St. Nicholas Church was built in the early 1200s, and is Copenhagen’s third oldest church. The oldest churches, St Clement Church and The Church of Our Lady (Vor Frue), were in the village of Havn around Gl. Torv and were farmers’ churches. St Nicholas Church (Skt. Nikolaj) was close to the shore, and was the church of fishermen, sailors and visiting traders. The church was named after the patron saint of sailors.The original building was a late-Romanesque, three-winged, brick church, which was replaced by a larger Gothic building with three naves, choir aisles and ridge turrets around 1500.In 1529 Hans Tausen was hired as priest of St. Nicholas Church, and the following year the church became the centre for the spread of the Reformation in Copenhagen. Towards the end of the century a tower was built to the west of the nave. It was completed in 1591, and is a monumental example of the Renaissance architecture that became fashionable during the reign of Christian IV. The tower’s impressive buttresses were added soon after.