Our floating hotel, the Viking Prestige, was made for a city like Passau. We tied up at the confluence of two tributaries, the Ilz and the Inn, flowing into the Danube. (Hey, a city of three rivers! I can identify with that!) We walked off the boat, and --voila!-- we were in the old town. A short walk up a mild grade took us into the center of town, and the subject of this blog, St. Stephen's Cathedral.
If you have been reading my church accounts, you may have noticed the name Passau come up in previous histories of other churches and cities. From what I can gather, in the 13th and 14th and 15th centuries, before the prominence of Vienna or Budapest or Prague, Passau was the ecclesiastical center of this part of Europe. From the plains around Saltzburg, Austria, a mere 90 minute bus ride south, came salt. Salt was the gold, the industrial might, the digital revolution, of the Middle Ages. Salt meant wealth. Salt came to Passau, with its accessible transportation downstream on the Danube, and made a few bishops and businessmen very rich.
However, before telling the tale of another overwhelming Baroque cathedral, let me share with you two stories from our university-educated guide Passau guide. As we walked through a narrow alley, he stopped at a nondescript old brown wooden door. He said that the door, and the building, were hundreds of years old. In the door was a smaller (maybe 10" square) cut-out at shoulder height. He explained that the cut-out was used during the Black Plague as a way of townspeople giving the home's inhabitants food. But the kindly Good Samaritans didn't want to get close to the home's residents, lest they catch the deadly disease. So they would put the food on a long stick, and from a distance insert the stick, with its food, into the cut-out. Hence came the saying, "Don't touch me with a ten-foot pole."
Another story is that in the Middle Ages it was hard to tell if a person had died. In some cases coma and death were too close. So the undertaker would put a bell on the hand of the deceased as the body was placed in the coffin. If in the church or the graveyard the mourners heard a noise, they immediately opened the coffin. He was "saved by the bell."
Floods also mark Passau. Some were from centuries ago. But the city endured a "500-year" flood in 2013. Usually the Danube is no more than two meters (six feet) deep. But heavy rains in April 2013 caused such flooding in the area that the Danube River rose to a height of 10.5 meters (40 1/2 feet). We saw the flood water marks on bridges and buildings.
As with most of the church buildings in this part of the world, St. Stephen's Cathedral was built over centuries. The earliest church on the site dates to the 700s. (If this date is amazing, it is no less than the restaurant in Saltzburg which has been in continuous operation since 803. "St. Peter's Restaurant" was begun alongside a Benedictine monastery, and still is open for food today, 1,212 years later.) A three-aisle basilica was built about 990, and survived until 1662, when it was destroyed in a fire. The current cathedral was begun shortly thereafter, with completion about 1707.
Besides its very ornate Baroque frescoes, the Cathedral's claim to fame is that it holds "the largest cathedral organ in the world" and "the largest organ in Europa." The original organ was installed 1684-91, and enhanced in 1715-18. Later renovations of the organ were done in 1886-90 and 1977-80. The organ now has 233 stops and 17,974 pipes. "Organ" is a mis-nomer, as it is actually five organs, in three locations in the cathedral.
God was with our little group, as we arrived for our eight hour visit to Passau on Friday, May 1. Organ concerts are held daily from noon to 12:30 from the first day of May until the last day of October. We were able to hear the year's first concert. Our guide gave us tickets (two euros) to the concert. The cathedral's seats were filled with rubber-necked tourists who obviously had never been in a Christian church. The sound of the organ can only be described as "AWESOME." From the lowest of low notes to the highest of bird chirps, it was magnificent to be surrounded by visual and aural beauty in St. Stephen's Cathedral.
After the concert, we strolled through the old town. There was a market just outside the cathedral. I bought a warm fresh pretzel from a truck of "Ratzinger Brothers Bakery." (Any relation to Pope Benedict XVI?) There was also a puppet show for the children. The kids sat on the ground entranced by the movements of the small wooden marionettes. A lone accordionist accompanied the action on stage.
I found a nice church books and gifts store on the other side of the main square. Nearby were contemporary stores--and fine ice cream for a warm sunny day. Down two alleys I walked into a Franciscan church, a complete opposite of the ornate cathedral. This poor church was merely white walls and a few wooden statues. What a contrast.
I enjoyed our short stay in a delightful old/new town, Passau.
