St. Severin Schwefe

The church itself has undergone major alterations on several occasions, but unfortunately not always by builders whose skills matched those of their ancestors. For example, the Romanesque tower and the south wall of the nave—which is still preserved in its original form—were constructed much more carefully and sturdily than the chancel and the north wall, which were built about 550 years later (~1706); the latter had to be stabilized on the outside with retrofitted buttresses and on the inside with iron bracing.

Likewise, the haphazardly arranged Baroque window openings do not stand up to comparison with the much more beautifully structured upper story of the Romanesque tower, which is, after all, more than half a millennium older, and whose form remained unchanged even after the restoration and plastering in 1993–94. The beautifully and harmoniously shaped spire dates from 1788. It was modeled after Gothic forms after the Romanesque spire had been destroyed by a lightning strike.