The timber tunnel
Dim light through side gaps the whole way up.
Tiberiu Neag — CC BY-SA 3.0 ro · Myrabella — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Txllxt TxllxT — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Dennis G. Jarvis — CC BY-SA 2.0
It is the oldest building in Sighișoara and the most important architecturally: a Gothic church built in stages between the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries at the highest point of the town. Inside are fifteenth-century wall paintings uncovered from under plaster, carved timber furnishings, and a crypt with burials. Around it a Saxon cemetery falls away down the hillside among the trees, its German inscriptions telling the story of the community that left. The climb is worth it even without going into the church — the quiet at the top is nothing like the crowded square below.
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The Scholars' Stairs are a long timber tunnel climbing from the heart of the citadel to the church on the hill — **one hundred and seventy-five steps** roofed over and walled in wood, so you climb in dim light entering through gaps in the sides. It was built in 1642 for an entirely practical reason: the church and the Lutheran school stand on the hilltop, and the way up is exposed to snow, ice and wind through the whole Transylvanian winter. The roof was built so that schoolchildren and worshippers could reach the top without slipping — hence the name. The stair originally had about three hundred steps and was later shortened. Walking it is among the most distinctive things in the citadel, and at the top are the fourteenth-century Gothic church with its wall paintings and an old Saxon cemetery on the hillside among the trees. **Free and always open.**
Dim light through side gaps the whole way up.
Fourteenth-century Gothic with wall paintings.
Sighișoara Citadel, towards the Church on the Hill