Churches and Church Tours in Prien

Pfarrkirche Mariä Himmelfahrt
Master builders from Munich and Salzburg joined together to create this wonderful church. This cooperation is typical for the region, as it lies approximately halfway between the two cities. The design encompasses the differences of Munich’s characteristic court-like elegance from Johann Baptist Zimmermann, which gives the space its dominant features, with the starker, artier grand air of Salzburg.

If Prien has a truly outstanding 18^th Century religious structure in its Pfarrkirche, Prien county’s village of Urschalling has an amazing record of middle age art in its St. Jakobus church, which is almost unique in Bavaria.

St. Jakobus in Urschalling
The wealth of pictures in St. Jakobus in Urschalling really makes this church unique. Few religious buildings have provided as many surprises as this over the centuries. Created at the height of the Romanesque period, the church’s paintings were originally commissioned by the earls of Falkenstein. The whole interior of the church is covered by a chain of images that were gilded as early as 1500, as the people of the Gothic period believed they were too primitive. At the end of the 14th Century, a chain of images was created that completely tells the story of salvation. Not much is known about the identity of the painter, thought to be a local master, but the value of the frescoes is their completeness and large scale, typical for the period. The church’s furnishings are emphatically minimalist and are limited to a few statues and an organ.

Prien church tours
Tours are available around the Pfarrkirche church in Prien which received its distinctive Baroque looks in the middle of the 18^th Century thanks to Johann Baptist Zimmermann. The altar image is the copy of one of Rubens’ paintings and the organ is a masterpiece from an outstanding instrument maker. One technical masterstroke for the time was the famous relocation of the church tower.