Zittau’s ‘Lenten Veil’

It was once the practice in churches in parts of Austria and Germany to screen off the sanctuary during the season of Lent. The reason for this, so I have been told, was to impose a spiritual, as well as a physical, fast on the faithful during that period.

This screen called a Fastentuch (or Lenten Veil) was originally a plain piece of cloth but it later became the practice to decorate it in various ways. The great Lenten Veil of Zittau, the small East German town in which I spent the last eighteen months of World War II as part of a working party (Arbeitskommando) of thirty ‘other rank’ British prisoners of war, was unique in Germany. It was 8.2 metres high by 6.8 metres wide. It was seven centuries old and had painted on it 90 Biblical pictures, 45 from the Old Testament and 45 from the New. It was the town’s pride and joy.

At the end of World War II it was found to be missing from its home in the Zittau Town Museum and was eventually found on the slopes of Mount Oybin (a spectacular peak several miles from the town). It was in four pieces and was being used by some Russian soldiers to line the walls of a sauna! It was recovered and, after German reunification, was lovingly restored and put on permanent display in the redundant Church of the Holy Cross that has been adapted and provided with controlled lighting and a controlled atmosphere to ensure its preservation.

No-one knew quite how this enormous artifact had found its way from the museum to Mount Oybin. This mystery was solved quite accidentally during the course of correspondence between myself and an email pen-friend (Ingrid Zeibig) in Zittau when I mentioned, quite casually, one of the odder jobs that I had had while doing ‘hard labour’ in her town between September 1943 and May 1945. It had been towards the end of February 1945, after the terrible British and American fire-bomb raids of the 13th and 14th of that month on the city of Dresden (about 60 miles from Zittau). The thunder of artillery from the eastern front was becoming daily louder. The end of the war was clearly in sight. I had been one of a party of half a dozen or so POWs who helped transport for safety some very heavy cases of ‘treasures’ from the town museum to what I thought was a ruined ‘Dracula type’ castle (I discovered later that it was actually a ruined monastery) on the summit of Mount Oybin.
Ingrid immediately thought of the Fastentuch and took it up with the scholarly Dr Volker Dudeck, Direktor (we would call him the curator, I think) of the Zittau Museum, who agreed with her. Thus, I became unwittingly one of the ‘rescuers’ of one of the town’s most valued possessions.
This ensured for me a little local and very temporary celebrity when in March 2007, my son and grandson (I certainly couldn’t have done it on my own!) accompanied me on my revisit to Zittau as a free man after over 60 years. We were able to meet and be welcomed by my correspondent and her family – and by Dr, Dudeck, who speaks perfect English.
We were given a free VIP showing of the Fastentuch displayed in all its glory together with a commentary in English on each of its 90 pictures. I found myself astonished by its immense size and by the comprehensive nature of the pictures on it. I couldn’t think of a single familiar bible story that wasn’t illustrated! I hope that I may be forgiven a warm glow of pride at having played a tiny role in the history of an artefact that had been, for seven centuries, an important part of the spiritual life of a great many local people.
Afterwards we were interviewed by a friendly, and fortunately bilingual local newspaper reporter (my German is of the tv ‘ ‘Allo, Allo’’ variety) and a photo of my son, grandson and myself appeared, together with a very friendly article, on the front page of the following issue of Zittauer Zeitung (Zittau Times).
That was not the end of my involvement with Zittau and its Fastentuch. I continued my correspondence with Ingrid Zeibig. Dr Dudeck and I became close friends and we too corresponded by email. During my visit Ingrid, knowing that I was an author and journalist, asked me when I returned to England, if I would write an article about my impressions on returning to Zittau as a free man after over sixty years. She would translate it into German primarily for her own family but perhaps also for a wider readership.
I sat down at my lap-top intending to write about 1,000, perhaps 1,500 words. However, once I had written the first few sentences I became carried away. I explained why I had wanted to return to Zittau and how, when I was in my eighties, this had become possible. I finished with a considerable piece of autobiography of nearly 8,000 words. It was certainly much too long for any publication in this country. Nevertheless I duly dispatched copies by email to Volker Dudeck (we were on Quakerly first-name terms by this time) and to Ingrid.

Both were enthusiastic about it but Ingrid must surely have been daunted by the thought of translating it as well as holding down a full-time job and caring for a teenage daughter!

Fortunately, she didn’t have to. Volker, having read it, passed it on to Frau Schubert, a colleague whose knowledge of English was even better than his own, to translate. He sent me a copy of the result – ‘Rückkehr nach Zittau’ and also told me that it would be published in full in a future issue of the Zittauer Geschicktsblätter , a glossy regional cultural publication.