Endangered Monuments

The Fortified Churches of Transylvania
Under regular attack by Ottomans and Taters, early Saxon settlers in Transylvania (now part of Romania) designed their villages essentially as fortresses. The central feature of many villages was the church — imposing edifices of brick and stone that were used as shelters in time of danger. Some 300 fortified churches were built around the city of Sibiu, in southern Romania, between the 12th and 16th centuries, but the great majority have fallen to the ravages of time.

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