The City and Parish Church of St. Mary in Lutherstadt Wittenberg is a civic church and the preaching church of the reformers Martin Luther and Johannes Bugenhagen. Holy Mass was celebrated here for the first time in German, making the church the mother church of the Reformation. Since 1996, the City and Parish Church of St. Mary has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The parish church of St. Mary was first mentioned in a document in 1187. It is said to have originally been a wooden church belonging to the Diocese of Brandenburg. The present chancel and its southern aisle were built around 1280. Between 1412 and 1439, the nave was replaced by the three-aisled hall that still exists today, and the towers, initially crowned with a stone pyramid, were built. In 1522, during the iconoclasm initiated by Andreas Bodenstein, almost all of the interior furnishings were demolished and removed. Martin Luther therefore returned from the Wartburg to Wittenberg and delivered his famous Invokavit sermons there. During the Schmalkaldic War in 1547, the wooden pyramids were removed from the towers to create platforms for cannons. In 1556, the octagonal domes were placed on the platforms, and a clock and a watchman's apartment (occupied until 1945) were built. Subsequently, the eastern gable and the room above it for the ordinands were added. In 1811, the church's interior was redesigned in the Neo-Gothic style according to plans by the architect Carlo Ignazio Pozzi.
A thorough renovation followed in 1928 and again in 1980/83. In preparation for the upcoming 500th anniversary of the Reformation in 2017, work on another comprehensive renovation began in 2010. Following the completion of the construction work, the church was re-consecrated on November 30, 2014. The renovation of the towers was put on hold for some time due to financial constraints; however, the towers were completed in the summer of 2015. Source: Wikipedia
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