Cloister Garden @museum.de

M 1: We’ve moved on to 1552. In the diocese of Magdeburg, Martin Luther's Reformation has gained more and more followers. Large parts of the population have converted from Roman Catholicism to the new Protestant faith. The monasteries were just another thorn in Luther's side – because of their loyalty to Roman Catholic teachings, their large estates and the power derived from them. The monasteries in the diocese of Magdeburg were dissolved, and their properties put to secular uses. Only three elderly canons remained and continued to hold services. That same year, 1552, a nobleman called Hans von Krusemark took possession of the monastic buildings and turned them into a manor. For the time being, prayer, contemplation and pastoral care were no longer major concerns here.

F 2: Over the following centuries, everything that didn’t contribute to the management of the new estate vanished: the altars and stained glass windows in the church, the Paschal candle stand, and the ornate arcade windows overlooking the inner courtyard. Many items were simply dumped into the courtyard of the cloister. In the late 1970s, the ground level there was about 80 centimetres or more than two and a half feet higher than it is today, so it was stripped back. That produced many exciting finds. For example, the decoration, or tracery, on the cloister’s medieval windows was discovered. Coloured fragments of the old church windows were excavated, too.

But the most spectacular find came about rather earlier, in the 19th century, when the Romanesque Paschal candle stand was unearthed. It has stood inside the church ever since.