Klosterkirche Marienwerder

Klosterkirche Marienwerder stands in Hanover’s Marienwerder district, northwest of the city, beside the monastery it serves. You see a three-aisled basilica shaped by the transition from Romanesque to Gothic architecture. Romanesque windows, a Gothic vault, a transept and three eastern apses define its historic form.

Count Konrad I of Roden founded the church and monastery in 1196, and consecration followed in 1200. Fire destroyed the northern aisle in 1335, while later rebuilding added two altars by 1339. Renovations from 1858 to 1861 brought the octagonal roof spire, organ gallery and north-side portal, while Oscar Wichtendahl completed the Neo-Romanesque apse paintings in 1886. Three stained-glass windows joined the main apse in 1898, and a new organ followed in 1972.

Inside, an oak Crucifixion group from around 1230 remains the most striking medieval detail. Christian Adolf Vogell designed the 1859 pulpit and baptismal font, surrounded by figures of the four Evangelists. Look beneath the organ gallery on the western interior wall, where a foundation stone from the sixteenth or seventeenth century stands between two windows.