page_title: St. Mary's Church, Lübeck
section_title: Destruction and restoration
hierarchical_section_title: St. Mary's Church, Lübeck / Destruction and restoration
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Mittelschiff, Blick nach Westen vor der Zerstörung 1942. Foto wurde später nachträglich colouriert.
context_page_description: St. Mary's Church in Lübeck was built between 1250 and 1350. It has always been a symbol of the power and prosperity of the old Hanseatic city, and is situated at the highest point of the island that forms the old town of Lübeck. It is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of the old Hanseatic City of Lübeck.
  St. Mary's epitomizes north German Brick Gothic and set the standard for about 70 other churches in the Baltic region, making it a building of enormous architectural significance. St Mary's Church embodied the towering style of Gothic architecture style using north German brick. It has the tallest brick vault in the world, the height of the central nave being 38.5 metres.
  It is built as a three-aisled basilica with side chapels, an ambulatory with radiating chapels, and vestibules like the arms of a transept. The westwork has a monumental two-tower façade. The height of the towers, including the weather vanes, is 124.95 metres and 124.75 metres, respectively.
  St. Mary's is located in the Hanseatic merchants' quarter, which extends uphill from the warehouses on the River Trave to the church.
context_section_description: In an air raid on 28–29 March 1942 – the night of Palm Sunday – the church was almost completely destroyed by fire, together with about a fifth of the Lübeck city centre, including Lübeck Cathedral and St. Peter's Church.
  Among the artefacts destroyed was the famous Totentanzorgel (Danse Macabre organ), an instrument played by Dieterich Buxtehude and probably Johann Sebastian Bach. Other works of art destroyed in the fire include the Mass of Saint Gregory by Bernt Notke, the monumental Danse Macabre, originally by Bernt Notke but replaced by a copy in 1701, the carved figures of the rood screen, the Trinity altarpiece by Jacob van Utrecht (formerly also attributed to Bernard van Orley) and the Entrance of Christ into Jerusalem by Friedrich Overbeck. Sculptures by the woodcarver Benedikt Dreyer were also lost in the fire: the wooden statues of the saints on the west side of the rood screen and the organ sculpture on the great organ from around 1516–18 and Man with Counting Board. Also destroyed in the fire were the mediaeval stained glass windows from the St. Mary Magdalene Church, which were installed in St. Mary's Church from 1840 on, after the St. Mary Magdalene Church was demolished because it was in danger of collapse. Photographs by Lübeck photographers like William Castelli give an impression of what the interior looked like before the War.
  The glass window in one of the chapels has an alphabetic list of major towns in the pre-1945 eastern territory of the German Reich. Because of the destruction it suffered in World War II, St. Mary's Church is one of the Cross of Nails centres. A plaque on the wall warns of the futility of war.
  The church was protected by a makeshift roof for the rest of the war, and the vaulted ceiling of the chancel was repaired. Reconstruction proper began in 1947, and was largely complete by 1959. In view of the previous damage by fire, the old wooden construction of the roof and spires was not replaced by a new wooden construction. All church spires in Lübeck were reconstructed using a special system involving lightweight concrete blocks underneath the copper roofing. The copper covering matched the original design and the concrete roof would avoid the possibility of a second fire. A glass window on the north side of the church commemorates the builder, Erich Trautsch, who invented this system.
  In 1951, the 700th anniversary of the church was celebrated under the reconstructed roof; for the occasion, Chancellor Konrad Adenauer donated the new tenor bell, and the Memorial Chapel in the South Tower was inaugurated.
  In the 1950s, there was a long debate about the design of the interior, not just the paintings (see below). The predominant view was that destruction had restored the essential, pure form. The redesign was intended to facilitate the dual function that St. Mary's had at that time, being both the diocesan church and the parish church. In the end, the church held a limited competition, inviting submissions from six architects, including Gerhard Langmaack and Denis Boniver, the latter's design being largely accepted on 8 February 1958. At the meeting, the bishop, Heinrich Meyer, vehemently – and successfully – demanded the removal of the Fredenhagen altar (see below).
  The redesign of the interior according to Boniver's plans was carried out in 1958–59. Since underfloor heating was being installed under a completely new floor, the remaining memorial slabs of Gotland limestone were removed and used to raise the level of the chancel. The chancel was separated from the ambulatory by whitewashed walls 3 metres (9.8 ft) high. The Fredenhagen altar was replaced by a plain altar base of muschelkalk limestone and a crucifix by Gerhard Marcks suspended from the transverse arch of the ceiling. The inauguration of the new chancel was on 20 December 1959.
  At the same time, a treasure chamber was made for the Danzig Parament Treasure from St. Mary's Church in Danzig (now Gdańsk), which came to Lübeck after the War (removed in 1993), the Parament Treasure is now exhibited at St. Anne's Museum), and ab
caption: Nave, view to the west, before the destruction
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