Villages with Fortified Churches in Transylvania

Saxon settlers arriving in southern Transylvania in the late Middle Ages built villages to a distinctive plan — farmsteads ranged along the street, communal land beyond, and at the centre a church ringed by defensive walls stout enough to shelter the whole community. Seven such villages, their churches fortified and remodelled between the 13th and 16th centuries, were inscribed by UNESCO in 1993 and remain among Romania's most atmospheric cultural landscapes.