The Görlitz Frauenkirche, Görlitz

From 1449 onwards, it was rebuilt in place of a simple predecessor building, which was probably a kind of chapel of atonement and had been destroyed by the Hussites, before the completed building was finally consecrated in 1473. The spacious three-nave hall church, now also built in late Gothic style and adjoined by an elongated choir, bears witness to the economic prosperity that the citizens of Görlitz had achieved at that time. Ornate tracery and a delicate reticulated ribbed vault give the nave a graceful appearance. The keystones of the ribbed vault depict the Seven Joys of Mary. The interior, however, is due to a reconstruction of the years 1869/70, which reflects the romanticising neo-Gothic ideas of the Wilhelminian period. The cemetery, which was surrounded by a protective wall with towers in memory of the Hussite times and testified to the donors' need to be close to their saints on their last journey, was levelled as early as 1840. Since then, the Südvorstadt has been dominated by large-scale department store architecture from the Wilhelminian period, among which the church now almost threatens to disappear.