Where is this church? Not there, where it should be. Church Svätý Kríž (translation – Saint Cross) is an articular wooden church, situated close to the village Lazisko. Originally it was built in the village Paludza. Paludza is a village, that you can swim through. Yes, you read it right – swim through, if you have diving equipment, because now the village is at the bottom of Liptovska Mara dam. The village was flooded after building of the dam and inhabitants were moved to new housing estates.
As the articular wooden church is so unique, they decided to dismantle it and to carry it away to another village. The church wasn´t listed in UNESCO, because it´s not located at its place of origin, even though it deserves it.
Why is it so unique? Because, the church is one of the biggest wooden buildings in the central Europe. According to various sources, the church can take 4.000 to 6.000 people. During its construction not a single piece of stone or metal was used. It´s all made up of wood. Nowadays, the wooden wall facing is attached to the wall with small metal nails, but it wasn´t like this in the past. The bell-tower built by the entrance, was added a few years later after its construction. The only material allowed by the construction was wood. No other materials were allowed, because of the Austro-Hungarian law. Austro-Hungarian empire opposed the spreading of Protestantism and they wanted to make further spreading more difficult, so the conditions under which new protestant churches could be built, were tightened up. The new conditions included for example: construction only of wood, at high humidity places (so the wood will be rotten soon) and they couldn´t be built in the villages.
All these applied mesaures were probably useless, as the wooden church is still standing in the 21st century and it is in better condition than a lot more buildings, that were built in the 18th century. 🙂
PS: Don´t forget to buy some souvenir voluntarily, to contribute in running the church, otherwise the ladies, who look after it, will remind you to do so.
