Verena chapel at Zugerberg, Baroque chapel at Zugerberg, Switzerland
The Verena Chapel at Zugerberg is a Baroque chapel built 1705–1710, with a Latin-cross plan whose entrance arm is twice as deep as the other three. A round dome with an octagonal lantern sits over the crossing, and a hexagonal roof turret with a cross rises above the choir. A porch on four Tuscan columns shelters the portal dated 1705, above which a niche holds a statue of Saint Verena.
A St. Verena shrine existed on the Zugerberg path to Aegeri by the late 16th century and was enlarged with an altar in the early 17th century. A second small chapel stood higher at Chämistal; from the material of both, a chapel was built there and consecrated in 1684. The present cross-domed chapel was begun in 1705, built by masters from Vorarlberg and Zug, and consecrated in 1710.
The chapel is dedicated to Saint Verena of Zurzach, a martyr linked to the Theban Legion. A gilded statue of her holding a small jug crowns the dome, and a statue stands in the niche above the portal. The high altarpiece depicts her reception into heaven, accompanied by the sick and her devotees.
The chapel stands at the forest edge on the Blasenbergstrasse, at the start of the steep former mountain path toward Aegeri above Zug. It is reached on foot; the surrounding residential quarters have grown close to it. The site also includes the Bruderhaus, built in 1725.
The dome is hidden inside the roof: only its octagonal lantern rises above the ridge, and a painted sheet-metal figure of Saint Verena with her jug tops it. On the choir stands a six-sided ridge turret with a wrought-iron cross.
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