Life behind monastery walls

Sources:

Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, Kloster Ranshofen Deed 2 (so-called founding certificate of the Stift Ranshofen, 1125). Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, Library 2°E 1a/2 Michael Wening, Historico-Topographica Descriptio ..., Vol. 32, Table 33 (Stich des Klosters Ranshofen, 1721). Bayerischer Hauptstaatsarchiv, KL Seeon 65, fol 23 (Kuchlbuch der Benediktinerabtei Seeon, 1531). Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, Landesdirektion in Ständic Klostersachen 3386 (Inventory of Klosterapotheke Frauenchiemsee, 1803). Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, Manuscriptensammlung 686 (History of the Cancellation of the Ranshofen Pen, 1811).

Points of attachment:

Where do we find remains of the Middle Ages in our region? What role did the Church play in everyday life and in the culture of the Middle Ages? What did monks and nuns eat? What sold a monastery apotheke? Could you just go to the doctor before? What happens to the archives of an abandoned monastery? How did today's Bavaria originate? What impact does Bavaria's historical development have on my home region?

The first news about the Ranshofen monastery dates from the time of Emperor Charles the Great. At that time Duke Tassilo III reigned in Bavaria, who owned a Palatinate in the settlement of Ranteshofen. Among them you can imagine a small farm holding in the form of a farm. The monastery of Ranshofen itself originated from the Palatinate Chapel and is detectable by 1125 as Augustiner-Chorherren-Stift. During the Middle Ages, the monastery was given more and more property and more extensive rights. Specifically, this meant: more basic subjects and higher revenues. The land that belonged to the monastery, cultivated peasants who were obliged to do so as land subjects. In documents preserved until today, the monastery was able to confirm its rights and possessions by the Emperor. In the 12th century Emperor Konrad II presented. a confirmation that was so important for the monastery that it was kept fireproof in a custom metal container.

The Ranshofen monastery, like other landlords, increased its lands and, together with other Bavarian monasteries in the Middle Ages, created the foundations of the cultural landscape, which today still dominates the face of Bavaria.

After Ranshofen had survived the confusions of the 30-year war, the monastery experienced in the 17th and 18th. century a flowering period. A great baroque monastery complex with magnificent church and representative buildings were built and the economic buildings and gardens were expanded. There was a flower, herbal and vegetable garden as well as a large orchard. The monks who lived in the monastery were largely fed by the products of their own agriculture (medicine) and the natural taxes of their subjects.

A cube book in the form of an immersive menu from the monastery of Seeon provides information about the eating habits in the monastery. Seasonally and regionally, cereals and soups, eggs and cheese as well as fruits after the season were often on the table. On fast days there was only a warm meal and occasionally fish. Only on feast days there were meat in the form of poultry. roasts, carvings, potatoes or tomatoes were in the 16th. Century in Bavaria still unknown.

A monastery like Ranshofen lived not only from its base subjects. In return, it also ensured them. It often acted as a sort of savings bank and almost always there was a pharmacy in which a holy monk or a holy nun prepared from the gardens of the monastery medicines, which were also issued to the population in the countryside. There was no supply of doctors to the population today. The inventory of the monastery apothetics lists the equipment and contains tinctures, extracts and water. Some of them are still known today as domestic agents such as linden blossom and chamomile tea, others only as ornamental plants in the garden such as Benedictine root or Angelica. Belladonna or rabies has largely disappeared from the house apotheke because the danger of poisoning is too high.

With the abolition of the monasteries (secularization) around 1800, this relationship with the population also ended. Many monasteries were sold and continued privately with some luck.

The monastery of Ranshofen was affected twice by secularization. Until the peace of Teschen in 1779, the Innviertel, in which Ranshofen – today a district of Braunau – is located, was Bavarian. With the assignment of the Innviertel it came to Austria. The monastery of Ranshofen was not lifted by the Austrian emperor Josef II because of its still in Bavarian possessions, but was severely circumcised. The reorganization of Braunau to a fortress in 1799 and the Napoleonic wars took place at the expense of the monastery: some buildings were broken off, distribution payments, quarters, epidemics and plunderings shook humanly and financially at the foundation of the monastery. The number of choir rulers decreased sharply and the finances were worse and worse. Between 1810 and 1816 the Innviertel belonged to Bavaria again. Although in the rest of Bavaria the monasteries had already been completed, in October 1811 a revocation commission came to Ranshofen. This ended the time of the monastery life. The documents, books and other documents stored in the Ranshofen pen archive were scattered throughout the world. Documents documenting important legal claims and possessions were taken to Munich – they are now stored in the Bavarian Main State Archive. Further documents can be found in the Upper Austrian Landesarchiv in Linz. Volumes of the library reached the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich, the Bodlein Library in Oxford and the Russian State Library in St. Petersburg.

Immediately after his inauguration in 1825, King Ludwig I began to promote existing monasteries in Bavaria and to support the establishment of new monasteries. In this sense, the nursing in the General Hospital in Munich was transferred to the merciful sisters of St. Vincent von Paul. In particular, Ludwig lay the orders in education and teaching, such as the English misses and the poor school sisters and the Benedictines.

Course reference:

Methodology competence, judgment competence, orientation competence Nationality and Cultural Heritage (Gymnasium, Class 8), Society between Inequality and Equality (Gymnasium, Class 11), Aspects of European History – Concepts and Forms of Order

Further information:

www.bavarikon.dewww.gda.bayern.de/www.kulturgueter.kath-orden.atwww.doris.at/themes/history/history.aspx