Pilgrimage Church Maria Ponsee

The statue of grace on the high altar "Maria zu den Sieben Linden" and the "Mother of the Forest" are revered in Maria Ponsee. This miraculous image is now on the side altar next to the entrance to the parish church.The beginning of the pilgrimage can no longer be precisely dated.
The pilgrimages to Maria Ponsee that had been going on since the 17th century were revived after World War II.

Maria Ponsee pilgrimage churchnoteThe Maria Ponsee pilgrimage church was built from a chapel in the 12th century, mentioned in documents in 1329 as a Marian shrine. Around 1420 it was expanded to a three-bay side aisle with cross-ribbed vaults. The unique, impressive defensive tower is probably made of Roman rubble stone. From 1716 to 1726 the church was enlarged and given a Baroque look according to plans by Jacob Prandtauer. The early Baroque extension to the north dates from this period as a counterpart to the Gothic side aisle. At the same time, a hunting lodge was built as a summer residence for the provosts of Herzogenburg Abbey, which was later converted into a rectory. The high altar has a special feature, not an altarpiece, but a life-size statue of the Virgin Mary, which was washed up by the Danube flood in 1720. The parish of Ponsee experienced its first heyday as a pilgrimage church in the 18th century. It was renamed Maria Ponsee in 1950, when the forgotten pilgrimages were ceremoniously resumed.