"Oliwa Cathedral"

In 1186 a Cistercian monastery was founded.  It was destroyed and rebuilt several times over the next 200 years. In 1831  Prussian authorities closed down the Cistercian monastery. The church, together with some of the buildings belonging to it, was handed over to a Catholic parish. In 1976 it was raised to the dignity of a minor basilica by the decision of Pope Paul VI. In 1992n Pope John Paul II issued a bull by which he established the Archdiocese of Gdańsk with the seat in Oliwa and raised the basilica to the dignity of an archcathedral.

The architectural style of the basilica is   Gothic, Brick Gothic, Mannerist, and Baroque.

The archcathedral in Oliwa is a three-nave basilica with a transept and a multisided closed presbytery, finished with an ambulatory. The façade is flanked by two slender towers, 46-metres tall each with sharply-edged helmets. It is enlivened by a Baroque portal from 1688, as well as three windows of different sizes and three cartouches. The crossing of the naves is overlooked by a bell tower, a typical element of the Cistercian architecture. The cathedral is 17.7m high, 19m wide and 107m long (97.6m of the interior itself), which makes it the longest Cistercian church in the world. It holds works of art in Renaissance, Baroque, Rococo and Classical style of great artistic value. 

All 23 altars of the cathedral are of great historical value. They are mainly Baroque and Rococo, partly made of marble. Their iconography depicts the main principles of the post-Trent church. Most outstanding is the present High Altar (1688),[2] which is the most profound Baroque work of art in Pomerania; and the Netherland Renaissance style altar