Around 1430 as a feast and reception building of the citizenry at the mouth of Fleisch- and Dietrichstraße in the main market, 1481-83 largely converted and from then until the 18th century also used as a town hall. In 1944, the building was completely destroyed by the influence of the war. The building was rebuilt in 1968-70 due to its urban and historical significance. The four-storey building, completed with a crenelated corridor and a steep hipped roof, stands in the tradition of Romanesque residential towers. To the market leading out of the construction bay, it has open arched arches on the ground floor, whose round pillars (steipes) gave its name to the building, the city patrone Peter, Paulus, Helena and Jakobus interlaced on the corners of the first floor By Master Steffen sculptor in the municipal museum). The storeys were separated from each other by the encircling window banks, the windows differed in the manner of a storey. On the southern side of the narrow side, a typical exterior fireplace. Due to its history and use, the building also has a high identification value. The building complex surrounding the narrow Steipenhof in the west and north forms parallel to the western market front a back-sided, long-stretched and a side gateway overhanging main house with trapezoidal saddle roof. In the north-west is a tall, square staircase, flanked by a narrow-brimmed gable façade. The western (recognizable in the inner courtyard of the estate Jakobstrasse 4) and the eastern longitudinal front of the back Renaissance house are characterized by their stilt-like character through the group of storey windows distributed with irregular axes. A special feature is the magnificent window panel on the first floor, which is guided across the entire eastern façade and resolved by the wall. Stylistically comparable is the portal, arranged in the Westfassade, equipped with a skylight. Its decoration in late Gothic forms is the only one of its kind in Trier's old town. The Treppenturm, preserved with its stone spindle, is dated 1559 on the court portal (copy). In contrast to the Renaissance windows, the vegetal-detailed Volutenzier originates in the uppermost, retracted storey of the gable standing against the tower and the keil stone-reinforced ochsenauge in the Giebelfeld from the 17th century probably also the small, elaborately framed rectangle walls of the towerobergeschosse from this time. (Denkmaltopographie Bundesrepublik)> The Steipe, erected since 1430, resembles in its form the nearby Frankenturm. Here, too, the crenellated crown is found again. However, the windows of the steipe are larger, the inhabitants no longer have to hide behind narrow slabs. Instead of being closed by large stone blocks, the ground floor is opened to the main market by generous pointed arches. Why were you so fearless? In the Steipe was actually never lived, but celebrated and negotiated. It was the headquarters of the Trier citizenship, even a town hall for a long time. The generous arcades should not provide shade, but offer space to the market court that was meeting among them. The Steipe, whose name goes back to the round supports of the arcades, called in the Volksmund Steipen, was a public building, self-assured by the citizens at a time when the archbishop was struggling for power in the city. The Late Gothic limestone figures (copies) tell of this dispute. Above James, Helena, Peter and Paul rise the so-called Steipen-Riesen, to which there is an exciting interpretation: with an open visor, the once looked over to Sankt Gangolf, the Bürgerkirche, whose tower was little later, 1507, intentionally aufgestockt , In order to cross the southwest tower of the cathedral in height. The visor of the other giant is lowered, but his head points towards the cathedral.
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More info in the denkmallisten of the town Trier.
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