Resurrection church Spremberg, Romanesque church in Spremberg, Germany.
The Auferstehungskirche Spremberg is the former village church of Pritzen, dismantled in 1988 ahead of the Greifenhain open-cast lignite mine and rebuilt here between 1991 and 1994. It is a long rectangular nave with a flat choir end and a fully plastered tower of octagonal plan on the south side, entered through a round-arched door in the tower base. The lower nave is faced with natural stone blocks on which the numbering from the translocation is still visible; the tower has slanted buttresses covered with flat tiles in 2012. A rough-plastered two-storey annex to the north-west holds the sacristy below and the patron's box above.
The church was built in the 14th century as a Romanesque structure. In 1585 parts of the interior, including the altar, were reworked in Renaissance style, and in 1681 (other sources say 1770) the tower was added, later braced with side walls after ground settlement and a slight westward lean. In 1988 the building was dismantled before the advancing Greifenhain open-cast lignite mine and rebuilt in Spremberg, consecrated on 4 April 1994.
The church was moved from Pritzen because the Greifenhain open-cast mine was advancing; the last service there was held on 28 February 1988. Its new site near the Waldfriedhof was chosen partly because residents of devastated villages such as Wolkenberg and Stradow had settled in the neighbouring Schomberg estate. The building was re-consecrated on Easter Monday, 4 April 1994, as the Evangelical Resurrection Church.
The church stands in Spremberg near the Waldfriedhof, on a plot of about 3,000 square metres; the site was chosen partly because residents of devastated villages such as Wolkenberg and Stradow had settled in the neighbouring Schomberg development. The main entrance is the round-arched door in the tower base. The building is oriented southwest to northeast.
It is the only church building in the GDR that was completely dismantled with its furnishings and rebuilt elsewhere. The parts were numbered: seven doors, seven windows, 25,000 roof tiles, 14,000 roof-timber beams and 6,000 floor slabs were stored near Vetschau before reconstruction in Spremberg.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 94,647 contributors worldwide.