The 12 Romanesque churches of Cologne, arranged in a semicircle around the city center, are unique. Worldwide. Nowhere else can you find so many Romanesque collegiate and monastic churches in such close proximity.
Built between 1000 and 1250, with heavy walls, a three-nave basilica, a cruciform layout, rounded arches, pillars, and squat towers, these 12 cultural and historical Romanesque edifices strikingly mark the period before the Gothic church architecture, exemplified by the Cologne Cathedral. Some of the churches stand on foundations from the Roman era, which, along with the churches themselves, the original medieval furnishings, and relics, you can also visit—thanks to decades of reconstruction and monument preservation after the destruction caused by World War II.