St. Lawrence’s Church is a 15th century gothic cathedral in Nuremberg. It was the only church we entered on the whole trip– Severin doesn’t like visiting churches (too bad because there are probably several thousand very old churches in Cyprus!) I actually convinced him to go inside twice– once in the evening, and again the next morning, so I could try to get pictures to do it justice. It has minimal electric lighting and it was winter in Germany– I brightened them up a lot on the computer but as a result you can see they got grainy.
This is a five hundred year old wood sculpture depicting the “Annunciation.” I will admit I had no clue what that meant until five minutes ago, when I looked it up– it’s apparently the moment the Angel Gabriel told the Virgin Mary she was going to become the mother of the son of god. That’s heavy; she looks pretty serene though.
I like medieval churches because I think they’re good at their job. Even 500 years later, I spent an inordinate amount of time staring at the ceiling. And this particular church is filled with stuff from the rich families of Nuremberg, who apparently made lavish donations of art and other accoutrements to the church:
It had some pretty intense stained glass too. This church, like most things in Germany, was destroyed during World War II. However, people had the foresight to take out all of the glass panels, art work, and other items so once the stonework was rebuilt (no small feat, as you’ll see from later photos), it was as good as new.
During our morning visit, this guy was practicing on the organ. I’m not one to sit and listen to organ music on my couch, but there is really no other fitting soundtrack for a medieval church. It’s amazing how the organ just fills the space and it’s almost as if you can feel the music in the air.
From the church’s facade. It’s a Roman skewering a baby, obviously. I’m not really sure why it’s on a church, but admittedly my biblical knowledge is significantly lacking.
This guy isn’t that exciting or impressive but I just thought his crouch was funny and awkward:
