The Temple Saint-Étienne (''Protestant St. Stephen's Church''; Alsatian: ''Schtefànskerch'') is a

Calvinist Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Ca ...

church located in the city of

Mulhouse Mulhouse (; Alsatian: or , ; ; meaning '' mill house'') is a city of the Haut-Rhin department, in the Grand Est region, eastern France, close to the Swiss and German borders. It is the largest city in Haut-Rhin and second largest in Alsace a ...

Alsace Alsace (, ; ; Low Alemannic German/ gsw-FR, Elsàss ; german: Elsass ; la, Alsatia) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in eastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine next to Germany and Switzerland. In 2020, it had ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

. Its congregation forms part of the

Protestant Reformed Church of Alsace and Lorraine The Protestant Reformed Church of Alsace and Lorraine (french: Église protestante réformée d'Alsace et de Lorraine (EPRAL); german: Reformierte Kirche von Elsass und Lothringen; gsw-FR, d'Reformierta Kìrch vum Elsàss ùn Lothringa) is a Cal ...

. Because of its central location on the main square of Mulhouse, the ''Place de la Réunion'', and its 97 metre high bell tower (the highest steeple in the department of

Haut-Rhin Haut-Rhin (, ; Alsatian: ''Owerelsàss'' or '; german: Oberelsass, ) is a department in the Grand Est region of France, bordering both Germany and Switzerland. It is named after the river Rhine. Its name means ''Upper Rhine''. Haut-Rhin is th ...

), it is sometimes referred to as the "Cathedral of Mulhouse" (''Cathédrale de Mulhouse''). The church was designed by the city architect Jean-Baptiste Schacre, who also designed the large

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

St. Stephen's Church ('' Église Saint-Étienne'').

History

Until 1858, the former parish church of St. Stephen stood at the location of the current building. The originally late Romanesque building from the 12th century was expanded at the beginning of the 14th century in the

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

style. A substantially higher choir was added to the nave. In 1510, the Romanesque bell tower was remodelled in the style of the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...

. In 1707, the bell tower was crowned with an onion dome. In 1857, the city council of Mulhouse decided to replace the place of worship, which had come to be looked upon as dilapidated, by a new building. The city architect Schacre, who had already constructed the main synagogue of the city and the Catholic St. Stephen's Church, designed a church in the

neo-Gothic Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

style with a simple, rectangular ground plan without a transept and choir. In contrast to the long Catholic church, it was a squat, but very wide building. The bell tower, which is visible from quite a distance away, stands behind the building, in contrast to its model on the

Freiburg Minster Freiburg Minster (german: Freiburger Münster or Münster Unserer Lieben Frau) is the cathedral of Freiburg im Breisgau, southwest Germany. The last duke of Zähringen had started the building around 1200 in romanesque style. The construction con ...

. The current church was built between 1859 and 1866. Since February 2009 and prospectively until late 2019, the church is subjected to a progressive restoration of all its exterior and interior parts. The work had started with the complete scaffolding of the steeple.

Furnishings

A considerable part of the furnishings of the previous building were used in the St. Stephen's church of Jean-Baptiste Schacre. The most important of all the artistic treasures of the city of Mulhouse are the large leaded-glass windows from 1320 to 1350, famous for their vivid design and rich colors. They were originally in the choir and were set into the clerestory windows. The Baroque

choir stalls A choir, also sometimes called quire, is the area of a church or cathedral that provides seating for the clergy and church choir. It is in the western part of the chancel, between the nave and the sanctuary, which houses the altar and Church tab ...

of dark oak are from 1637. The stone church monument of Baron Friedrich Ludwig Waldner von Freundstein (1735), an important work of the local late Baroque period, was erected in the assembly room of the new church. Of the Silbermann organ made by

Johann Andreas Silbermann Johann Andreas Silbermann, also known as Jean-André Silbermann (26 June 1712, in Strasbourg – 11 February 1783, in Strasbourg) was an 18th-century organ-builder, as were his father Andreas Silbermann and his paternal uncle Gottfried Silberman ...

(1765), only the case remains; it was moved into the Reformed St. John's Church (Temple Saint-Jean) of the city, when the old church was torn down. The current organ comes from the workshop of Eberhard Friedrich Walcker, but has been altered many times since it was installed in 1866, especially by the Schwenkedel organ manufacturer. The Baroque pulpit from 1647 is found in the Reformed church of Illzach today. The main steeple houses the largest set of bells of any Protestant church in France. The five bells were cast in 1867 in Zurich.

Gallery

File:Stephanskirche Steinbachplatz Muelhausen 1900.jpg, View of St. Stephen's Church around 1900 File:Templeplacereunion.jpg, Other view of the façade File:Dom Mulhouse von Rue de Sauvage.JPG, The bell tower dominates the skyline of Mulhouse File:Mulhouse - Temple Saint-Étienne2.jpg, The church under restoration, 2010

References

*Scheurer, Marie-Philippe; Lehni, Roger; Menninger, Claude: ''Mulhouse, Haut-Rhin − Images du Patrimoine'', Le Verger,

Illkirch-Graffenstaden Illkirch-Graffenstaden () is a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Grand Est in north-eastern France. It is the second-largest suburb of the city of Strasbourg, and is adjacent to it on the south-southwest. Illkirch-Graffenstaden is one of the ...

, 1990,

External links

Website of the parish

Exterior and interior views

{{DEFAULTSORT:Temple Saint-Etienne Buildings and structures in Mulhouse

Gothic Revival church buildings in France Monuments historiques of Haut-Rhin Churches completed in 1866 1866 establishments in France