wheel chandelier

The wheel, its gates, and its towers, which are usually decorated with Prophets and Apostles or inscribed with their names, symbolise the city walls of the New Jerusalem. The buttresses, towers, and candles number twelve or a multiple of twelve, after the numerology of the Book of Revelation. This symbolism is first found on two wheel chandeliers of Hildesheim Cathedral. The great wheel chandelier of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was an inspiration.

In Germany there are four great Romanesque wheel chandeliers. The fact that they are made from fire-gilt copper and not from pure gold has saved them from being melted down. They were decorated with Prophets and angels in silver and with precious gemstones, but for the most part these have been lost. • The Barbarossa chandelier in Aachen Cathedral is attributed to Frederick Barbarossa (1122–1190). • Hartwig's chandelier in Comburg, Schwäbisch Hall, with a 5-metre diameter, from the 12th century (also called Himmlische Jerusalem(Heavenly Jerusalem) with saints and soldiers in the towers. • Hezilo chandelier in Hildesheim Cathedral with a 6-metre diameter, a donation of Bishop Hezilo of Hildesheim (1054–79). • Azelin chandelier in Hildesheim Cathedral with a donation inscription of Bishop Thietmar of Hildesheim (1038–44).

The wheel chandeliers of the Gothic period in Germany are smaller in size than the Romanesque ones, and they are no longer representations of Jerusalem. The chandelier made of brass in Münster Cathedral has a circular pierced rim decorated with a few statuettes on its side, and ornamented with tracery-work like filigree and pinnacles. In the Minster Church of St. Alexander in Einbeck there is a later gothic wheel chandelier of painted brass with a diameter of c. 3.5 metres. The inscription on its bracket dates it to 1420. It was presumably gifted by Degenhard Ree, a canon of the collegiate church. The composition ought to go back to a lost example in Pöhlde Cloister. Another Gothic example is one in bronze found in the Cathedral of St. Stephan and St. Sixtus in Halberstadt (1516).

• Illustration — Electric wheel chandelier in St. Elisabeth Bonn In some neo-Romanesque churches there are large wheel chandeliers too. Some of these were electric even when they were first installed Some examples: • St. Godehard's Basilica in Hildesheim, gifted in 1864 by Marie of Saxe-Altenburg • St. Cäcilia in Harsum (c.1886) • Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune in Strasbourg (c.1890) • Bethlehemkirche in Hannover (c.1904) • St. Elisabeth in Bonn under contemporary frescoes in the dome (c. 1910) (electrified from installation)

• Illustration — Wagon wheel chandelier There are also contemporary wheel chandeliers, which continue this tradition: • Herrenhäuser Kirche in Hannover (c. 1990) • Great St. Martin Church in Cologne (before 1993) • Church of Kloster Lippoldsberg (1999)

Another type is the wagon wheel chandelier. As its name suggests, it is usually made from old wagon wheels. As opposite to most of the wheel chandeliers, wagon wheel chandeliers were usually created as a cheap way to lighten the common spaces of large houses, businesses and public halls. Most of them were made from wood reinforced with steel.