilgrims from all over Christendom. It was important to church officials that they be properly housed, and thus began a building program in the new style of Gothic architecture, based in particular on the French cathedral of Amiens.

The

foundation stone

was laid on 15 August 1248, by Archbishop Konrad von Hochstaden. The eastern arm was completed under the direction of Master Gerhard, was consecrated in 1322 and sealed off by a temporary wall so it could be used as the work continued. Eighty-four misericords in the choir date from this building phase.

In the mid-14th century work on the west front commenced under Master Michael. This work ceased in 1473, leaving the south tower complete to the belfry level and crowned with a huge crane that remained in place as a landmark of the Cologne skyline for 400 years. Some work proceeded intermittently on the structure of the

nave

between the west front and the eastern arm, but during the 16th century this also stopped.

File:Botanischer-Garten-am-Dom-um-1820.JPG, The unfinished cathedral as in 1820, engraved by Henry Winkles. The huge crane on the tower of the cathedral is visible in the picture.
File:Johannesfranciscus-Michiels bau-des-doms-koeln-1855.jpg, The unfinished cathedral as in 1855. The medieval crane was still in place, while constructions for the

nave

had been resumed earlier in 1814.
File:Rheinpanorama 1856 detail Dom.jpg, The unfinished cathedral as in 1856. The east end had been finished and roofed, while other parts of the building are in various stages of construction.

19th-century completion

With the 19th-century Romantic enthusiasm for the Middle Ages, and spurred by the discovery of the original plan for the façade, it was decided, with the commitment of the Protestant

Prussia

n Court, to complete the cathedral. It was achieved by civic effort; the '' Central-Dombauverein'', founded in 1842, raised two-thirds of the enormous costs, while the Prussian state supplied the remaining third. The state saw this as a way to improve its relations with the large number of Catholic subjects it had gained in 1815, but especially after 1871, it was regarded as a project to symbolize German nationhood.

Work resumed in 1842 to the original design of the surviving medieval plans and drawings, but utilizing more modern construction techniques, including iron roof girders. The nave was completed and the towers were added. The bells were installed in the 1870s. The largest bell is St. Petersglocke.

The completion of Germany's largest cathedral was celebrated as a national event on 14 August 1880, 632 years after construction had begun. The celebration was attended by Emperor

Wilhelm I

. With a height of , it was the tallest building in the world for four years until the completion of the

Washington Monument

.

World War II and post-war history

The cathedral suffered fourteen hits by aerial bombs during World War II. Badly damaged, it nevertheless remained standing in an otherwise completely flattened city. The twin spires were an easily recognizable navigational landmark for Allied aircraft bombing.

On 6 March 1945, an area west of the cathedral (Marzellenstrasse/Trankgasse) was the site of intense combat between American tanks of the 3rd Armored Division and a Panther Ausf. A of Panzer brigade 106 Feldherrnhalle. The Panther successfully knocked out a

Sherman

, killing three men, before it was destroyed by a

T26E3 Pershing

hours later. Footage of that battle survives. The destroyed Panther was later put on display at the base of the cathedral for the remainder of the war in Europe.

Repairs of the war damage were completed in 1956. An emergency repair to the base of the northwest tower, carried out in 1944 using poor-quality brick taken from a nearby ruined building, remained visible as a reminder of the war until 2005, when it was decided to restore the section to its original appearance.

Repair and maintenance work is constantly being carried out in one or another section of the building, which is rarely completely free of scaffolding, as wind, rain, and pollution slowly eat away at the stones. The ''Dombauhütte'', established to build the cathedral and keep it in repair, is said to employ the best stonemasons in the Rhineland. Half the costs of repair and maintenance are still borne by the Dombauverein.

File:Hasak - Der Dom zu Köln - Bild 02 Westseite.jpg, The west front of the completed cathedral in 1911
File:Warning sign in cologne.jpg, US soldier and destroyed Panther tank, 4 April 1945.

21st century

On 18 August 2005,

Pope Benedict XVI

visited the cathedral during his apostolic visit to Germany, as part of World Youth Day 2005 festivities. An estimated one million pilgrims visited the cathedral during this time. Also as part of the events of World Youth Day, Cologne Cathedral hosted a televised gala performance of

Beethoven

's Missa Solemnis, performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Choir conducted by Sir Gilbert Levine.

On 25 August 2007, the cathedral received a new stained glass window in the south

transept

. The glass work was created by the German artist Gerhard Richter with the €400,000 cost paid by donations. It is composed of 11,500 identically sized pieces of colored glass resembling

pixel

s, randomly arranged by computer, which create a colorful "carpet". Since the loss of the original window in World War II, the space had been temporarily filled with plain glass. The then archbishop of the cathedral, Cardinal Joachim Meisner, who had preferred a figurative depiction of 20th-century Catholic martyrs for the window, did not attend the unveiling. Holder of the office since 2014 is Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki.
On 5 January 2015, the cathedral remained dark as floodlights were switched off to protest a demonstration by

PEGIDA

.

World Heritage Site

In 1996, the cathedral was added to the

UNESCO

World Heritage List of culturally important sites. In 2004, it was placed on the "World Heritage in Danger" list, as the only Western site in danger, due to plans to construct several high-rise buildings nearby, which would have visually impacted the site. The cathedral was removed from the list in 2006, following the authorities' decision to limit the heights of buildings constructed near and around the cathedral.

As a World Heritage Site and host to the Shrine of the Three Kings, Cologne Cathedral is a major attraction for tourists and pilgrims, and is one of the oldest and most important pilgrimage sites of Northern Europe. Visitors can climb 533 stone steps of the spiral staircase to a viewing platform about above the ground. The platform gives a scenic view over the

Rhine

.

There is ongoing conservation at the cathedral to address the problem of the black discoloration caused by the sandstone reacting with sulfuric acid during rainfall. The acidic rain is a consequence of air pollution.

St. Joseph's Catholic Church in Washington, D.C. was modeled after the cathedral.

Architecture

See also: Finials of Cologne Cathedral

The design of Cologne Cathedral was based quite closely on that of Amiens Cathedral in terms of ground plan, style and the width to height proportion of the central nave. The plan is in the shape of a

Latin Cross

, as is usual with Gothic cathedrals. It has two aisles on either side, which help to support one of the very highest Gothic vaults in the world, being nearly as tall as that of the

Beauvais Cathedral

, much of which collapsed. Externally the outward thrust of the vault is taken by

flying buttress

es in the French manner. The eastern end has a single ambulatory, the second aisle resolving into a ''chevet'' of seven radiating chapels.

Internally, the medieval choir is more varied and less mechanical in its details than the 19th-century building. It presents a French style arrangement of very tall arcade, a delicate narrow

triforium

gallery lit by windows and with detailed tracery merging with that of the windows above. The clerestory windows are tall and retain some old figurative glass in the lower sections. The whole is united by the tall shafts that sweep unbroken from the floor to their capitals at the spring of the vault. The vault is of plain quadripartite arrangement.

The choir retains a great many of its original fittings, including the carved stalls, which is made the more surprising by the fact that French Revolutionary troops had desecrated the building. A large stone statue of St Christopher looks down towards the place where the earlier entrance to the cathedral was, before its completion in the late 19th century.

The nave has many 19th century stained glass windows. A set of five on the south side, called the ''Bayernfenster'', were a gift from

Ludwig I of Bavaria

, and strongly represent the painterly German style of that date.

Externally, particularly from a distance, the building is dominated by its huge spires, which are entirely Germanic in character, being openwork like those of

Ulm

,

Vienna

,

Strasbourg

and

Regensburg Cathedral

s.

File:Cologne cathedral aerial (25326253726).jpg, A "Bird's eye view" shows the cruciform plan
File:Cologne cathedrale vue sud.jpg, The cathedral from the south
File:Koelner-dom-spire.jpg, The exterior of one of the spires
File:Cathedral main entrance.jpg, The main entrance shows the 19th century decoration

File:Koelner dom blick nach osten.jpg, The flying buttresses and pinnacles of the Medieval east end
File:Koelner Dom Innenraum.jpg, The

nave

looking east
File:Cologne Cathedral interior.JPG, Interior of the Medieval east end, showing the extreme height
File:Koelner dom neue orgel.jpg, This "swallows' nest" organ was built into the gallery in 1998, to celebrate the cathedral's 750 years

Dimensions

Treasures

One of the treasures of the cathedral is the High Altar, which was installed in 1322. It is constructed of black marble, with a solid slab long forming the top. The front and sides are overlaid with white marble niches into which are set figures, with the

Coronation of the Virgin

at the centre.

The most celebrated work of art in the cathedral is the ''Shrine of the Three Kings'', commissioned by Philip von Heinsberg, archbishop of Cologne from 1167 to 1191 and created by Nicholas of Verdun, begun in 1190. It is traditionally believed to hold the remains of the

Three Wise Men

, whose relics were acquired by Frederick Barbarossa at the conquest of Milan in 1164. The shrine takes the form a large

reliquary

in the shape of a basilican church, made of bronze and silver, gilded and ornamented with architectonic details, figurative sculpture, enamels and gemstones. The shrine was opened in 1864 and was found to contain bones and garments.

Near the

sacristy

is the '' Gero Crucifix'', a large crucifix carved in oak and with traces of paint and gilding. Believed to have been commissioned around 960 for Archbishop Gero, it is the oldest large crucifix north of the

Alps

and the earliest-known large free-standing Northern sculpture of the medieval period.

In the Sacrament Chapel is the ''Mailänder Madonna'' ("Milan Madonna"), dating from around 1290, a wooden sculpture depicting the

Blessed Virgin Mary

and the infant

Jesus

. The altar of the patron saints of Cologne with an altarpiece by the International Gothic painter Stefan Lochner is in the ''Marienkapelle'' ("St. Mary's Chapel").
After completion in 1265, the radiating chapels were immediately taken into service as burial place. The relics of Saint Irmgardis found a final resting place in the St. Agnes’ Chapel. Her trachyte

sarcophagus

is considered to be created by the cathedral masons’ guild around 1280.
Other works of art are in the Cathedral Treasury.

Embedded in the interior wall are a pair of

stone tablets

on which are carved the provisions formulated by Archbishop Englebert II (1262–67) under which Jews were permitted to reside in Cologne.

File:Gerokreuz full 20050903.jpg, The '' Crucifix of Bishop Gero'', 10th century, the oldest known large crucifix
File:Cologne Cathedral Shrine of Magi.jpg, The Shrine of the Three Kings
File:Kölner Dom - Christophorus (2008).jpg, Medieval statue of

St. Christopher

File:Cologne Cathedral window, interior view (2).jpg, ''Petrus- und Wurzel Jesse-Fenster'', 1509
File:Cologne Cathedral window, interior view (1).jpg, ''Anbetungs-Fenster'', 1846
File:Richter window Cologne Cathedral.jpg, Modern

stained glass

window by Gerhard Richter

Church music

Cologne Cathedral has two

pipe organ

s by Klais Orgelbau: the Transept Organ, built in 1948, and the Nave Organ, built in 1998. Cathedral organists have included Josef Zimmermann, Clemens Ganz (1985–2001) and Winfried Bönig (2001).

Bells

The cathedral has eleven church bells, four of which are medieval. The first was the 3.8-tonne ''Dreikönigsglocke'' ("Bell of the Three Kings"), cast in 1418, installed in 1437, and recast in 1880. Two of the other bells, the ''Pretiosa'' (10.5 tonnes; at that time the largest bell in the Western world) and the ''Speciosa'' (5.6 tonnes) were installed in 1448 and remain in place today.

During the 19th century, as the building neared completion, there was a desire to increase the number of bells. This was facilitated by Kaiser Wilhelm I who gave French Bronze, French bronze cannon, captured in 1870–71, for this purpose. The 22 pieces of artillery were displayed outside the cathedral on 11 May 1872. Andreas Hamm in Frankenthal used them to cast a bell of over 27,000 kilos on 19 August 1873. The tone was not harmonious and another attempt was made on 13 November 1873. The Central Cathedral Association, which had agreed to take over the costs, did not want this bell either. Another attempt took place on 3 October 1874. The colossal bell was shipped to Cologne and on 13 May 1875, installed in the cathedral. This ''Kaiserglocke'' was eventually melted in 1918 to support the German war effort. The Kaiserglocke was the largest free-swinging bell in history.

The 24-tonne '' St. Petersglocke'' ("Bell of St. Peter", "'" in the Colognian language, Kölsch language or in common parlance known as "''Dicker Pitter''"), was cast in 1922 and was the largest free-swinging bell in the world, until a new bell was cast in Innsbruck for the People's Salvation Cathedral in Bucharest in Romania.The World Peace Bell in Newport, Kentucky is larger, but turns around its center of mass rather than its top.

See also

* Gothic cathedrals and churches
* List of Gothic Cathedrals in Europe
* Architecture of cathedrals and great churches
* Gero Cross
* Gothic architecture
* Gothic Revival architecture
* List of buildings and structures
* List of highest church naves
* List of cathedrals in Germany
* Medievalism

References

Sources

* Swaan, Wim and Christopher Brooke, ''The Gothic Cathedral'', Omega Books (1969),
* Fletcher, Banister, ''A History of Architecture on the Comparative Method''.
* Hubbard, Howard, ''Masterpieces of Western Sculpture'', Thames and Hudson,
* Wolff, Arnold, ''Cologne Cathedral. Its History – Its Works of Arts'', Verlag (editor) Kölner Dom, Cologne: 2nd edition 2003,

External links

Cologne Cathedral Official website

*
Cologne Cathedral music



Web cam showing Cologne Cathedral

*

5 Gigapixels GigaPan of Cologne Cathedral

History and photos of the Cologne Cathedral

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Cologne Cathedral,
Churches completed in 1880
Former world's tallest buildings
Gothic architecture in Germany
Landmarks in Cologne
Landmarks in Germany
Roman Catholic cathedrals in North Rhine-Westphalia
Tourist attractions in Cologne
Innenstadt, Cologne
World Heritage Sites in Germany
Christian architecture
World Heritage Sites in Danger
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1880 establishments in Germany