!!!Maria Saal

Maria Saal, Carinthia, market town in the district of Klagenfurt Land, 
alt. 505 m, pop. 3,700 (3,202 in 1981), area 
34.84 km%%sup 2/%, highly popular with pilgrims and day trippers; 
situated north of the town of Klagenfurt in the outer regions of the 
Zollfeld (valley drained by the River Glan, part of the Klagenfurt 
Basin). - Open air museum exhibiting typical Carinthian farmsteads, 
convent of the Sisters of Mercy (including a domestic science school 
and a home for mentally handicapped children); timber processing, 
haulage company, car traders, distribution centre of a trading chain, 
engineering works. - Late Gothic fortifications encircling a 
provost´s cottage and a pilgrimage church (constituted the 
religious centre of Carinthia during the 8%%sup th/%  century, 
bishopric until 945 with short interruptions). Choir and transept 
(1430), nave (1450-1459), fortifications (destroyed by a great fire, 
rebuilt between 1670 and 1674); various stone monuments from Virunum 
(e.g. stone relief of a Roman wagon), as well as historical tombstones 
(Keutschach Epitaph, 1510) along the outside of the south walls. 
Interior ornamented with Gothic frescoes (Genealogy of Christ, 1490); 
transept decorated with murals (1430), a mural by H. Boeckl (1928) and 
Baroque stucco works; impressive high altar (1714) with a cast stone 
madonna (1425); magnificent winged altars in the side choirs. The 
church bell weighing 6,600 kg was cast from Turkish canons in 1687; 
Baroque pulpit (1747); Gothic lantern (1497) in front of the south 
portal; charnel house (first documented mention in 1416); 
fortifications including a tower, a deanery, a former provost´s 
cottage (now housing the museum of local history´s furniture 
collection) and a gate house (ornamented with frescoes depicting the 
Virgin, 1776); column dedicated to the Virgin (1663); Plague cross 
ornamented with Late Gothic murals(1523).

!Literature
F. Schroeer, Propstei- und Wallfahrtskirche 
Maria Saal, 1983.


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