Sct. Catharine’s Church and Monastery This church and monastery are unique buildings. They were founded in 1228 by the Blackfriars, who came from Spain, and had chosen Denmark as one of the first countries outside Spain in which to build a church and monastery. One may well wonder today why they chose such a small town as Ribe for their work. But at the time it had an important harbour, the king resided in Ribe, and it had been the episcopal residence for hundreds of years. The Blackfriars built the church and one wing of the monastery first, but they made the mistake of building in soft ground. Subsidence was a recurrent source of trouble, and it wasn’t until the 15. century that the third and last church was built. Shortly after that
they had to leave both church and monastery because at the reformation in 1536, the king handed the church over to the parish, and the monastery became a hospital for the poor, the old and the sick people. The monastery has - until this century played a varied role. As well as a hospital for the old and the sick it was used as a field-hospital for foreign troops, when they were stationed in Ribe. The courtyard was used as a barn for the kings hay, and from 1709 lunatics were housed in the buildings as well as the poor and sick. Furthermore 12 pupils and their teachers from the grammarschool in Ribe (the oldest grammarschool in Denmark) had their meals in the hospital every day. They literally had to �sing
