Corps de Garde de Colmar (Colmar Guardhouse), Colmar

Corps de Garde de Colmar (Colmar Guardhouse) is a historical monument located in Colmar. At the current location was the chapel of Saint-Jacques, the first mention of which dates from 1286. In 1308 , part of the cemetery was removed and the chapel became an ossuary. It was definitively suppressed in 1533, following the imperial edict prohibiting cemeteries in built-up areas. The rear wall of the guardhouse still reveals the arches of this former chapel.

The guardhouse was erected in 1575 (master builder Beier Melchior). The loggia, erected between 1577 and 1582 , allowed the Magistrate to take the oath and pronounce sentences.

Before serving as housing for the guardhouse, this building was intended to serve as a town hall. The passage towards the rue des Marchands served as a market for nuts and oilseeds. The facades, roofs, staircase and rooms on the first floor forming the former large decorated room have been classified as historic monuments since July 5 , 1958. The old crypt-ossuary has been classified as a historic monument since December 12, 1991. It is a Rhenish Renaissance style building.

The main portal has an entablature resting on Tuscan columns, adorned with lion heads. Its pediment is made up of interlacing scrolls framing a medallion with a bust. The portal of the loggia constitutes a jewel of Renaissance architecture in the Upper Rhine, it rests on columns with palmettes and is provided with a railing decorated with motifs of fittings, shields, rosettes and of heads.

The lintel of a door in the segment of an arc is dated MDLXXV (1575). Behind the latter, there is a wooden spiral staircase. The large upstairs room has retained the original decorations, in particular a pointed arch niche with painted decoration and a beam engraved with the date of 1575.