User Reviews
Llanddwyn island is rich in legends, in particular in its association with Dwynwen. The name Llanddwyn means 'The church of St. Dwynwen'. Dwynwen is the Welsh patron saint of lovers, making her the Welsh equivalent of St. Valentine. The island bears the ruined remains of St Dwynwen's Church (Eglwys Santes Dwynwen). Unusually for churches in that region it has a cruciform floorplan.
Archaeologists examined the ruins of St Dwynwen's in 2011 and again in 2021. The 2021 dig discovered traces of even older buildings below the ruins.
The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.