The boat pulled out of Dresden early in the morning. As we woke up, we saw the great churches and palaces of that city drifting past us. It took a couple hours for the boat to make it to our first destination of the day, the small city of Meissen. Although Dresden today is the important political and cultural center, in early centuries that distinction belonged to Meissen. During the fifteenth century this was the seat of the Elector of Saxony and the see city of the diocese covering lower Saxony. It faded in importance when the capital was moved to Dresden, and after the Reformation the Diocese of Meissen was dissolved after a majority its clergy and laity became Lutheran.
In the early eighteenth century, however, Meissen became significant again when chemists and craftsmen working for Augustus the Strong discovered the formula for making porcelain. Augustus, hoping for a monopoly on European porcelain production, picked Meissen as the center for production of the precious commodity. The secret did not last; ten years later porcelain was being produced in other European locations. But Meissen stayed as the center of Saxon porcelain production and has been celebrated for the quality of its ceramic products for two centuries.
Our tour of the city began with a tour of the Meissen factory. Normally I find this sort of thing really annoying as the “tour” is mostly about shoving the poor tourist into a gift shop to endure a hard sales pitch. But I had heard from others that there was not much of a push to buy the product here and that the museum attached to the factory was wonderful. Both of those things proved to be true.
We did not really enter the factory. Instead, the tour goes through several demonstration rooms. Each room has a craftsman working while taped narrator explains the different steps in the process. We watched as the porcelain clay was tossed on a wheel, formed into shapes in molds, and also shaped by hand.
We watched pieces being painted by hand
and learned the difference between underpainting and overpainting porcelain. It is much more interesting than I expected it to be.
One of the things I found quite curious what just how porcelain shrinks every time it is fired. They showed us two versions of the same piece. As you can see, one is smaller. It did not start out that way.
At the end of the demonstrations, we were shown the gift shop but we were also invited to visit the factory’s museum on the second and third floors. This proved to be absolutely fascinating. There were hundreds of pieces on display from all periods of porcelain production at Meissen. Most were exactly what you might expect
though some were not exactly what I think of with Meissen.
Large porcelain animals are a speciality.
John was fascinated by “Feast and Folly,” a rather salacious new piece.
I was more interested in the partitive organ with porcelain pipes. I doubt it sounds that great.
Leaving the factory we had to cross the street. When the German Democratic Republic came to an end, few people wanted to keep anything from that era. Except one thing … the walk lights! Everybody loves the old East German walking man.
After we finished at the factory, we were driven close to the center of the old town. Meissen escaped bombing during the Second World War and its historic core is beautifully preserved. For example, the old city gate
leads into a large square. Here you can see the “dom”, as the Germans call cathedrals, as well as the old elector’s palace. Our guide was Gertun, and she was sweet and knowledgable. We both felt a little guilty for finding her rather dull.
John is normally not the one who wants to go into a church, but he found the towering black cathedral intriguing, particularly as he could hear the organ playing inside.
We learned that there was going to be an organ concert in about an hour, but we would not be in Meissen long enough for that. For a modest contribution, we were still allowed to explore the church. We not only listened to the organist practice, but had the opportunity to watch him as well.
It’s hard to quite explain why this church is so quintessentially Lutheran.
The clear balance of preaching,
baptism,
and the table of the Lord’s Supper is definitely Lutheran. But it is mostly I think that stark focus on the passion of Christ that comes close to defining the Lutheran sensibility. Unlike Catholicism, the community recedes in importance here. It is the sinful believer facing a just yet gracious God that is the essence of Lutheran spirituality.
Theology aside, the building is an interesting bit of late Gothic architecture. It has soaring ribbed vaulting like most of these ancient buildings.
But it also has retained some of the original coloring of the stones. We think of Gothic architecture as cold and gray, but originally the structures were brightly painted. Some of that remains here.
Less colorful and more unique to this cathedral, of course, is the use of Meissen porcelain on the altar.
After about twenty minutes in the cathedral we decided we should rejoin our guide and our tour group. We found our way doing to the market square where we were supposed to all meet up and go back to the ship.
We all stopped briefly to listen to the porcelain carillon in the bell tower.
It was far less impressive than the one in Dresden.
As we ate our lunch on the bow, the boat pulled out of Meissen. I had not expected that much from this stop on the river, but it proved to be a quite memorable moment in the trip.
After lunch, we watched the pastoral countryside as we floated down the river. This was a perfect afternoon, clear and cool.
The animals seemed to be enjoying the day as much as we were.
If it weren’t for the occasional car or electric power lines I would have thought I had somehow drifted into a John Constable painting.
At dinner time we docked in Torgau. I have to admit that this is the one town on this trip that I had never heard of before even though it is historically quite important. I learned some things at this stop.
In 1945, this was the place where American and Red Army troops met up, officially closing the Eastern and Western fronts of the war. Keiran, our guide, kept referring to them as “Russians” but they were actually Ukrainian soldiers and few Ukrainians today would be willing to be identified as Russians. Germany had effectively lost the war by this point, but this completely sealed its fate. At statue marks the spot. As the East German government erected it, the hammer and sickle is more prominent than the Stars and Stripes.
The bridge where the forces met has been replaced with a new one. But a small portion of the old bridge has been left to mark the spot.
Torgau was extensively damaged in the war but has been almost completely rebuilt. This is because it was so important during the Reformation. Torgau was a center of Saxon government, and the Elector of Saxony became a supporter Martin Luther’s cause. The importance of this alliance cannot be overstressed. Previous reformers, people like Wycliff and Hus, failed to attract powerful political patrons. Luther succeeded here, and that meant that the Reformation succeeded. But there was a cost, too. Wycliff and Hus imagined a simple Christian community detached from political power. They foreshadowed the Anabaptists more than the Lutherans or the Calvinists. Luther’s embrace of the Saxon state ensured that his movement would prosper, but also established a pattern of Protestant subservience to political authority that would continue well into the Nazi era.
Schloss Hartenfels is the magnificent Saxon castle here. The grand entry still shows the Prince Elector’s coat of arms.
Its central staircase is a masterpiece of North Renaissance architecture.
There are other lovely architectural details as well such as these windows.
Less lovely from a modern point of view is the “bear moat” surrounding the castle. There are still three females brown bears kept here. They had gone to bed for the evening when we arrived.
Keiran took us through the center of town.
He gave us a lot of history, and John listened attentively. He had the good sense to sit down.
Torgau has a LOT of Lutheran history. Not only was this the home of Luther’s patron, but the very first chapel designed for Lutheran worship was in the castle. But wait, as they say in those television commercials, there’s more. It was here that the first drafts of the Augsburg Confession was written. And, for real Lutheran theology buffs, it was here that the Formula of Concord, the Declaration of the Formula of Concord, and the Book of Concord were penned.
And there is more Lutheran stuff here than simply disputations about justification by faith and consubstantiation to Torgau. Luther’s rather formidable wife Kathe left Wittenburg after her husband’s death to avoid plague. She came here to Torgau. Unfortunately, she had some kind of unfortunately accident in an oxcart and died of her injuries not only after. This is where she died
and she is buried somewhere in the parish church here.
I found all this rather interesting though my enthusiasm was not shared by my friend in the window.
I do think that most dogs are Catholic, anyhow. Cats are definitely Presbyterian.
Tomorrow we go to the heart of Lutherland, the city of Wittenberg.
