Bergkirche Eisenstadt
The Bergkirche looks unusual from the first glance, and it is: it is built in two parts. The church itself is roughly a square, raised on a hill that was made taller with earth heaped up during construction, which is one way to read the "Berg" in its name. Prince Paul Esterházy built it in the early 18th century, when Eisenstadt was the seat of his family.
Go inside, it is free. The baroque interior plays with painted illusion in pinks and greys, and the dome was frescoed in the late 18th century by J. W. Baumgartner. In a side chapel stands a large marble sarcophagus: the tomb of Joseph Haydn, who spent much of his career working for the Esterházys. Most of his remains have rested here since 1932; his skull only joined them in 1954, with full ceremony.
Look for the organ too. It is the original instrument by the Viennese maker Gottfried Malleck, restored to the state it was in when Haydn and Beethoven played it at premieres of well-known works. Its old console now sits in the Haydn Museum, which you reach later on this walk.
East of the church rises the Kalvarienberg, an artificial hill full of passages and grottoes where painted statues show the 24 Stations of the Cross. Franciscan friars made them more than 250 years ago, in loud, vivid colours, and the hill was once a pilgrimage goal praised as the eighth wonder of the world. Visitors still move through it station by station; give it time if folk piety interests you.
From here it is 450 m, about 6 minutes, to the Jewish Museum, through the old Jewish quarter of Unterberg.
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