determined to advance their own welfare by the downfall of the
citizen-patriot. Making the acquaintance of Hermann, whose honest nature
suspected no treachery, they wormed themselves into his confidence, and
at a fitting opportunity invited him to the cathedral to see its hidden
beauties and great store of riches. Leading him from chapel to cloister,
and through chamber after chamber, they came at length to a door which
they said contained the richest sight of all; and one of them, unlocking
the door, invited the citizen to enter. No sooner had he crossed the
threshold than the thick portal was closed suddenly upon him, and, at
the same moment, he heard the roar of some wild animal, and saw fixed
upon him two fierce eyes gleaming with hunger and savage rage.
Hermann Grynn was a man for emergencies. Rapidly twisting his cloak
around his left arm, and drawing his short sword, he prepared for the
attack; nor had he long to wait. With a growl of triumph, a huge animal
sprang upon him with open jaws; but with admirable coolness the hero
received his assailant upon the guarded arm, and, whilst the brute
ground its teeth into the cloak, he thrust his sword into its heart.
Searching around the chamber, he was aware of a window concealed by a
shutter, and, opening this, he looked forth into the streets, where a
great crowd was collected around a priest, who went along telling some
tale which seemed to move the people to deep grief. As the throng drew
nearer, he listened eagerly, and heard with surprise "how the good
burgess Hermann Grynn, the friend of the people, and the well-beloved
ally of the Church, had without advice sought a chamber where a lion was
in durance, and had fallen a sacrifice to his unhappy curiosity."
Burning with rage and a determination to expose the treachery of the
priests, he waited till the crowd came beneath the window from which he
looked; and then, dashing the glass into a thousand pieces, he attracted
attention to the spot, and, leaning half out of the opening, displayed
his well-known cap in one hand and his bloody sword in the other. He
was almost too high to be heard, but the faint echo of his war-cry was
enough to convince the people of his identity, and with one voice they
shouted: "To the rescue!" Forcing their way into the cathedral, they
quickly released their leader, and, learning from him the story of cruel
treachery, the two priests were ferreted from their hiding-places, and
hanged by the neck in the room over the body of the dead lion. To this
day the portal they slammed on Hermann Grynn is known as the _Pfaffen
Thor_,--the priest's door,--whilst over the gate of the venerable town
hall of Cologne may yet be seen, graven in stone, the fight of the
citizen-patriot with the hungry lion of the cathedral.
* * * * *
These two legends refer solely to the cathedral. There is, in addition,
the rather more familiar one of "St. Ursula and the Eleven Thousand
Virgins."
And, besides legends, there is much real symbolism that peeps out
wherever one turns. The skulls of the "Three Kings" still grin from
under their crowns in the cathedral, as they did when Frederick
Barbarossa stormed Milan and brought back these relics of the three
_Magi_. Beneath the pavement of the cathedral lies buried the heart of
Marie de Medici, who, in her fallen fortunes, died at Sternen-Gasse 10,
in the house where Peter Paul Rubens was born.
In a rather roundabout way the name of one great in letters is
associated with Cologne. Petrarch came here on his way from Avignon to
Paris in 1331, and the superb beginnings of the new cathedral inspired
him with the most profound admiration. In a letter which he addressed to
his friend and protector, Jean Colonna, he said: "I have seen in this
city the most beautiful temple; yet incomplete, but which is truly
entitled to rank as a supreme work."
It was a fortunate day for the history of the church at Cologne when the
Evangelist first preached the gospel in the city of Colonia Agrippina.
In those days the primitive church sheltered itself modestly under the
shadow of the Roman fortress, whereas to-day the great cathedral rises,
stately and proud, high above the fortification of the warlike
Teuton--if he really be warlike, as the statesmen of other nations
proclaim.
When Charlemagne fixed his official residence at Aix-la-Chapelle, he
placed his imperial palace in the diocese of Cologne; the two cities
together, by reason of their power and importance, standing as a symbol
of mightiness which did much to make the great, unwieldy dominion of the
Carlovingian Emperor hang together.
It has been claimed, and there certainly seems some justification for
it, that the general plan of the cathedral at Cologne is similar to that
of Notre Dame d'Amiens; there is something about the general scale and
proportions that makes them quite akin. Perhaps this is due to the
particularly daring combination of its lines and the general hardiness
of its plan and outline. These features are certainly common to both in
a far greater degree than are usually found between two such widely
separated examples. At any rate, it is perhaps as safe a conjecture as
any, since the hand that traced the plan of Cologne is lost in doubtful
obscurity, to consider that there is something more than an imaginary
bond between the cathedrals of Amiens and Cologne.
A resemblance still more to be remarked is the great height of the choir
and nave. This is most marked at Amiens and still more so at Beauvais.
Cologne, as to these dimensions, ranks between the two.
There was once a Romanesque cathedral at Cologne, but a fire made way
with it in 1248. Certain facts have come down to us regarding this
earlier building, but they appear decidedly contradictory, though
undoubtedly it was an edifice of the conventional Rhenish variety. It is
supposed that this original cathedral had at least a "family
resemblance" to those at Mayence, Worms, and Speyer.
These three great ecclesiastical works in the Rhine valley mark the
Hohenstaufen dynasty as one of the most prolific in German
church-building. Although they are not as beautiful as one pictures the
perfect cathedral of his imagination,--at least no more beautiful than
many other hybrid structures,--they show an individuality that is
peculiarly Rhenish, far more so than the present cathedral at Cologne or
any of the smaller churches of the region.
After the fire in 1248 a new cathedral was planned as a commensurate
shrine in which to shelter the relics of the "Three Wise Men of the
East," which henceforth were to be known as "The Three Kings of
Cologne." From this period on, Cologne began to acquire such wealth and
prominence as to mark the era as the "Golden Age" in the civic and
ecclesiastical affairs of the city.
Abandoning the _basilica_ plan entirely, a great Gothic church was
undertaken. In its way it was to rival those Gothic masterpieces of
France.
The origin of the plan of the cathedral in fact, as well as in legend,
is vague. Some have considered Archbishop Engelbert, Count of Altona and
Berg, who was murdered in 1225, as the author, but this can hardly have
been so, unless it were conceived before the _basilica_ was burned.
Assiduous research has been made from time to time in an effort to
discover the identity of the actual designer of the present cathedral:
Archbishops Engelbert and Conrad, Albertus Magnus, Meister Gerard, and
others have all had the honour somewhat doubtfully awarded to them and
again withdrawn.
There is a great painting exhibited at Frankfort called "Religion
Glorified by the Arts," by Overbeck, wherein is an ideal portrait of the
"Great Unknown of Cologne" pictured as the genius of architecture.
A comparatively recent discovery seems to award the honour to Gerard de
St. Trond. A charter of 1257 makes mention of the fact that the chapter
of the cathedral had given a house, for services rendered, to one
Gerard, "a stone-cutter," who had directed the work of construction;
this gift being made some years after the foundations were first laid.
The same architect figures among the benefactors of the hospital of St.
Ursula as "the master of the works at the cathedral." Perhaps, then, the
name of Gerard de St. Trond deserves to be placed with that of
Libergier, the designer of Reims, the greatest Gothic splendour of
France.
Engelbert's successor, Conrad of Hochsteden, furthered the plans,
whoever may have been their creator, and work on the new edifice was
begun a few months after the destruction of the older one.
On August 14, 1248, the foundation-stone of the new structure was laid,
forty-four feet below the surface of the ground.
The portion first erected was the choir, and for ages it stood, as it
stands in its completed form to-day, as perfect an example of the style
of its period as is extant.
For seventy years this choir was taking form, until it was consecrated
on September 27, 1322.
The occasion was a great one for Cologne and for the church. The
ceremony was attended by much glitter and pomp, both ecclesiastical and
civil.
No sooner was the choir completed than it was embellished as befitted
the shrine of the three kings.
Coloured glass, stone, and wood-carving, and the art of the gold and
jewel smith all blended to give a magnificence to the whole which was
perhaps unapproachable elsewhere at the time.
Then, for a time, enthusiasm and labour languished. For nearly two
centuries the work was pursued by the prelates and architects in a most
desultory and intermittent fashion.
The choir had been completed, and to the westward considerable progress
had been made, but there was a gaunt ugly gap between. It would seem as
though there were no intention of ever joining the scattered parts,
which were linked only by the foundation-stones, for the nave and aisles
were left merely covered with temporary roofs.
Then the Reformation came, and that boded no good for the cathedral. The
people looked askance at the symbol of such great power in the hands of
Rome.
The seventeenth century saw some abortive efforts toward completing the
structure, but in the end all came to nought.
In the eighteenth century the choir received its baptism of the
Renaissance, and certain incongruous Italian details were added. The
stone screens which surrounded the choir proper were demolished and the
painted glass of the triforium mysteriously disappeared.
During the French Revolution, Republican troops bivouacked within the
walls of Cologne's cathedral, and the chapter fled to Westphalia,
leaving behind valuable archives which were destroyed.
The very fact of its profanation may have been the cause which hastened
the restoration of the edifice.
Napoleon himself was deeply moved by the state of the "_ruine
pittoresque_," and, upon the advice of an agent of his government, made
a somewhat fitful attempt toward putting it in order. Thus the impetus
for the work of restoration and completion was given.
After Napoleon had restored the churches of Cologne to their rightful
guardians, he transferred the archbishopric to Aix-la-Chapelle, and
Bertholet, the new bishop, contemptuously told the people of Cologne to
beautify their ruin by planting trees on its site.
The neglect to which the choir had fallen was shocking, and it took an
immediate expenditure on the part of the citizens of over thirty
thousand marks to merely repair the leaks in its roof. Tom Hood, a
supposed humourist, but in reality a sad soul, wailed over Cologne's
cathedral when he saw it in the early years of the nineteenth century,
and called it "a broken promise to God"; and Wordsworth wrote of it
thus:
"Oh! for the help of angels to complete
This temple--Angels governed by a plan
Thus far pursued (how gloriously!) by man."
A rearrangement of the Catholic sees of Germany took place in 1821, and
the archbishopric of Cologne was refounded and Count Charles Spiegel zum
Desenburg was appointed archbishop.
At this time, also, was undertaken the repair and completion of the
cathedral, and thus what had long been a ruin and an unfinished thing
was in a fair way to be speedily completed.
The rebuilding of the choir stimulated the desire to carry the entire
work to a finish, and a sort of second foundation-stone was laid by
Frederick William IV. of Prussia on September 4, 1842, when the newly
restored choir was also reopened.
[Illustration: Cologne Cathedral in 1820 From and old Print]
In 1848 the nave had sufficiently progressed to allow of its being
consecrated; which ceremony took place at seven o'clock in the morning
of August 14th, six hundred years after the commencement of the choir.
High mass was celebrated by the archbishop, in the presence of Archduke
John, King Frederick William of Prussia, and a host of other notables.
Within the next twenty years much progress was made in the work of
completing the southern nave, the west front--with those enormous
pretentious towers--the transepts, and the triforium and clerestory of
the nave and transepts.
In 1863 the wall between the fragmentary nave and the choir was removed
and the structure opened from end to end.
Before 1870 the western towers were spired, though the final touches
were not given to them until quite 1880. Now that they are finished,
there is an undeniable elegance and symmetry which cannot be gainsaid,
though they were certainly heavily massed in the early views one sees of
the cathedral in its unfinished state. One still remarks the
apparent--and real--stubbiness of the edifice which, as Fergusson said,
would have been alleviated if the overhanging transepts had been
omitted. Why they should have been omitted it is hard to conceive, and
the criticism does not seem a reasonable one, in spite of the fact that
a certain sense of length is wanting.
The nave is undoubtedly very broad, but it has double aisles which
satisfactorily accounts for this.
Professor Freeman draws a significant contrast between the outline of
the cathedrals at Cologne and Amiens.
"Amiens has no outline," says he; meaning that there is a paucity of the
picturesqueness of irregularity in its sky-line. "Only at Cologne," he
continues, "is this outline seen in its perfect state, and Cologne is a
French church on German soil, just as Westminster is a French church on
English soil."
Indeed, among all the great cathedrals it is only at Cologne that we
find a pair of western towers with any kind of dignity and proportion.
The west front of Cologne is pretty much all tower, with the nave rather
rudely crowded between the two. These towers are in reality of such vast
bulk that they outflank the nave considerably, as do their smaller
counterparts at Wells, though here at Cologne the great transepts
overflow the width even of these great towers of the façade.
There is a noble simplicity and yet a wealth of warmth and feeling in
this church, which runs the whole gamut of Gothic, from the thirteenth
to the sixteenth centuries. From this latter date, however, the style
did not change, but was carried out with that devotion to the original
plan which should have inspired the imitators of Gothic in our own time
to have done better than they have.
The clerestoried choir of Cologne more nearly follows the French variety
than does any other in Germany; indeed no other in Germany in any way
approaches the dignity and harmony of those magnificent _chevets_ which
the French builders, for a hundred years before Cologne, had so proudly
reared.
Metz in a way also reflects the same motive, though that cathedral in
many other respects is French.
The apside is supported by twenty-eight flying buttresses, which again
are an echo from France; this time of Beauvais; and certainly, if they
do not excel the French type, they at least quite rival it in beauty and
grace.
One enters through a magnificently planned vestibule and comes at once,
not into darkness, but into a subdued and religious atmosphere which is
quite in keeping with the spirit of devotion.
There are numerous monuments scattered about, and there are eight
fifteenth-century tapestries from the Gobelins' factory.
The organ-case is unusually ornate and dates from 1572.
The pulpit is not perhaps so elaborate as one might expect from the
general splendour surrounding it, but its sculpture is distinctly good.
In the choir, on the screens above the stalls, is a series of restored
frescoes which came to light after a coating of whitewash had been
removed. They were admirably restored by Steinle in the mid-nineteenth
century and are very beautiful. The decorations depict scenes from the
life of the Virgin and are also reproduced in part in the glass of the
lady-chapel.
A modern altar, in the mediæval style, has replaced the
seventeenth-century Renaissance work, which is manifestly for the
better, judging from the old engravings that one sees of the former
unlovely altar.
The glass throughout is hardly of the excellence that one might expect,
but the effect is undeniably good. A portion of that in the Chapel of
the Three Kings is a relic of the old Romanesque cathedral, while that
of the north aisle of the nave dates from the time of Dürer.
That of the windows of the Chapel of the Three Kings has been called one
of the most beautiful pages out of the book of the fifteenth-century
glass-worker. The subject referred to is, of course, "The Adoration of
the Magi."
The capitals of the columns of the nave and choir are superbly foliaged,
and add much to the general sumptuous appearance of the interior.
Before the Chapel of the Three Kings are many tombs; the most remarkable
being that which covered the remains of Marie de Medici, who died in
exile at Cologne in 1642. One knows that after the death of the crafty
Richelieu the body of the queen was transported to St. Denis, there to
rest with others of the long line of kings and queens there buried, but
the heart remained at Cologne, and, next to the relics of the Three
Kings, it is the chief "sight" of interest to inquisitive tourists.
The casket in which repose the relics of the Three Magi is a masterwork
of the goldsmith's art of the twelfth century. Incrusted on its surface
were more than fifteen hundred precious jewels, although some have
disappeared in the course of the ages. Among them is a topaz of
monstrous size, which excites the admiration of all who set eyes upon
it.
In 1794 the canons transported the casket to Arnsberg, to Prague, and to
Frankfort, their financial difficulties of the time forcing them to
sell the crowns with which the skulls were adorned. Since then other
coronets have replaced the first, set with gems and stones brought from
Bohemia.
On the 23d July, 1164, these relics were first deposited in the ancient
cathedral, from which they were subsequently transferred to the new
edifice amid much ceremony.
In their first resting-place they were guarded only by a simple iron
grille up to the time when the archbishop Maximilian Henry constructed
the _ædicule_ which encloses them to-day.
On the pediment of this screen is sculptured an "Adoration of the Magi,"
by Michel Van der Voorst of Antwerp. There are also figures of St. Felix
and St. Nabor, and two female figures bearing the arms of the
Metropolitan Chapter.
On the frieze is the following inscription:
TRIBUS AB ORIENTE REGIBUS
DEVICTO IN AGNITIONE VERI NUMINIS
MUNDO
CAPITULUM METROPOL EREXIT.
And above the great window, whose grille is opened on ceremonial
occasions to allow the public a better view of the relics, is graven
the following:
CORPORA SANCTORUM RECUBANT HIC
TERNA MAGORUM
EX HIS SUBLATUM NIHIL EST ALIBIVE
LOCATUM.
Finally one reads the following single line placed between the columns
at the right and left of the relics:
"_Et apertis thesauris suis, obtulerunt munera._"
Behind the reliquary which encloses the skulls is a bas-relief in marble
representing the solemn journey by which the relics were first brought
from Milan. A bas-relief in bronze, richly gilded, represents an
"Adoration." It was the gift of Jacques de Croy, Duc de Cambrai, in
1516. The window above contains some fine glass of the thirteenth
century.
Before the high altar are four great candelabra of reddish copper, cast
at Liège in 1770.
The sculptured stalls of wood, which range themselves in a double row in
the choir, are notable for the profusion of figures of men and animals
which they show in their carving. They are perhaps not comparable with
the stalls at Amiens and at Antwerp, nor with those in Ste. Cécile at
Albi in France; but they merit, nevertheless, a very high rank for
excellence, and are very extensive as to size and number.
[Illustration: _Stone-masons' marks, Cologne Cathedral_]
To sum up, the cathedral at Cologne has had the good fortune to have
been carried out in a pure and distinct German form of Gothic without
the interpolation of any _outré_ disfigurements. It is a sumptuous
edifice, perhaps the grandest, in general effect, of any church in
Europe, not even forgetting the splendid cathedrals at Reims, Amiens, or
Chartres, all of which stand out from among their surroundings in much
the same imposing manner as does Cologne.
One recognizes even to-day on the stones of Cologne's cathedral certain
cryptogramic marks which are supposed to be merely the identifying
marks of some particular stonemason's labour, and are not, as has been
doubtfully advanced from time to time, of any other significance
whatever.
[Illustration]
XXVI
THE CHURCHES OF COLOGNE
The popular interest in Cologne, the ancient _Colonia Agrippina_ of the
Romans, and the romantic incidents connected with it, are so great that
one might devote a large volume to the city, and then the half of its
legend and history would not have been told.
Cologne is one of the most ancient cities of Germany. It takes its place
beside Trèves and Mayence as one of the earliest seats of Christianity;
but the actual date of the establishment of the church in Cologne is
lost in obscurity.
There were undoubtedly persons professing the Christian faith in the
colony in the third century, and toward the year 312 the Emperor
Constantine, having embraced the faith himself, gave his protection to
its adherents throughout his colonies.
The church of St. Peter at Cologne contains a painting presented to it
by Rubens in memory of the fact that he was baptized before the altar
of this church. Of this picture, a "Crucifixion of St. Peter," Sir
Joshua Reynolds wrote:
"It was painted a little time before Rubens's death. The body and head
of the saint are the only good parts in this picture, which, however, is
finely coloured and well drawn; but the figure bends too suddenly from
the thighs, which are ill drawn, or, rather, in a bad taste of drawing;
as is likewise his arm, which has a short interrupted outline. The
action of the malefactors has not that energy which he usually gave to
his figures. Rubens, in his letters to Gildorp, expresses his own
approbation of this picture, which he says was the best he ever painted;
he likewise expresses his content and happiness in the subject, as being
picturesque; this is likewise natural to such a mind as that of Rubens,
who was perhaps too much looking about him for the picturesque, or
something uncommon. A man with his head downwards is certainly a more
extraordinary object than if the head were in its natural place. Many
parts of this picture are so feebly drawn, and with so tame a pencil,
that I cannot help suspecting that Rubens died before he had completed
it, and that it was finished by some of his scholars."
St. Maria in Capitola, one of Cologne's famous churches, stands on the
site of the ancient capital of the Romans. It is one of the most perfect
examples extant of a triapsed church, though the three apses themselves
are supposed to have been an afterthought added in the twelfth century,
whereas the nave dates from the century before. The nave, too, has an
interpolation or addition to its original form in that a Gothic roof was
added some three hundred years after it had first been covered with a
plain wooden ceiling.
The three apses unfold grandly, with the high altar in the most easterly
or middle termination.
The general effect of the interior is decidedly high coloured, with much
polychromatic decoration and painted glass. In the Hardenrath chapel are
found the most striking of these mural decorations, which are
interesting as illustrating a certain phase of art, if not for their
supreme excellence.