Weimar

The city church St. Peter and Paul is closely connected with the Ernestine princely house, serving as the burial place for the dukes of Saxony-Weimar from Johann Friedrich I to Wilhelm IV. They furnished the church with funerary monuments, which rank among the masterpieces of German Renaissance sculpture. Connected with the history of the city church are a number of significant historical figures, such as Martin Luther, who was supported by the Ernestines and who preached here on a number of occasions between 1518 and 1540, and Johann Sebastian Bach, who had four of his children baptized in the city church. Under the regency of Anna Amalia, who in 1807 became the last member of the princely house to be buried in the choir, Johann Gottfried Herder came to Weimar in 1776. Together with Christoph Martin Wieland, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and Friedrich Schiller, he belongs to what is known as the traditional Viergestirn (four stars) of Weimar. Until his death in 1803, the poet, theologian, and philosopher served as the superintendent and high priest of the city church.