The Pfaffengasse (Priests' Lane) is mentioned in 1375 without a name, referred to only as a cross street off the Brotbankengasse (Bread Stalls Lane). By 1382 it already appears as "platea sacerdotum" (Street of the Priests), and from 1416 onward the name Pfaffengasse is regularly documented.

Around 1800 it was also called Große Pfaffengasse (Great Priests' Lane) to distinguish it from the Erste Priestergasse (First Priests' Lane), which at that time was also known as Kleine Pfaffengasse (Small Priests' Lane). Since the number of priests serving at Danzig's churches was extraordinarily large - the historian Hirsch estimates some 240 mass priests around 1500 - groups of two to four would typically share their own so-called Priesterhaus (priests' house). The street takes its name from one or more such houses located along it, just as the Erste Priestergasse does.

History