Eberhard of Rohrdorf, also called Eberhard of Salem, was one of the most important abbots of Salem Imperial Abbey. In the almost 5 decades during which he held office (1191-1240), the convent experienced its first economic, political and cultural heyday.
Eberhard came from a southern German noble family, the Counts of Rohrdorf, whose family seat was Benzen Castle near Meßkirch. His noble relatives also included Diethelm of Krenkingen, who was Bishop of Constance from 1189 to 1206. Around 1180 Eberhard entered the Cistercian monastery of Salem, which had been founded in 1137. At the age of just 30 he was unanimously elected abbot on 12 June 1191, which proves that he must have already attracted attention due to his unusual talents at an early age. According to the monastery history Apiarium Salemitanum (1708), he was the first abbot of Salem, who did not come from the founding convent of the Alsatian monastery of Lützel, and therefore also the first German abbot.
Konrad of Urach came from the family of the Counts of Urach, and was a Cistercian abbot, cardinal bishop and cardinal legate in France and Germany. Konrad, the son of the Count of Urach, became a Cistercian monk in 1200 and Abbot of Villers Monastery – today Villers-la-Ville – in Brabant in 1209. In 1214 he became abbot in Clairvaux, in 1217 in Cîteaux – today Saint-Nicolas-lès-Cîteaux. He was a councilor to Pope Honorius III, who appointed him to cardinal bishop of Porto and San Rufino. Here he became involved in the fight against the Albigensians, promoted the Crusades and a renewed order in the monasteries and under the clergy.
Veronika of Rietheim was born in 1472. Her father was the imperial knight Ulrich of Rietheim and her mother was Veronika of Landau. In her long term as Abbess, she had built and expanded the convent church and Heiligkreuztal Convent. As a result, she can be referred to as the second founder of Heiligkreuztal. During her term in office she always saw to order and ensured modern renewal. Here it should be noted that all of her achievements were carried out in politically difficult times. The Peasants’ War and the period of schism made such actions arduous.
At Heiligkreuztal Convent this important woman is still present today. The 24 predecessors of Abbess Veronika are shown in the convent gallery in a series with equal spacing and size. Only Abbess Veronika is given a great deal more space and text. Her achievements are therefore honored in an impressive way.
Hans Multscher is one of the most important German sculptors and is linked to Heiligkreuztal Convent by the creation of the famous altar in 1450. Multscher war a pioneer of the Realism that came to Germany from Burgundian Netherlands and was to replace the “soft style” of his contemporaries.
Following training in his home in the Allgaeu region, he was introduced to artistic innovations in northern France and the Netherlands during his years of travel as a journeyman. In 1427 he became a free citizen in Ulm. Multscher worked as a sculptor, painter and modeller and ran an extensive, respected workshop until his death in 1467.
Joseph Anton Feuchtmayer is considered to be one the most important Rococo artists. He worked as a stuccoworker and sculptor, altar builder and copper engraver in the area around Lake Constance in southern Germany and Switzerland. For his drafts he used ideas from the most important European artists from papal Rome, like Michelangelo and Bernini, and from imperial Vienna. His work is characterized by an extremely elegant dynamism. Feuchtmayer’s stuccowork ceiling over the Nuns’ Gallery from 1754 can be admired at Heiligkreuztal Convent.