Church of St Martin

Construction of the archparish Church of St Martin in Laško began in the second half of the 12th century, perhaps in the 13th. The church was subsequently enlarged and remodelled several times. The bell tower and main nave survive from the original design, and research has shown that the nave originally had a flat ceiling. Beneath the massive choir tower — now the bell tower — was a square presbytery with the high altar. Its cross vault with two diagonal ribs still survives, the ribs resting in the corners on short columns supported by corbels. This building method influenced other churches in the historic Laško mother parish and forms what is known as the architectural ‘Laško group’.

During the Gothic period, two lower and shorter side aisles were added to the original single-nave late-Romanesque church. Both are beautifully painted. At the end of the 15th century a high presbytery with external buttresses was added to the east in the same style, leaving the massive Romanesque bell tower in the middle of the church.

In the first half of the 18th century the Chapel of St Francis Xavier and the Chapel of the Holy Cross were added. Both are decorated with frescoes by Janez Zlatoust Vogel.

The final extension came just before the Second World War, when two smaller chapels were added. Today's main entrance passes through one of them.

The church contains eight altars. The high altar, installed in the second half of the 18th century, is dedicated to St Martin. Three tombs lie beneath the church floor, one in each nave. After the cemetery that once surrounded the church was abandoned, several tombstones were moved inside, including those of Polydor de Montagnana and the Stich family from the period when Primož Trubar served in Laško.

With the final extension in 1935, the Church of St Martin acquired its present form — an architectural conglomerate of Romanesque, Gothic, Baroque and modern styles.

At the entrance, visitors can see a stone lion set into a shell-shaped niche in the exterior wall. It is a Baroque-altered lion of Roman origin whose relief was originally part of an ancient funerary stone.