Eppinghoven Abbey (Holzheim)

Eppinghoven Abbey is a former Cistercian nunnery located south of Neuss-Holzheim, directly on the Erft river.

The monastery was founded as Mariensaal Abbey, together with Saarn Abbey, around 1214, initially in Karlesforst (Kaarst). In the same year, it was incorporated into the Cistercian Order and placed under the authority of the abbot of Kamp Abbey. For the first two decades of their existence, Kaarst and Saarn were under the joint leadership of Abbess Wolberna. Already after 1231, due to a donation from the Neuss couple Sibert and Gisela, the convent was relocated to Eppinghoven, where a farm from the possession of Gerresheim Collegiate Church was exchanged for the new foundation. In 1236, Emperor Frederick II guaranteed the monastery his protection, and in 1237, Pope Gregory IX confirmed its possessions. During the Burgundian War in 1475, the monastery was so severely damaged that the abbess and the convent had to seek refuge in the neighboring fortified Gnadental Abbey. In 1650, the monastery was converted into a noble canonry for women.

In September 1794, the canonesses fled with their valuables from the French to the Capuchin monastery in Düsseldorf, which was subsequently plundered during the crossing of the Rhine by French troops on September 6, 1795. During this time, a lazaretto for 700 men was set up in Eppinghoven Abbey. In 1795, the canonesses were able to return to the abbey buildings under significant French contribution demands, but in the following years, they faced massively increasing tax burdens, which they eventually could no longer manage. In 1802, the abbey was dissolved, and the abbey church was later demolished. The only remaining parts of the former abbey church's furnishings are two side wings of an altar, created around 1500, which are now in the Clemens Sels Museum in Neuss.