If you like seeing ancient ruins while you’re travelling you will definitely like the ruins of Eldena Abbey. Going there may not be easy though since it’s located in a small city in the northeast of Germany that some people may not have heard of. The Ruins of Eldena Abbey is in Greifswald, Germany in a state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The city only has a population of about 60,000. If you visit Berlin or Hamburg, the larger cities of Germany then you may get the chance to see the Eldena Abbey by driving 250 km from either of those cities. It was when we drove from Szczecin, Poland and took an overnight in Greifswald that we learned about what to see in the city.
The history of Eldena Abbey dates back in the 12th century when Greifswald was founded in 1199. It is a former Cistercian monastery confirmed by Pope Innocent III in 1204. The buildings of the Abbey is of Brick-Gothic. The construction was completed in the 15th century.
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- It looks like this is part of the interior of the Abbey
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- The walls are huge!
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- We can see some pillars here
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- Looks like the Holy Water font of the Abbey
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- Getting into the ruins of the Abbey
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- The information board is in German showing the activities from 1199 to 1999
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- The wall outside the Abbey by the road
The Abbey were severely damaged during the Thirty Years’ War, during which Greifswald was occupied by Catholic Imperial forces and thereafter by Protestant Swedish forces. The Ruins of Eldena Abbey (Klosterruine) was declared a cultural site of the “Euroregion Pomerania”. Interesting, isn’t it?
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