The copper engraving by Casper Merian shows the Porta Nigra, probably built after 170 AD, at the time when it was integrated – or, as the Latin title inscription in the middle of the picture indicates, transformed – into the double church of St. Simon.
In the 11th century, the Roman city gate was converted into the two-storey Simeon monastery. Merian depicted the church in the condition in which he had personally inspected it, as recorded in the inscription on the lower left edge of the picture using a term of great significance for aesthetic theory: ad viv[um] deli[neavit]: drawn to life – and then engraved on copper.
Further Reading
- Brouwer, Christoph / Masen, Jacob: Antiquitatum et annalium Trevirensium libri XXV, Lüttich 1670.
- Gose, Erich (Ed.): Die Porta Nigra in Trier, Berlin 1969 (Trierer Grabungen und Forschungen 4).
- Heyen, Franz-Josef: Das Stift St. Simeon in Trier, Berlin 2002 (Germania Sacra, N.F. 41).
- Kancirova, Martina: St. Simeon in Trier zwischen Renovatio und Rokoko. Die Überformungen der Porta Nigra im 18. Jahrhundert, Wiesbaden 2020 (Trierer Grabungen und Forschungen 17).
- Lindner, Christoph: 170 n. Chr.: zur Datierung der römischen Stadtmauer und der Porta Nigra in Trier, in: Funde und Ausgrabungen im Berzirk Trier 50 (2018) pp. 85– 92.
