It is one of the nine preserved temples of the Mennonites in the country - reflecting with its form the transformations in the architecture of this community in the light of political, social and cultural changes taking place in the second half of the 19th century. It has all characteristic features of Dutch ecclesiastical architecture of the Mazovian region.

History

Nowe Wymyśle village (Deutsch Wymysle, Wymyśle Niemieckie), until the first half of the 19th century known as Olędry Czermińskie, was founded by Kajetan Dębowski in 1781 and settled by the colonists: Jakub Konarski, Jerzy Drews, Jan Konarski, Jan Golen and Dawid Górski. In the years 1808-1829 Wymyśle was inhabited by families of various religious beliefs: approx. 50 Mennonite families, approx. 50 Evangelical families and 60 families of unknown faith. They were active in their traditional forms of economy - horticulture, cow and sheep breeding, production of Dutch cheese and willow growing. The first Mennonite temple (wooden) in Wymyśle was erected in 1818, but it was burned down by the fire in 1845. A school was erected in its place in 1854. The new, brick temple was built in 1864 on a plot belonging to Michael Loter, who also funded a large part of construction materials necessary for erection. During World War I the building was partly demolished by the German troops - the roof structure was used to reinforce trenches and the sheet metal cladding was melted down. In 1924, owing to the help of Mennonites living in the US and Canada, the temple was rebuilt and renovated. Most probably, the paintings in the main room were made at that time. After World War II the building was taken over by the Roman-Catholic parish in Czermno and consecrated in 1946. In 1948 the building was taken over by the Communal National Council in Czermno. For several years it remained unused. In 1954 it was renovated and adapted to serve as a school common room. In the mid-1970s the feature served as a “Herbapol” herbs buying station. Currently, it is not used.

Description

The temple is located in the central part of the village, on a small, rectangular plot that is not fenced at the front, at its southern border, directly at a road. It is oriented towards the east, built of bricks and plastered, on a rectangular floor plan, single-storey and covered with a three-sided roof clad in sheet metal joined by standing seam.

The silhouette of the building is compact and uniform. The façades are plastered and show a uniform architectural décor - they feature a separate, low plinth shared by all façades, are rusticated and have a circumscribing entablature with a lower profiled cornice, plain plastered frieze and a pronounced finial cornice. The façade (on the west side), initially (until the 1950s) housing the only entrance to the building on the axis, with a two-wing door, is marked by a partition into two storeys. It is symmetrical, three-axial, crowned with a triangular, corniced gable, at the finial of which a metal crucifix with clover-shaped arms is embedded on a profiled base. It is articulated by window openings positioned in three rectangular panels nearly reaching the finial cornice, framed by profiled surrounds: a secondary opening - rectangular on the front façade axis, in place of the original entrance to the building; square ones - located on each storey on extreme axes; a rectangular one - terminating in a pointed arch on the gable axis. Rectangular panels that constitute planes for window openings of the front façade intersect the lower cornice of the entablature. Other façades are analogous, single-storey, elevated on a plinth and crowned with the entablature mentioned above. Side façades - initially three-axial (two secondary door openings in the south façade, made in the 1950s), while the south façade is two-axial. Their vertical articulation consists of rectangular windows in plaster surrounds, with profiled cornices below the windows. The interior is a single, open space, with a choir gallery separated on the ground floor of the west part and three rooms under the choir gallery. It is covered with a single ceiling with a semi-circular crown moulding resting on a pronounced profiled cornice. The eastern and central part of the building is occupied by the main room, where the windows are positioned in rectangular, splayed niches terminating in a segmental arch. In the western part, there is a choir gallery with a wooden balustrade in a frame-and-panel structure, decorated with semi-balusters (not preserved until now), under which three rooms are separated: a centrally located hall, a room with the stairs leading to the choir gallery on the south side and a library on the north side. The western wall separating these rooms, as seen from the main room, is partitioned by four pilasters with a profiled cornice resting on them.

The walls of the prayer house are decorated with, only fragmentarily preserved, paintings: marbleization in the parts of the ground floor, decorations with geometric motifs in the form of an arcaded frieze in the cornice and crown moulding part. The roof truss made of pinewood, in the queen-post structure, originating from 1924, is uniform for the entire building.

The church is open to visitors.

Author of the note Jerzy Szałygin, National Institute of Cultural Heritage, Regional Branch in Warsaw 20-07-2017

Bibliography

• Marchlewski W., Studium ruralistyczne wsi Wymyśle Nowe, vol. 1 and 2, Warsaw, 1984, a typescript deposited in the Branch of the Voivodeship Office for the Protection of Historic Monuments in Płock.
• Record sheet of monuments of architecture. Zbór mennonitów, prepared by Wojciech Marchlewski, Warsaw 1984.
• Szałygin J., Katalog zabytków osadnictwa holenderskiego na Mazowszu, Warsaw 2004, pp. 8-37.