Gurk Cathedral

Church in Carinthia, Austria

Gurk Cathedral

LocationGurk, CarinthiaCountryAustriaDenominationCatholicHistoryFoundedc. 1140Founder(s)Bishop Roman I of GurkConsecrated1200ArchitectureFunctional statusCathedralStyleRomanesqueAdministrationDioceseDiocese of GurkClergyBishop(s)Josef Marketz

Gurk Cathedral (German: Dom zu Gurk, officially Pfarr- und ehemalige Domkirche Mariae Himmelfahrt, Slovene: Bazilika v Krki) is a Romanesque pillar basilica in Gurk, in the Austrian state of Carinthia. The former cathedral and current co-cathedral of the Catholic Diocese of Gurk was built from 1140 to 1200. It is one of the most important Romanesque buildings in Austria.^[1]

With its consecration in 1174, the grave of Saint Hemma of Gurk was relocated there from former Gurk Abbey, a Benedictine nunnery she had founded in 1043 and which was dissolved by Archbishop Gebhard of Salzburg in 1070/72, in order to fund the newly established Gurk diocese and the construction of the cathedral. The cathedral chapter established in 1123 moved to Klagenfurt in 1787.

Construction

The elongated building has a westwork with two towers, a gallery, a crypt, and three apses. The crypt, with its 100 columns, is the oldest part of the cathedral. In the middle of the rural Gurktal, the imposing 60 m (200 ft) tall twin steeple of the cathedral can be seen from a very great distance.