A German Monumental (
visit link) wayside cross with Christ figure.
About 3 meters high and made of red sandstone and dates from the early 18th century. The Christ figure is made of metal.
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The text on the information board reads:
“STADTKYLL
The “Seven Footfalls” wayside crosses in Stadtkyll.
In the past, wayside shrines and crosses were of great importance to the villagers. They were usually erected for a special reason: misfortune, plague or atonement, for a crime committed, but also as special markers for processions or pilgrimage routes.
Today, they are often seen as worthless relics of the past. Walkers usually pass them by carelessly.
Of particular importance in Stadtkyll were the “seven footfalls” or the seven indulgence crosses When someone was dying in the village, the village children, accompanied by an older female person, would go to these crosses, which stood in the village and in the fields, to pray. If it was a woman, it was the girls and if it was a man, it was the boys.
The rosary was prayed and an invocation formula, which varied from place to place, was used to help the dying person on their last journey. This Christian custom was still practiced until the middle of the last century.
The location of the seven “footfalls” in Stadtkyll is still known: Teacher Heinrich Delvos made an overview in the middle of the last century by means of a harid drawing and the indication of the locations of the crosses. Century made an overview.
At that time, some of the crosses could no longer be found due to war destruction, road and street construction measures, etc
Today, all but two crosses have disappeared.
The first cross stood on the corner of Hauptstrasse and Hüllstrasse. The second was in the upper Hüllstrasse. The third was at the corner of the Fenner house on Marktplatz, which used to be called a Ture because a corner tower of the town fortifications once stood there. The fourth cross stood on the Mühlenpeich at the old flour mill on the corner of Hauptstrasse and Kurallee. The fifth cross, which still exists today, can still be found here on the old path to the cemetery, which was interrupted by the construction of the railroad in 1912. The sixth cross stood halfway to the cemetery and the last of the seven crosses stands at the Margarethen Chapel in the municipal cemetery."