Wetzlar Cathedral (Dom)

Romanesque-Gothic cathedral, shared by Catholic and Protestant congregations for over four centuries

The Dom (officially the Stiftskirche of the Marian collegiate chapter) is famously unfinished. Construction began around 1230 on the foundations of an earlier Carolingian and Romanesque church, and by the time the money and ambition ran out in the 16th century the building had two mismatched west towers, a finished Gothic choir, and a nave in three different styles. The result is a hybrid that reads like an architectural cross-section of the late Middle Ages.

The interior is unexpectedly harmonious, with 14th-century frescoes, an unusually expressive late-Gothic Pietà from around 1380, and the dramatic light from the south rose window. Free to enter; small fee for the treasury.

things to do sight church
A story
Since 1561 the Dom has been a Simultankirche — used by both Catholics and Protestants under one roof. They share the building according to a 1577 agreement, with the Catholic side at the high altar and the Protestants in the nave. It is one of only a handful of such shared churches in Germany, and the arrangement has held without serious incident for more than four hundred years.

Other places in Things to do