Speyer

Monografie über die Kirche der ehemaligen Reichsabtei Murbach im Elsass. Von der Klosterkirche des 12. Jhs. sind nur die Ostteile mit eindrucksvoller Doppelturmfassade erhalten.
Anhand der am Bau erkennbaren Spuren und Planwechsel wird die Bauabfolge untersucht und jede Phase nach Bauform, Technik und Bauplastik kunsthistorisch eingeordnet und datiert.

This article re-considers the migration of the Kalonymide family of pietists from medieval Speyer to Regensburg, suggesting a revised date for the move and an expanded interpretation of the reasons for it. Drawing on both halakhic and hagiographic sources, it demonstrates a more inclusive methodology for attempting to reconstruct historical events from incomplete and even apparently conflicting sources. It attempts to show that the prominent rabbi who moved to Regensburg
in the 12th century was not Rabbi Yehudah the Pious, but his father Rabbi Shmuel, and two accounts of the migration that seem unrelated different may share a historical kernel associated with the pietistic agenda that was interpreted in radically divergent ways.

Jewish Studies Quarterly 24 (2017), pp. 234–260
DOI 10.1628/094457017X14998549543534

in: Der Dom zu Speyer. Konstruktion, Funktion und Rezeption zwischen Salierzeit und Historismus, hrsg. v. M. Müller/ M. Untermann/ D. v. Winterfeld. Tagungsband zur Tagung „Der Dom zu Speyer: Kirchenbau und Repräsentation für die Salier und das Kaisertum“, Speyer 30. Juni–2. Juli 2011; Darmstadt 2013.

This contribution deals with the “crookedness” or “bend” in the plan of Speyer Cathe-
dral  Until recently this has been regarded as the result of an error made in setting out the right
angle at the start of the choir (the transept)  In the course of this research work conducted by the
author it was discovered that it is not, in fact, an error but was part of the plan  This realisation
led to a new way of looking at the “bend”, which in turn allowed the founding date of the cathe-
dral to be calculated based on astronomy to 1027 
The background to this discovery is the tradition of orienting sacred buildings according to the
rising sun  In the Middle Ages a different orientation was frequently chosen for the axes of the
nave and of the choir  The choice of day for each orientation was set in the programme for the
building. These oriented axes are “temporal marks” which are        eternalized in the foundations
and can therefore be discovered scientifically 
The liturgical programme for the Imperial Cathedral of Speyer was as follows: orientation day
for the nave (the space for the congregation of the faithful) was Monday, 25 September 1027,
whereas the orientation day for the choir (the space for the members of the clergy) was Friday,
29 September 1027  The latter day is the feast day of Archangel Michael (the patron saint of the
Holy Roman Empire) and was most probably determined by the cathedral’s founder, Emperor
Konrad II. As the sun rises at a different point on these two orientation days, this created an “axi-
al bend” in the floorplan of the cathedral, which is expressed as its “crookedness”.

Diese bereits länger bekannte Inschrift muss anders gelesen werden, als dies bisher der Fall war. In der Konsequenz ist wahrscheinlich, dass in einer der genannten Personen ein bislang unbekannter decurio der civitas Nemetum genannt wird, wodurch sich die Anzahl der bekannten decuriones dieser Gebietskörperschaft weiter vergrößert.

Presentation and text to a lecture (in German language) held May 2017:

What do the Swedish Queen Christina of Saxony, the Swabian-born noble and Saxon master chef Anthonius von Oberndorf and the Greifswalder writer Bartholomäus Sastrow have in common?

They have all experienced the ups and downs of the time around 1500 and they stand as an example of a time in transition. Christina withstand several months of sieges and had to suit her own son for debt. At the end of his life the highly sought-after and industrious chef Oberndorf realized bitterly that he had been cheated out of his wages and took his debtors to duty for his salvation as a devout Catholic. Sastrow's survival, on the other hand, seems like a miracle, as he always managed to get caught in the 1540s between the fronts of the denominations.

Three completely different personalities from around 1500 between poverty and wealth, between homeland and foreign lands, between war and peace, between world history and everyday life.

Drei Tage nach der Seligsprechung Edith Steins besucht Papst Johannes Paul II. am 4. Mai 1987 Speyer. Während der Messe vor dem Dom ruft er die Gläubigen dazu auf, treue Hüter der Botschaft von Edith Stein zu sein.
Der Kaiser- und Mariendom wie auch das Kloster der Dominikanerinnen von St. Magdalena sind die zentralen Stätten, an denen Menschen der Bitte des Papstes entsprechen. Daneben haben sich eine Reihe weiterer Orte in Speyer entwickelt, die an die besondere Verbindung der am 11. Oktober 1998 heilig gesprochenen Edith Stein zu Speyer erinnern.
19 Stationen quer durch Speyer erzählen Geschichten von einer großen Beterin, einer bedeutenden Wissenschaftlerin und einer beeindruckenden Persönlichkeit, die nahe bei Gott und nahe bei den Menschen war.