The Baroque building complex

The Virgin Mary Church (Nagyboldogasszony templom) was built in Baroque style between 1748 and 1779 on the basis of the plans by Franz Anton Pilgram. The bearing of the church was laid only on 14th August 1748 but the construction was moved on so fast that before the end of the renovation, on the occasion of the hundredth anniversary of the Battle at Szentgotthárd, the church could have been consecrated by Alberik Fritz, successor of Robert Leeb who had died meanwhile. János Szily, the first bishop of Szombathely, accomplished the consecration on 16th March 1779. From the murals of the church emerges the artwork about the victory of Szentgotthárd above Turkish, painted by Stefan Dorfmeister. The painter of the main altar and all the other altars was Matthias Gusner, a lay brother. The statues of the church are creations of Joseph Schnitzer, a Cistercian sculptor. The highly ornamented singing-gallery, the benches and the lockers in the sacristy had been carved by Kaspar Schrezenmayer, a lay brother, for almost 40 years. The biggest bell in West-Hungary, which is almost 40 quintal, can be found in the tower of the church. The wrought iron gate was prepared in 1791. The construction of the monastery, now used as the Townhall, was started in 1740 and monks could move into the half-made building in 1746. Franz Anton Pilgram originally planned the building to be symmetric, i.e. there would have been another wing of the monastery on the Northern side of the church, however, as they ran out of funds during construction, therefore only the Southern wing could be built.