Inside the Chapel of Saint Michael in Hallstatt

I originally wanted to visit the Chapel of Saint Michael in Hallstatt early in the morning before I go to the salt mine but it seems the chapel is open in the afternoon. Now, there is actually a person selling tickets and letting people inside, I understand why it wasn’t open in the morning. The chapel itself is very small at the side of a small room. However, it is packed with around two thousand human skulls. The skulls belonged to people who used to be buried here in Hallstatt, however because of the lack of space for burial, existing burial sites were dug up to make room for the more recent dead. The skulls were then cleaned up and then painted to help identify them. They are now displayed here in the Chapel of Saint Michael.

The chapel was built in the 1200s. Even then, there already was a chronic lack of space for burying the dead. The number of skulls at the ossuary grew and according to the registry there are more than thirty thousand people who passed through the ossuary. However, there are only 1,200 skulls here. The rest have been moved somewhere else. The skulls have been painted a variety of ways and you can tell from the style what era they were painted in. These days, people are no longer laid to rest here because of the rise in popularity of crematoriums. The last skull was placed here was in 1995.

Visiting the chapel of Saint Michael can be a eerie affair. Going face to face with more than a thousand skulls can be an unnerving event. When I entered the chapel, there was a couple who was there before me which helped alleviate some of the anxiety when visiting a place like this. Eventually, they also left and I was alone inside the very quiet chapel. I guess I didn’t stay too long for my mind to start coming up with things. I still got my photos and I quickly made my way out. It is certainly one of the more unique places to visit here in the village of Hallstatt. I can’t say it was enjoyable but it is also a fascinating look into the lives, and deaths, of the people of this beautiful village.

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