Himmelkron Abbey

In addition to representatives of the local nobility, personalities who clearly show the connection to the monasteries of Sonnefeld and Langheim are listed as witnesses.

These two building phases were interrupted by the time of Margaret von Zedtwitz (1484-1499), when the abbey suffered from difficult economic conditions.

Apparently some rebels gathered in Bayreuth, but the damage to the abbey, e.g. the theft of a silver cross, remained minor, and no persons were harmed.

In the time of abbess Apollonia von Waldenfels, the Reformation moved into the region and found favor among the population and the clergy.

Margrave George, an early follower of Martin Luther, forced conversions to Protestantism and allowed a forcible expulsion of nuns from Himmelkron and Hof unless they accepted the new denomination.

The margrave-friendly preacher Johannes Behaim, who was appointed in Himmelkron, criticized Abbess Apollonia and Prioress Dorothea von Wirsberg from the pulpit.

This gave the margrave the opportunity to impose conditions on the abbess for her conduct of office and to gain insight into life in the abbey and its furnishings.

Thus Wieland[8] was able to name a "Lawke" and a "Leukardis", who succeeded Katharina von Schaumberg according to parish registers, in a document of 27 June 1401.

Similar to the tradition of the founding period of the Hof abbey, the focus on Agnes as the last member of the family group could have originated.

Wieland mentions from a document of the Sonnefeld abbey from 15 September 1287, a "Rihze" and for 1357, thus after the death of Agnes, a "Reitzgk II.

Margrave George Wilhelm had the baroque Red Eagle Hall built, which is used by the Himmelkron parish for weddings and concerts.

Today, the convent and the surrounding grounds house a residential home, a daycare center and a workshop for people with disabilities.

Kaspar Brusch, the author of the oldest written account of the legend,[10] claims to have seen the graves of the two children in the Himmelkron abbey himself.

On the outside, a structural peculiarity is recognizable: the chancel and the nave in the east, which extend over the entire height of the church, are followed in the west half by a crypt at ground level and above it the nuns' choir.

In the early 1990s, restoration work in the floor of the choir found more stone slabs with frescoes, which are exhibited in the Collegiate Church Museum.

There are: Today, the crypt is called the Knight's Chapel and is used as a devotional space for the Day Care Center for the Disabled.

A small area adjacent to the nave with the sarcophagi of the margraves is divided by a partition wall that does not reach the ceiling.

The vault ends with ornate keystones, which have coats of arms of local noble families in rounded form and other colored ornaments, including a pentagram, as a motif.

In the nuns' choir and in a neighboring room of the former convent, St. John's parlor, the Collegiate Church Museum has been located since 1987.

[14][15] Among other things, textiles and liturgical utensils from the 16th to 18th centuries are exhibited there, as well as an Olivet group from the convent period and an altar shrine.

In addition to other epitaphs, especially from the 17th and 18th centuries, including those for teachers and priests, there are surviving grave monuments of the Counts of Orlamünde and also of lesser noble Franconian knights, many of whom were free of riches.

A preserved wing of the Gothic cloister adjoins the southern outer wall of the collegiate church in the former courtyard of the abbey.

The parish priest at the time personally lobbied the margrave for the preservation of the cloister and was thus able to protect the still existing wing.

The crowned man on the lower right points with his hand to God and his creation and speaks according to the banner, which, as is often the case with stone carvings, uses abbreviations: "Ipse dixit et facta sunt, ipse ma[n]dav[it] et creata sunt" (he spoke, and it happened; he commanded, and it was created, from Psalm 33, verse 9 in the Old Testament).

[21][22] The musical instruments are oriented to the theme of the sandstone reliefs; for example, at the height of the depiction of hell, the bell is struck to chase away evil spirits.

At the end of the cloister, the coat of arms of Künsberg is mounted in the ceiling vault, surrounded by 16 representations symbolizing religious affiliations.

According to the current state of research by Werner Bergmann[24], these are religious affiliations of a male member of the Künsberg family.

The so-called devil's ground above the cloister shows animal figures made of sandstone, which, according to medieval belief, were supposed to keep evil spirits away.

The much larger Lower Court was only gradually extended to a more or less closed area, beginning with the buildings of Abbess Magdalena von Wirsberg up to the time of the margraves.

The long construction phase explains the irregular ground plan and the open peripheral buildings of the courtyard.