Stone | Stone Album in Großjena

Description
The so-called Stone Album is located above the Unstrut Valley, in the immediate vicinity of Naumburg, in southern Saxony-Anhalt. It consists of 12 larger-than-life reliefs that were carved into the red sandstone over a length of around 180 metres during the Baroque period. This monument will celebrate its 300th anniversary in 2022. The reliefs depict Old Testament motifs, most of which relate to viticulture. However, Duke Christian zu Sachsen-Weißenfels, in whose honour the Stone Album was created, is also depicted.

In terms of content, the project focussed on the various aspects of weathering and the long-term preservation of the 12 reliefs, which had already been extensively restored at the end of the 1990s. Despite this major measure and although an exemplary monitoring and maintenance concept was planned immediately after the restoration campaign at the time, which has been regularly implemented since then, the damage dynamics objectively assessed in the project are immense.

As part of the DBU research project, the focus was on analysing the causes of this damage and also on adapting the conservation and restoration care measures.

Important points in the root cause analysis are the extreme exposure of the reliefs in the rock, its gypsum load and the sometimes massive biogenic growth. The specific questions and investigation results as well as the results of the numerous sample areas, which were created primarily with regard to the effects of the plastering of the surfaces, the old preservations and the possibility of re-treatment and dealing with the sometimes massive biogenic colonisation, were presented in the lecture - as part of the final colloquium on 10 June 2022 - by Prof. Dr Jeannine Meinhardt.

Final theses
The research project was developed and implemented with the significant involvement of students from the stone department. Several practical theses as well as bachelor's and master's theses were written and successfully completed.

Master's theses:

Benjamin Hübner (summer semester 2017): "The long-term care and preservation of heavily contaminated objects in the in-situ rock - development of a mineral compress plaster to protect anthropogenically damaged surfaces in the in-situ rock using the example of the Steinernen Album in Großjena"
Janosch Klein (winter semester 2021/22): "Investigations on the consolidation of plastered sandstone surfaces with silicic acid ester using the example of the Steinernes Album in Großjena"
Joann Zilm (still in progress, summer semester 2023): "Investigation of the effect of cleaning measures on the recolonisation of biogenic growths on sandstone and the determination of the effectiveness of selected essential oils as a preventive measure to inhibit biogenic recolonisation"
Bachelor thesis:

Joann Zilm (summer semester 2018): "Development of a stone supplement mortar for freely weathered red sandstone in connection with the long-term preservation of the Steinernes Album in Großjena"