The potential of desalination of highly salt-contaminated buildings by denitrifying bacteria was investigated against the background of environmental protection and preservation of ancient monuments. Besides determination of specific ecophysiological demands of selected bacteria strains, evaluation of cell-specific denitrification rates as well as simulation and realisation of desalination experiments at buildings with different contamination degrees were aim of this work. In laboratory tests, most of the investigated bacteria strains tolerated the relevant abiotic parameters at the masonries and denitrified satisfactorily. The cell-specific denitrification rates measured in desalination procedures of contaminated buildings were sometimes as high as for established biotechnological processes (e.g. in waste water treatments).