Minoritenkloster Hannover

The Minoritenkloster in Hannover stood on the site of today’s Niedersächsischer Landtag. Founded by Franciscans in 1291, it was one of the four mendicant orders permitted inside the city walls. The brothers built along the Leine, extending their church and living quarters over the water. Their arrival followed an earlier gift of land from the von Alten family in 1288, confirmed by Bishop Siegfried II of Hildesheim in 1291. The convent grew steadily. By 1340 it owned quarries in Linden for building stone, and in 1399 received thousands of bricks. Archaeologist Arnold Nöldeke later found remains of the second church inside the Leineschloss. The first church gave way to a larger one in 1436, which housed the tomb of Dietrich von Rinteln and memorials for the von Roden and von Idensen families. A provincial chapter of the Saxonia province met here in 1365, showing the site could host visiting friars. Visitors today see no trace of the monastery above ground. The church survived as the Leineschloss chapel before becoming part of the Landtag. Beneath the modern buildings lie the buried foundations of the Franciscans’ long halls and cloister. The Leine still flows past the southern edge of the site, close to where the brothers once kept their boat and tended their garden.