Freystadt Abbey

The Freystadt Monastery is a Franciscan establishment in Freystadt in the Upper Palatinate and in the Diocese of Eichstätt.

In 1452, a Franciscan hospitium (later a monastery) was founded on the Möningerberg at the request of St. Capistran by Count Palatine Otto II. In 1546, the Reformation was introduced in Freystadt; the monastery was dissolved from 1556 onwards.

In 1681, outside Freystadt near the pilgrimage church "Maria Hilf", a Franciscan hospice was again established by Countess Maria Theresia von Tilly, which was subordinate to the Franciscans of Dietfurt an der Altmühl; the Counts of Tilly had held the lordships of Freystadt, Holnstein and Hohenfels since 1627. Three Franciscans from Dietfurt took over the pastoral care of the pilgrims in 1681, which was again forbidden to them in 1688. From 1705, however, two fathers were again allowed to live in the sacristan's house. In 1710, the Prince-Bishop of Eichstätt, Johann Anton I. Knebel von Katzenelnbogen, approved the establishment of a hospice for six fathers and one lay brother. Ferdinand Lorenz Graf Tilly built this until 1715. In the meantime, in 1711, the Freystadt establishment was separated from the Dietfurt monastery. In 1715, the independent monastery could be expanded by four fathers and two lay brothers, and in 1718 by two more fathers.

The monastery, whose buildings were structurally altered several times, existed until the secularization in Bavaria in 1802/03. Afterwards, the private owners of the monastery complex changed several times. In 1833, the city of Freystadt came into its possession. The re-establishment of the monastery operation took place at the instigation of the citizens of Freystadt; in 1835, the Bavarian King Ludwig I allowed the return of the Franciscans, which took place in 1837.

In the 1950s and 1960s, the Franciscans ran a school with a boarding school. The city of Freystadt fundamentally renovated the monastery from 2005-2008, which has been inhabited by Franciscans (three fathers and one brother) from Poland since 1999; one father is also the city pastor of Freystadt and pastor of Thannhausen. In 2009, the school and seminary buildings of the monastery were demolished and the monastery garden was redesigned. A monastery tavern and a farm shop are operated privately with the "Haus Franziskus".