Chiesa di San Michele Arcangelo

Behind Bressanone Cathedral, the Church of Saint Michael is linked to it by the Old Cemetery. A parish church since at least the twelfth century, it took its present form in 1503 and received its Baroque interior in 1757–58.

Why it matters

As Bressanone’s parish church, Saint Michael represents the everyday religious life of the city alongside the cathedral’s ceremonial role. Its dedication to the Archangel Michael has been interpreted as a sign of an early cemetery-church function. The church’s towerless silhouette stands beside the 71-metre White Tower, while its interior brings together late-Gothic sculpture, Mannerist painting and frescoes from the circle of Paul Troger.

What to notice

The angel imagery includes Raphael walking with Tobias on the false dome above the organ gallery, an Annunciation with Gabriel, and the Holy Trinity in the altar room. A Mannerist high-altar painting from about 1680 depicts Michael casting down the rebellious angels. The side altars feature paintings by Franz Sebald Unterberger and marble statues by Dominicus Moling. A much-venerated “Kreuzzieher,” a figure of Christ carrying the cross from about 1450, stands on the left side altar; beneath the gallery is a late-Gothic cross from about 1515–20. The organ dates to 1740–41.

Context and history

Saint Michael has served as the city’s parish church since at least the twelfth century. Rebuilt and enlarged several times, it took its current form in 1503, at the height of the late Gothic boom that also gave the neighbourhood its White Tower, completed in 1459 as the city tower. The interior transformation came in 1757–1758, when Joseph Hauzinger, a pupil of Paul Troger, baroque-ised the space and painted its frescoes on the angelic themes that the patronage invited. A fundamental renovation in 2015–2016 consolidated the building for continued parish use. Between the church and the cathedral lies the Old Cemetery, the burial ground until 1792, where the late Gothic mortuary light of 1485 still stands and where the memorial stone of the minnesinger Oswald von Wolkenstein, commissioned in 1408 before his pilgrimage to the Holy Land, found its final place after the cathedral's Baroque remodelling displaced it.