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History of the "Kölner Domblatt" (Cologne Cathedral Paper)
"Official notes of Central Cathedral building society, with historic, artistic and literary articles published by the managing board” - thus the subtitle read of the society's organ published first in 1842.
The first issue of Germany's oldest magazine with emphasis in art history still published was four pages thick, printed on newsprint and made public as an insert in Sundays edition of “Kölnische Zeitung” (“Cologne newspaper”) - a support free of charge by the publishing company DuMont-Schauberg (publisher Joseph DuMont himself was member in of the “Central Cologne Cathedral building society”).
On page 1 the readers learnt the spirit of the publication: the “official part” contained “protocols, reports, notifications, circularisations, demand notes, etc. of Central Cologne Cathedral building society” and published “the registers of members and the contributions (…); so that the 'Cologne Cathedral Paper' in this official part” represented “a complete archive of all endeavours and accomplishments of Central Cologne Cathedral building society and of benevolent societies associated in its entire extent”.
The second part was supposed to “cover the history of mediaeval art of construction in general, but ought to communicate in particular all that remained treasured about the history of Cologne Cathedral and its architecture.”
It wanted to “indicate and seek to implement what bears reference in general historical and art historical regard to our Cathedral or otherwise bears upon the theory and technique of ecclesiastical architecture of the Middle Ages, (…) presenting views, opinions, suggestions etc. of all kinds concerning the modus of continuing construction, procurement and increase construction resources etc., withal giving free rein to every convincement and understanding and excluding no other than those apparently conflicting with the purpose of the association, the completion of the work itself.”
The Cologne Cathedral paper served also as a forum for discussion, in which methods and ways of the Cathedral’s complementation was argued. At the beginning weekly, later on every two weeks issued, the association’s organ was published since the beginning of the eighteen-seventies in increasingly greater intervals and contained fewer and fewer art historical articles.
In 1877 only one single issue was released, which solely consisted of the management board’s minutes in abbreviated versions.
Attempts to achieve reforms by August Reichensperger and the town’s registrar Leonard Ennen, who wanted to offer financial incentives to potential authors of essays for the paper in the form of remunerations, encountered resistance of several board members, who did not consider a revival of the Cologne Cathedral paper necessary.
Although Ennen and Reichensperger asserted themselves, the paper recorded again six issues 1878, it was 1880, the year of Cologne Cathedral’s completion, with only two issues already in a crises again.
Not even the ceremonial act of Cologne Cathedral’s completion in October was documented with a commemorative publication. The next Cologne Cathedral paper not before 1882 again.
The historian Kathrin Pilger commented on this development in her book about the history of the Central Cologne Cathedral building society* like this: “the decline of the Kölner Domblatt is a distinct sign for a ceasing demand in communication altogether within the association and here especially between society’s management and society’s basis – its members.
On the part of the top management one was not endeavoured to intensify again the contact with the members. Spoken exaggeratedly in the decade of the Cathedral’s completion the association was constituted of its forty members of the management board only.
This elitist social circle had only minor interest in a wide appeal of the Cathedral building project not least because of completely secured financing.
Economic responsible citizens like Oppenheim were to a great extent negligent of the artistic aspect of the Cathedral building, which had been playing an important part in motivating the members originally.
The Domblatt had thereby lost its right to exist both as communication organ and centre of publishing Cologne's Cologne Cathedral research and inevitably did no longer have to be issued regularly henceforth.”
Domblatt – Silent period 1893 – 1947
1880 Cologne Cathedral was completed, but the clearing work (above all the removal
of scaffolds of the towers) took still years. So for a while Cologne Cathedral paper was still issued irregularly until 1885 and finally published 1892 in an edition summarising several years, before it was discontinued for the time being.
In 1902, when the Cathedral clearance – which had been going on at the same time as Cologne Cathedral building - had come to a conclusion, master builder Karl Eduard Richard Voigtel declared with strong conviction, that no substantial restoration of Cologne Cathedral will be needed in the next 100 years. But as early as one year later his successor Bernhard Hertel warned in a thick expert report, that the cathedral choir (“Domchor”) might be endangered by weather effects. And 1906 it manifested dramatically and by a second warning, this time “from above”, that Voigtel had been profoundly mistaken:
A piece from an angel figurine's wing at the Wimperg of the Three Kings portal (left side-portal of the west façade) broke loose and fell off right in front of the seminarians, who were just leaving Cologne Cathedral through the main entrance after Sunday's High Mass.
Miraculously an umbrella opened just this minute deflected the stone, so that it did not hurt anybody.
Since then it was definitely clear: Central Cologne Cathedral building society would always be needed by Cologne Cathedral. However the society released Cologne Cathedral paper not until after the Second World War: Since 1948 it is published annually in December each time. The contents are, although produced with considerable expenditure and in bigger complexity, all things considered similar to the ones described in the first issue of 1842:
reports concerning the progress of Cologne Cathedral’s preservation, art historical articles and essays regarding the art of construction in the Middle Ages, especially in the context of Cologne Cathedral and its history, and reports from the association, diocesan chapter, Cologne Cathedral builder's hut and Cologne Cathedral building administration.
For some time past all editions of the Domblatt volumes 1842 through 1892 are digitalised entirely (original illustrations of all 2259 pages) to be found on the internet presence of the university library of Heidelberg. Digitalising all remaining editions through the present is a work in progress.
*Kathrin Pilger: Der Kölner Zentral-Dombau-Verein im 19. Jahrhundert. Konstituierung des Bürgertums durch formale Organisation, Köln 2004
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