The Old Mint () is a

protected Protection is any measure taken to guard something against damage caused by outside forces. Protection can be provided to physical objects, including organisms, to systems, and to intangible things like civil and political rights. Although ...

timber-framed Timber framing () and "post-and-beam" construction are traditional methods of building with heavy Beam (structure), timbers, creating structures using squared-off and carefully fitted and Woodworking joints, joined timbers with joints secure ...

house in the town of Stolberg in the German state of

Saxony-Anhalt Saxony-Anhalt ( ; ) is a States of Germany, state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony, Thuringia and Lower Saxony. It covers an area of and has a population of 2.17 million inhabitants, making it the List of German states ...

. The building houses the Old Mint Museum (Museum ''Alte Münze''). It is located at No. 19, ''Niedergasse''.

History and architecture

The impressively designed timber-framed building was built in 1534 or 1535Dehio, Handbuch, page 806 by Stolberg citizen and master minter (''Münzmeister''), Kilian Keßler. Over the years it has acted as a mint, mining fee office (''Berglehnsamt''), district court (''

Amtsgericht An ''Amtsgericht'' (District Court) in Germany is an official court. These courts form the lowest level of the ' ordinary jurisdiction' of the German judiciary (German ''Ordentliche Gerichtsbarkeit''), which is responsible for most criminal and ...

''), Princely Consistory of Stolberg-Stolberg and local history museum. Major restorations took place in 1843, 1990/91 and finally in 2004. Following the 2004 renovation work it was re-opened as the Old Mint Museum (''Museum Alte Münze''). The building has a solidly built ground floor above which rise three timber-framed storeys whose facade is asymmetrically designed. The two uppermost storeys are

jetties A jetty is a man-made structure that protrudes from land out into water. A jetty may serve as a breakwater, as a walkway, or both; or, in pairs, as a means of constricting a channel. The term derives from the French word ', "thrown", signif ...

, i.e. storeys that project beyond the one below. The top storey has inflexed arches. One feature of the building are its polygonal

oriel window An oriel window is a form of bay window which protrudes from the main wall of a building but does not reach to the ground. Supported by corbels, bracket (architecture), brackets, or similar cantilevers, an oriel window generally projects from an ...

s. These oriel windows, also built in a timber-framed style, are supported on decorated

corbel In architecture, a corbel is a structural piece of stone, wood or metal keyed into and projecting from a wall to carry a wikt:superincumbent, bearing weight, a type of bracket (architecture), bracket. A corbel is a solid piece of material in t ...

s and project out over the eaves of the house. The building is covered with a steeply-pitched

gable roof A gable roof is a roof consisting of two sections whose upper horizontal edges meet to form its ridge. The most common roof shape in cold or temperate climates, it is constructed of rafters, roof trusses or purlins. The pitch of a gable roof c ...

. The main entranceway is designed as a

semi-circular arch In architecture, a semicircular arch is an arch with an intrados (inner surface) shaped like a semicircle. This type of arch was adopted and very widely used by the Romans, thus becoming permanently associated with Roman architecture. Termi ...

and has Late Gothic

mullions A mullion is a vertical element that forms a division between units of a window or screen, or is used decoratively. It is also often used as a division between double doors. When dividing adjacent window units its primary purpose is a rigid sup ...

. The house measures 23.5 metres high, is 18 metres wide and 14 metres deep. The jetty plates (''Stockschwellen'') are decorated with double "ship cornices" (''Schiffskehlen''). On the shoulders are fan rosettes (''Fächerrosetten''), the heads of the jetty beams have very elaborate profiles. On the building are the inscriptions ''Am tage kiliani mit gots hilfe gericht'' ("Built on St. Kilian's Day with God's help") and ''Laus Deo'' (Latin for "Praise the Lord"). On the facade is a braid, rare even in Stolberg, which was supposed to ward off evil. There are other very varied decorations, including a heart pierced by an arrow. The windows are eight-pane windows, typical of Stolberg.

References

Literature

* Wolfgang Knape, ''Stolberg'', Schmidt-Buch-Verlag, Wernigerode, 2007, , page 46 ff. * ''Dehio, Handbuch der Deutschen Kunstdenkmäler, Sachsen-Anhalt II, Regierungsbezirke Dessau und Halle'',

Deutscher Kunstverlag The Deutscher Kunstverlag (DKV) is an educational publishing house with offices in Berlin and Munich. The publisher specializes in books about art, cultural history, architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and bu ...

, Munich, Berlin, 1999, , page 806

External links

Old Mint Museum (''Museum Alte Münze'')
{{Coord, 51.572265, N, 10.956132, E, type:landmark_region:DE-ST, display=title, format=dms Buildings and structures completed in 1535 Timber framed buildings in Germany Heritage sites in Saxony-Anhalt Museums in Saxony-Anhalt Buildings and structures in Mansfeld-Südharz Houses in Germany 1535 establishments in the Holy Roman Empire