Gottesackerkapelle

Gottesackerkapelle stands in Rheinfelden’s city park, just east of the old town in Switzerland’s canton of Aargau. The former Roman Catholic chapel presents a simple late Baroque form, with a rectangular hall and recessed polygonal choir. A copper-covered turret rises above the saddle roof, while round-arched windows brighten the walls.

A cemetery and chapel first appeared outside the city walls near Kupfertorturm in 1598. Swedish forces damaged both during the Thirty Years’ War, and restoration followed in 1639. Franz Altermatt directed the complete rebuilding in 1740, while the porch and turret changed again in 1827. The cemetery closed in 1924, and restoration in 1969 and 1970 brought a new Metzler organ.

Wooden columns support the entrance porch, whose portal incorporates reused stones and a 1740 keystone. Inside, a late Baroque altar displays the Fourteen Holy Helpers around Christ and Mary. Two colourful sandstone epitaphs mark the west wall, while an eighteenth-century painting shows Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier. The unheated interior holds up to fifty people, giving this former cemetery chapel an intimate setting among the park’s greenery.