ANNO . INCARNA.
DNI . MC.C.V.I.I.I.I.
PMO . IPERII . AN
NO . OTTONIS . A
DOLFO . COLON
EPO . SOPHIA . A
BBA . MAGISTER
WOLBERO . PO
SUIT . PMU . LAP
IDE . FUNDAME
NTI . HUI . TEM
PLI . I . DIE . SCI . DI
ONISII . MAR.
When a former Count of Clèves founded the primitive church here in the ninth century, it was a collegiate church attached to the abbey of which the mother superior was the Abbess Sophia, presumably the same referred to in the above inscription. The abbey itself was destroyed in 1199 during a civil warfare.
Though not really a massive structure, the church of St. Quirinus is, in every particular, of a strength and solidity which rank it as a masterwork of its age. There is nothing[{312}] weak and attenuated about it, and its transepts and apses make up in general effect what it lacks in actual area.
The façade is imposing, though decidedly bizarre when compared with the simple flowing lines of Gothic; but, on the whole, the effect is one of a certain grandeur.
The aisles are astonishingly tall when compared with the nave.
There are various meetings of round-arched windows and arcades with those of a pointed nature, but there is not the slightest evidence of a development or transition from one to the other, hence the Gothic strain may be said not to exist.
The general effect of the exterior is polychromatic, which is not according to the best conceptions of ecclesiastical decorations in architecture. A twilight or a moonlight view, however, tones it all down in a manner that makes the fabric appear quite the most imposing church of its size that one may find in these parts.
The great central tower, reminiscent enough of the parish church in England, but not so frequent in Germany, and still less so in France, forms a great lantern which rises over the crossing in a marvellous and exceedingly[{313}] practical manner, in that it affords about the only adequate means of admitting light into the interior.
The triforium of the nave is the chief interior feature to be remarked, and is most spaciously planned. It forms the männerchöre before mentioned.
The clerestory windows are decidedly Rhenish in character, resembling, says one antiquary, who is a humourist if nothing else, an ace of clubs. At any rate, it is a most unusual and inefficient manner of lighting a great church. These windows are practically trefoils of most unsymmetrical proportions, and are in every way unlovely.