The memorial slabs

stone signatures

The original Romanesque Church of St. Stephen is built on a burial site. Although parts of this site disappear under the church as it grows over the centuries, the city’s dead are still buried in the ground that remains. Indeed this continues until the end of the 18th century, at which point there are so many corpses under and around St. Stephens (and, as a result, such appalling standards of hygiene) that Kaiser Joseph II orders it to be cleared. The memorial slabs on either side of the main entrance remind us of the church’s original setting.