Melk Abbey (German: Stift Melk) is a Benedictine abbey above the town of Melk, Lower Austria, on a rocky outcrop overlooking the Danube river, adjoining the Wachau valley, that belongs to the Austrian Congregation. Today's Baroque abbey was built between 1702 and 1736 to designs by Jakob Prandtauer. Particularly noteworthy are the abbey church with frescos by Johann Michael Rottmayr and Paul Troger. In the later eighteenth century, Abbey of Melk became a center of Enlightenment thought and social exchange; there was even a Masonic lodge there, since a number of monks were Freemasons.