Lübeck - St. Johannes-Jungfrauenkloster

The area around Lübeck, today a large city with a population of more than 200,000, had been settled by Slavs since the 7th century. Slavs had a settlement north of the present city called "Liubice", which was razed by the pagan Rani tribe in 1128.

15 years later Adolf II, Count of Schauenburg and Holstein, founded the modern town as a German settlement on the river island of Bucu. He built a new castle, first mentioned as existing in 1147. Adolf II had to cede the castle to the Duke of Saxony, Henry the Lion, in 1158. After Henry's fall from power in 1181, the town became an Imperial city. Emperor Barbarossa ordained that the city should have a ruling council of 20 members. With the council dominated by merchants, trade interests shaped Lübeck's politics for centuries.

In the 14th century, Lübeck became the "Queen of the Hanseatic League", being by far the largest and most powerful member of that medieval trade organization. In 1375, Emperor Charles IV named Lübeck one of the five "Glories of the Empire", a title shared with Venice, Rome, Pisa, and Florence.

Conflicts about trading privileges resulted in fighting between Lübeck (with the Hanseatic League) and Denmark and Norway – with varying outcome. While Lübeck and the Hanseatic League prevailed in conflicts in 1435 and 1512, Lübeck lost when it became involved in a civil war that raged in Denmark from 1534 to 1536. From then on Lübeck's power slowly declined. The city remained neutral in the Thirty Years' War, but the devastation from the decades-long war and the new transatlantic orientation of European trade caused the Hanseatic League – and thus Lübeck with it – to decline in importance. However, Lübeck still remained an important trading town on the Baltic Sea.

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When Heinrich, who had been abbot at Brunswick, was elected bishop of Lübeck in 1173, no monastery did exist here. So Bishop Heinrich sought monks from his former monastery and build a monastery. It got consecrated in 1177. A few decades later, nuns were also admitted to the monastery. But living with the nuns is said to have contributed to the bad reputation of the monastery in 1246.

In 1231 the Archbishop of Bremen confirmed the transfer of the monks because of economic and disciplinary difficulties. In 1245 Bishop of Lübeck certified the separation of the monastery, which had become a double monastery. The monks had to leave and the remaining nuns now followed the rules of the Cistercians. The legal battle that the monks fought against the decision lasted for decades and was ultimately decided in Rome.

After the Reformation, the monastery continued to exist as a convent for single women under the name "Stiftung St. Johannes-Jungfrauenkloster". After nationalization in 1803, the monastery was run as a municipal institution, the entire inventory and most of the buildings including the large Romanesque church were knocked down.

In the early 20th century the monastery property was divided. On one part, the "Gymnasium Johanneum" was built, and on the other, in 1903/1904, a new building with apartments for the elderly was erected under the name of St. Johannes-Jungfrauen-Stift, continuing the tradition of the monastery as a municipal home for the elderly.