kaple Tří otců v Mikulášovicích Chapel

The Chapel of Three Fathers, also called the Chapel of the Coronation of the Virgin Mary, is a Baroque building in Mikulášovice. In German it was called Väters Kapelle and was previously also known as Bäterova kaple. It dates from seventeen ten and is therefore the oldest of the local chapels.

It received its name from those who built it. The construction was paid for by three fathers from the neighborhood, and one of them was a merchant Zacharias Hille. The chapel served from the beginning also as a bell tower for the lower part of Mikulášovice. The bell rang regularly at noon and in the evening, in summer at seven p.m. and in winter at five p.m. It also sounded when someone in the area died. On Easter Sunday, Easter riders would stop at the chapel and in May, May devotions were held here every week.

During the First World War, the bell had to be removed and melted down. After the war, people from the neighborhood pooled their money for a new one. The chapel then served as a bell tower until the end of the Second World War.

After the expulsion of the original inhabitants, nobody took care of the chapel, just like the other Mikulášovice chapels. Soon after the war, the doors and all the interior furnishings disappeared. Inside there used to be a wooden altar opposite the doors, two wooden benches, each for four or five people, and rich decorative images. The building deteriorated, although it has been protected as a cultural monument since nineteen sixty-six. At the beginning of the twenty-first century it was in a deplorable state. The roof and tower were rusty and falling apart, and stones in the façade were coming loose.

A turning point came with a general renovation in two thousand thirteen. The interior and exterior plaster and stone façade were repaired. The roof and tower were completely replaced.

The chapel is built on an almost square floor plan. It has stone masonry which is plastered on three sides, only the façade is faced with sandstone. The most distinctive feature is a massive onion-shaped dome with a small tower, in which the bell used to be. Since two thousand eighteen, the chapel has contained an image with the motif of the Coronation of the Virgin Mary by Tomáš Bodor.

The chapel belongs to the city of Mikulášovice. It is used irregularly, usually once a year during a novena to the Holy Spirit.