Pfarrkirche hl. Veit / Parish Church of St. Vitus - Hardegg (Waldviertel, Niederösterreich) - Medieval Churches on Waymarking.com

The parish church of St. Vitus (Pfarrkirche hl. Veit), medieval Romanesque-Gothic structure with Baroque tower and interior, is located on the northern slope of the castle hill in the town of Hardegg. Pfarrkirche hl. Veit is an Austrian listed building by Bundesdenkmalamt.

The St. Vitus church stands together with the Romanesque rotunda-shape Karner (charnel chapel) and the cemetery on a small terrace on the northern slope of the castle hill. The church is connected to the lower rectory building (Pfarre) with a steep covered wooden staircase. The Hardegg parish was founded probably by Counts of Plain-Hardegg in the middle of the 12th century. The parish, Protestant in the middle of the 16th century, was orphaned during the 17th century and was re-endowed by the government in 1694. The small late-Romanesque single-nave church building with high-Gothic extension was rebuilt in Baroque style (interior changes and bell tower added) in 1743-1754. The last principal chuch's reconstruction was done in 1970.

The core of the current church is a Romanesque nave from the beginning of the 13th century, which probably received a lower southern aisle in the beginning of the 14th century. The striking high-Gothic and a far visible choir extension at the north side of the original Romanesque nave was added around 1400. To the east of the sacristy, north of the choir, is the Baroque church tower from 1754. The simply structured nave with a smooth western gable front has Baroque arched windows on the south aisle. The slightly raised choir with a five-eighth closure is supported by tiered buttresses. The originally Gothic tracery windows are bricked in Baroque style and rounded with grooved reveals. The Baroque three-zone tower is simply structured with pilaster strips and ribbons and has small rectangular windows. The bell floor with profiled cornice and corner pilasters has arched windows and clock gables.

The church' interior was reshaped in Baroque style, but elements of Romanesque and Gothic periods of the architectural development are still present in vaults, pillars etc. Neo-Classsicist main altar was created by Wenzel Scribani in 1863, painting and side statues are older. The Baroque side altars are from 1733/1735.

Source: excerpted and translated from Wikipedia