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Church · Altstadt, Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg

Church of the Holy Spirit (Heidelberg)

Heiliggeistkirche

The Church of the Holy Spirit (Heiliggeistkirche) is the Protestant late-Gothic church in the centre of Heidelberg's old town, built between 1398 and 1441.

Why go

This record is the church building, used by the Protestant old-town parish Heiliggeist-Providenz of the Evangelische Kirche in Heidelberg. The parish's history page (in German) says a Romanesque church 'Zum Heiligen Geist' on the market square is first mentioned in 1239, that the present Gothic church was built in 1398 to 1441 as a university church and burial church of the Electors, and that the Bibliotheca Palatina, kept in its galleries, was carried off to Rome in 1623. It says the French burned the church in 1693, that from 1706 a dividing wall let it be used as a simultaneous church, and that after the wall came down in 1936 the whole church became Protestant. The parish's visiting page (in German) invites visitors to explore the church on their own, says visits are possible only outside services and devotions, and says photography or filming for commercial purposes needs permission.

Base yourself nearby

City

Heidelberg

Heidelberg is a city on the Neckar in Baden-Württemberg. The city's own site says it was first documented in 1196, was laid out to a plan and had its castle built in the 13th century, and entered its heyday as capital of the Electoral Palatinate, not least with the founding of its university in 1386; XTOUR maps Heidelberg Castle, the Old Bridge and the Church of the Holy Spirit in the city.

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