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Erlach Abbey

Benedictine monasteries in SwitzerlandBuildings and structures in BernChristian monastery stubsPrison stubsPrisons in Switzerland
Swiss building and structure stubs
SNB, GUGE NÖTHIGER F 38
SNB, GUGE NÖTHIGER F 38

Erlach Abbey or St. Johannsen Abbey (German: Kloster Erlach, otherwise Abtei St. Johannsen) was a Benedictine monastery in Gals, Canton of Bern, Switzerland. It was founded between 1093 and 1103 by Kuno, Count of Fenis and Bishop of Lausanne, on land that was then an island in the river Thielle. After Kuno's death, the abbey church was completed by his brother, Burchard, bishop of Basel. The new monastery was settled by monks from Saint Blaise Abbey. The Vogtei, initially the property of the Counts of Fenis, passed from them to the Counts of Neuchâtel-Nidau, and from them at the end of the 14th century to the city of Bern, which in took over the domain of Erlach in 1474, definitively acquiring it in 1476. The abbey was secularised between 1528 and 1529. The nave of the abbey church was demolished, but the choir and transept remained to be used for grain storage. These structures were demolished in 1961 after they had become unsafe, but the choir was rebuilt between 1970 and 1971. The other buildings remained standing, and in the 19th century were put to various industrial uses, until in 1883 the Canton of Bern bought the site back and turned it into a prison. Since 1978, it has served as an adjustment centre for young men.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Erlach Abbey (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 47.040152777778 ° E 7.071675 °
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Address

60b
3238
Bern, Switzerland
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SNB, GUGE NÖTHIGER F 38
SNB, GUGE NÖTHIGER F 38
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Nearby Places

Thielle
Thielle

The river Thielle (French: La Thielle, or La Thièle, German: Zihl), is a tributary to the Aare, in the Swiss Seeland. The Thielle results from the merging of the Orbe and Talent, northeast of the little city of Orbe in the Swiss canton of Vaud. It flows as a channel northeastwards through an intensively cultivated plain called "Plaine de l'Orbe" and flows after only 9 km into the Lake of Neuchâtel at Yverdon-les-Bains. The natural course of the river was considerably modified during the Jura water correction. Between the Lakes of Neuchâtel and Biel/Bienne it was converted into a dug-out channel. However, the previous natural bed of La Thielle still exists in some parts. The river flows out of the lake in Biel/Bienne and after 2 km merges directly into the Nidau-Büren channel, which was also dug out during the Jura water correction, ensuring the outflow of the Aare, just before the regulating dam in Port which was commissioned in 1939. Before, La Thielle used to flow into the Aare 7 km further downstream in the vicinity of Büren an der Aare. In the seventeenth century, a grand project was formed to establish a waterway transport system connecting the rivers Rhône and Rhine via the Lake of Geneva - the Venoge - and the Canal d’Entreroches - La Thielle - Aare. It unfortunately remained unfinished. A commercial waterway of this nature would have had a very significant impact on the European commercial transportation system.