The Beauty of Belief

Decorating the Württemberg Church During the Reformation
Erscheinungsjahr 2025
ISBN: 978-90-04-34862-2
Verlag: Brill

Buch, Englisch, 314 Seiten, Format (B × H): 163 mm x 241 mm, Gewicht: 621 g

Reihe: St Andrews Studies in Reformation History

The Beauty of Belief sheds new light on Lutheran relationships with ecclesiastical decoration in southwest Germany following the Duchy of Württemberg’s Reformation in 1534. Based on extensive original archival research and engagement with surviving images and objects, Róisín Watson compellingly demonstrates how Lutherans moved away from initial acts of iconoclasm and towards embracing the possibilities of the religious image in their devotional routines. She explores the interactions of Württemberg rulers, pastors, and congregations with their ecclesiastical spaces across the political upheavals of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In doing so, this book tells not only the story of the visual culture of the Reformation, but an account of Württemberg’s Reformation itself.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Watson, Róisín

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtswissenschaft Allgemein
• Geisteswissenschaften Kunst Kunstgeschichte

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Acknowledgements

List of Figures and Maps

Abbreviations

Notes on Conventions

Introduction

1 The “Childish Work” of the Image Question

2 The Image Question in Historical Perspective

3 Württemberg and the Image Question

4 Building the Württemberg Church—Nobility, Pastors, and Parishioners

Part1 The “Beautiful Decoration”—The Ducal House of Württemberg

Introduction

1 The Württemberg Reformation

1 Debating Images: The Württemberg Dukes and the Image Question in the Sixteenth Century

1 The Image Question before the Peace of Augsburg

2 The Augsburg Interim

3 Württemberg after the Peace of Augsburg

4 Württemberg Church Interiors at the End of the Sixteenth Century

5 Conclusion

2 Commissioning Images: Artists and Lutheran Art at the Württemberg Court

1 Artists and Art Markets in Württemberg

2 The Mömpelgard and Gotha Altarpieces

3 The Stuttgart Castle Chapel

4 The Stuttgart Lusthaus

5 Conclusion

Part2 The “Master Builders”—Pastors

Introduction

3 Defining Images: Württemberg Pastors and the Demarcation of Church Space

1 Freudenstadt

2 Kirchheim unter Teck

3 Teaching with Church Interiors

4 Conclusion

4 Overseeing Images: Württemberg Pastors and the Management of Church Interiors

1 Supporting Church Interiors

2 Securing Funding

3 Controlling Church Interiors—The Case of Ennabeuren

4 Conclusion

Part3 The “Building Bricks”—Congregations and Individuals

Introduction

5 Bequeathing Images: Donors and Donation in the Later Reformation

1 Supporting Church Interiors

2 Donors and Donations

3 Conclusion

6 Commemorating Images: Memory, Piety and the Lutheran Funerary Monument

1 To Demonstrate Faith

2 To Demonstrate Love

3 To Be of Use to the Living

4 Conclusion

7 Contemplating Images: Magdalena Sibylla von Württemberg and Lutheran Visual Piety in the Late Seventeenth Century

1 The Stetten Emblem Cycle

2 Lutheranism in Seventeenth-Century Württemberg

3 The Image Question and Ways of Seeing in the Late Seventeenth Century

4 Reading the Stetten Emblems

5 Conclusion

Conclusion

Bibliography

Index

Über Autor(innen)

Róisín Watson is a cultural historian of early modern Germany. Following her Ph.D. at the University of St Andrews, she lectured at the University of Oxford before joining The Open University as a Lecturer in Early Modern History. She publishes research on religion and visual cultures.