St. Michael's Church (Michaelskirche)

Carolingian round church from the 9th century, one of Germany's oldest surviving ecclesiastical buildings

The Michaelskirche stands immediately beside the Dom and provides the most striking architectural contrast in Fulda's historic centre. Built around 820 AD as the funerary chapel for the Benedictine monastery, it is a Carolingian round church — the nave is circular in plan, based on Byzantine models intended to evoke the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. It is among the oldest surviving ecclesiastical buildings in Germany, and the simplicity of its exterior gives little hint of the quality of what is inside.

The interior retains much of its original medieval character, including the crypt with its Carolingian columns. The round nave, with its low vault and ancient stonework, feels completely removed from the Baroque grandeur of the Dom next door. The contrast between the two buildings — one from the 9th century, one from the 18th — tells you almost everything you need to know about the history of Christian architecture in Germany in one glance. Entry is free; the church is open during normal visiting hours.

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A story
The Michaelskirche was built around 820 AD as the funerary chapel for the abbey. The design — a circular nave based on the model of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem — was intended to evoke the sacred architecture of the Christian East in the heart of a newly Christianised Germany. Standing in the crypt below the round church, surrounded by columns carved a thousand years before the Baroque cathedral next door was built, is an unusually direct encounter with the early medieval world.