St. Mark's Church (Markuskirche) near the Klaus Gate at the foot of the Mönchsberg is a masterpiece of baroque architecture: the cornerstone for the Ursuline Convent church was laid in 1699. A smaller church located on the same site was destroyed by a disastrous rockfall from the Mönchsberg thirty years before. At the time of its construction, raising a building on the small strip of land between the Mönchsberg and the precipitous banks of the Salzach was a masterly performance.
Archbishop Johann Ernst von Thun called on the renowned architect, Fischer von Erlach, who was also commissioned to design other churches in Salzburg. The church was consecrated in 1705 but the construction of the convent took another two decades. It served as the seat for the Ursuline Order until 1957. Today the former St. Ursuline Church, consecrated to St. Mark the Evangelist, is known by its original name again.
Three saints adorn the church's pediment: St. Mark the Evangelist in the center with St. Augustine and St. Ursula on either side. Visitors are usually stunned by the unexpected richness of the church's interior: elaborate stucco, colorful frescoes by the Tyrolean painter, Christoph Anton Mayr, and the cupola with portrayals of St. Ursula in heaven. The saints on the façade can also be found inside the church. The altar furniture and pews are embellished with fine woodcarving.
References:Saint-Georges de Boscherville Abbey is a former Benedictine abbey. It was founded in about 1113 by Guillaume de Tancarville on the site of an earlier establishment of secular canons and settled by monks from the Abbey of Saint-Evroul. The abbey church made of Caumont stone was erected from 1113 to 1140. The Norman builders aimed to have very well-lit naves and they did this by means of tall, large windows, initially made possible by a wooden ceiling, which prevented uplift, although this was replaced by a Gothic vault in the 13th century. The chapter room was built after the abbey church and dates from the last quarter of the 12th century.
The arrival of the Maurist monks in 1659, after the disasters of the Wars of Religion, helped to get the abbey back on a firmer spiritual, architectural and economic footing. They erected a large monastic building one wing of which fitted tightly around the chapter house (which was otherwise left as it was).