The parish church of St. Bartholomäus, Mistelbach

The church was painted in several stages with biblical scenes, starting with the lower gallery by an unknown artist. His 25 oil paintings of the Passion of Christ were embellished in 1632 during the Thirty Years’ war by Elias Brendel and his son Friedrich. The upper gallery, built at the beginning of the 18C, contains 26 scenes from the life of Jesus, in particular His miracles, painted in 1725 by Johann Peter Lanheinrich. That same year he got the contract to paint the barrel roof, with its Last Judgement above the chancel arch. The stone panels of the pulpit are also painted, for instance with Jacob’s Ladder.
It is not just the paintings which proclaim the Word of God, but also the rest of the furnishings and their figures: Johann Caspar Fischer’s altar with the Crucifixion group, the figures of Moses und John, God the Father and the risen one above (on the back of the altar is noted that this was the first altar made during the reign of Margrave Georg Wilhelm); Fischer’s pulpit with its sounding-board roof ; the two splendid processional crosses and the font. Above the memorial to the last Lord of Mistelbach is the epitaph of Father I.N.Geier, on whom a heavenly hand is placing the crown of life.
A small romanesque window behind the altar is evidence that there was already a church here in the 12C or 13C ; probably the castle chapel of the Mistelbachs, who also donated the castle church in Gesees.The church was dedicated to St Martin until the Reformation, when the patronage was changed to that of St Bartholemäus.