Stadtkirche St. Georg: Late Gothic Church in Schmalkalden
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 4.6
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- Country
- Germany
- Primary era
- Medieval
- External website
- Open
- Eras represented
- Medieval, Early Modern, Modern
- Civilizations
- Holy Roman Empire
- Site type
- Religious
- Remains
- Church
On this page15 sections
History
Stadtkirche St. Georg is a late Gothic church in Schmalkalden, Germany, whose construction began in 1413 and 1414 and continued until 1509. It replaced the Romanesque Marienkirche, while the lower section of that earlier building survived within the southwest tower. The church was consecrated in 1500 by the Bishop of Würzburg, and an inscription in the choir records the completion of the work in that year.
From the Romanesque church to the late Gothic building
The Romanesque tower became structurally unsound, and from 1434 onward it was dismantled down to the second storey. The new church was built around the predecessor structure. A visible joint and Romanesque round arches in the highest of the three towers still indicate the connection between the earlier building and its late Gothic successor. Although the choir inscription gives 1500 as the year of completion, building work continued until 1509.
Reformation and changes to the church
Martin Luther, the German theologian and reformer whose teachings initiated the Protestant Reformation, preached in Stadtkirche St. Georg in 1537 before the Schmalkaldic League. This was an alliance of Protestant German princes and cities formed in opposition to the religious policies of the Holy Roman Emperor.
Most medieval furnishings were removed after the Reformation. Disputes about the church’s furnishings grew more intense in the early seventeenth century. During the Schmalkaldic iconoclasm in December 1608, Landgrave Moritz of Hesse-Kassel ordered crucifixes, sculptures, and epitaphs to be removed, while paintings on the walls and galleries were painted over. Paintings from the 1503 gallery panels were rediscovered around 1900 beneath the Baroque gallery parapets.
Towers, memory, and later furnishings
The partly dismantled southwest tower was rebuilt from 1570. A tower keeper’s apartment was installed about 50 metres above ground and remained occupied from 1571 to 1935. The newly built northwest tower followed a different design, and the two contrasting towers now form a distinctive part of the church’s appearance.
The late Gothic baptismal font was moved from the western part of the church, near the bell tower, to the choir in 1560. A chandelier was made in 1642, and the wooden pulpit was completed in 1669. Arno Zauche’s relief of Martin Luther has commemorated the 1537 sermon since 1917. It stands on the pillar opposite the present pulpit, rather than at the original position of the stone “Luther pulpit,” which stood on the middle pillar on the south side until it was moved to the chancel arch in 1636.
The former parament chamber above the sacristy is known as the “Luther Room” and is associated with Luther’s stay there before services. A parament chamber was used to store or prepare ecclesiastical textiles and vestments. The room contains a Crucifixion painting from the first half of the fifteenth century, a carved triptych altar, and a seated figure of the Man of Sorrows, or Christ at Rest, dating from around 1500.
Organ and bells
Christian Busse built the church’s first small organ in 1606 and 1607. The present organ was made by A. Schuster & Sohn in 1961 and revised in 2023 by Mitteldeutscher Orgelbau A. Voigt. During that revision, it was retuned to the unequal “Kleine Stadt” temperament devised by Johann Georg Neidhardt, a German composer and music theorist associated with named tuning systems. The instrument also received a bus system and setter mechanism at a new console.
The church has five nineteenth-century bells. One inscription states that Johann Michael Kreuter, a Schmalkalden mayor and former tin-and-button manufacturer described as a citizen and friend of the poor, left funds for maintaining the church. The largest bell, known as “Great Easter,” is among the largest bells in Thuringia.
Remains
Stadtkirche St. Georg is a broad, three-aisled late Gothic hall church. In a hall church, the nave and side aisles are approximately equal in height, creating a unified interior space. The building contains varied vault forms, including ribs arranged in tracery patterns, and its external decoration is more elaborate on the side facing the market than on the side turned away from it.
Choir and Gothic decoration
Choir vault and east end
The choir has a net vault, a Gothic vault whose ribs form an intersecting network. It continues from the triumphal arch at the width of the central nave and ends to the east in a five-eighths termination, a polygonal end formed by five sides of an octagon. The choir is especially richly ornamented with applied tracery and pointed-arch windows containing elaborate stone patterns.
Sacristy and choir sculpture
On the north side of the choir stands the sacristy, with the former parament chamber and a library above it. One choir buttress carries unusual architectural sculpture: a portrait-like head appears within a window fitted with a shutter. Shafts or responds placed in front of the pillars rest on differently designed consoles decorated with head motifs.
Portals, altar, and interior works
South portal and altar
The south side has an ogee-arch portal decorated with tracery. Inside, the altar consists solely of a masonry mensa, the slab or table on which an altar is formed. The late Gothic baptismal font stands in the choir after its transfer from the western part of the church in 1560.
Stained glass and historic artworks
The interior stained-glass windows were created by Charles Crodel and form a unified visual scheme. The windows of the organ gallery use motifs from the Song of Solomon and are described as matching the quality of Crodel’s early colour woodcuts produced in Jena. The “Luther Room” preserves the fifteenth-century Crucifixion painting, the carved triptych altar with three connected panels, and the seated Man of Sorrows figure from around 1500.
Towers, organ, and bells
Contrasting towers
The three towers preserve evidence of the church’s relationship with its predecessor. Romanesque round arches survive in the highest tower, while the southwest tower incorporates the lower section of the earlier Marienkirche and was rebuilt from 1570. The northwest tower was constructed with a different design, creating the contrasting pair visible today.
Organ and roof turret
The present organ has 39 stops and approximately 2,800 pipes distributed across three manuals and a pedal. Its case was designed by Fritz Leweke. A roof turret on the choir contains two bells that sound the hours and quarter-hours.
