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St. John's Church is the oldest preserved sacred building in Chojnice. The construction of the temple was started in the 14th century, in the place of the old wooden church. The hall church with three aisles, a separate presbytery and tower presents the Pomeranian Gothic style. It was destroyed many times by fires associated with wars, devastated, robbed and persistently reconstructed. During the the Reformation, the church was occupied by Lutherans. After it was recovered and three chapels were added. The latter is the only one preserved to this day. It is the home of the replica of the Beautiful Madonna from the Church of St. Johns in Toruń. Unfortunately, the church failed to preserve its original interior. One of the few surviving elements is the Baroque baptism font in the shape of a goblet from the beginning of the 18th Century. It is made of wood and its lid is decorated with the sculpture of Christ and St. John. The neo-Gothic wooden main altar, which was rescued from a fire, was replaced with a silver altar presenting scenes from the Gospel.
The most recent archaeological work in the church’s crypt revealed several burials from medieval times. One of them can be seen through the glass floor. This was the location of the burial of the great Gdańsk painter, Herman Han, who lived in Chojnice during the final years of his life. His most famous works include the Coronation of the Holiest Virgin Mary, the Holy Trinity and the Assumption of the Holiest Virgin Mary and the Concert of the Angels.
References:The Amphitheatre of the Three Gauls was part of the federal sanctuary of the three Gauls dedicated to the cult of Rome and Augustus celebrated by the 60 Gallic tribes when they gathered at Lugdunum (Lyon). The amphitheatre was built at the foot of the La Croix-Rousse hill at what was then the confluence of the Rhône and Saône.
Excavations have revealed a basement of three elliptical walls linked by cross-walls and a channel surrounding the oval central arena. The arena was slightly sloped, with the building"s south part supported by a now-vanished vault. The arena"s dimensions are 67,6m by 42m. This phase of the amphitheatre housed games which accompanied the imperial cult, with its low capacity (1,800 seats) being enough for delegations from the 60 Gallic tribes.
The amphitheatre was expanded at the start of the 2nd century. Two galleries were added around the old amphitheatre, raising its width from 25 metres to 105 metres and its capacity to about 20,000 seats. In so doing it made it a building open to the whole population of Lugdunum and its environs.