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Taufsteine aus skandinavischen Gesteinen in Schweden und Norddeutschland
Get PDFTitle Baptismal Fonts made of Scandinavian Rock in Sweden and Northern GermanyThe article provides an overview of the various types of rock used for baptismal fonts from the Middle Ages onwards in Scandinavia, especially Sweden and Northern Germany. The fonts are made of boulders as well as bedrock from these countries, and some of them were exported within the region. Some studies of the migration of both rocks and styles in order throw further light on the existence of trade routes, forms of cultural transfer, iconography and decorative features, and how they changed over the centuries, have been published in Scandinavia. The specimens described here serve only as examples of larger groups of fonts, which in most cases have both stylistic and petrographic characteristics in common. The author wants to encourage further research, especially in Germany, in order to ascertain such similarities for other types of rock as well, and at the same time look for deviating elements. The article is in German, with captions in English and a map indicating the locations of the fonts depicted
Shadow Paintings: A Neglected Type of Wall Painting
Get PDFThe article presents the results of a pilot study focusing on what are called shadow paintings in Norwegian church interiors from the 17th and 18th centuries. Among the many Baroque illusionistic wall paintings in churches, painted shadows are probably the least known and considered. Shadow paintings are grey or black paintings that surround church furnishings, such as altarpieces, epitaphs and sculptures, as well as pulpits and stalls. They create an illusion of light by “casting” a shadow behind an object, thus enlarging and accentuating the object. Most of the original shadow paintings were overpainted or removed during the 19th century, but in the 20th century many were rediscovered and successively revealed. Remnants of shadow paintings are found in several northern European countries. In Norway, nineteen visible shadow paintings have been preserved, offering an understanding of how these wall paintings were formed, executed and popularized. Aside from their decorative character, painted shadows can supply greater knowledge about the church furnishings. But above all, shadow paintings are relics of an age when light – both natural and spiritual – created a more dramatic expression within churches
Sofia Lahti: Silver Arms and Silk Heads. Medieval Reliquaries in the Nordic Countries, Åbo/Turku 2019
No full textKronborgs tre kroner. Kunst og heraldik som kampplads i 1500-tallets Norden
Get PDFTitle: The three crowns of Kronborg. Art and heraldry as a battlefield in 16th-century ScandinaviaThe article deals with the controversy in the 16th century between Denmark-Norway and Sweden concerning the right to use the coats-of-arms with three golden crowns on a blue background. The Swedish king Erik XIV (ruled 1560–1568) claimed that the three crowns were a symbol of Sweden and should not be used by the Danish king now that Sweden was an independent country, while the Danish king Frederik II (ruled 1559–1588) claimed that the three crowns were simply a reminiscence of the Kalmar Union between all Scandinavian countries, which lasted with several long intermissions from c. 1397 to 1520, headed by the kings of Denmark-Norway. The article stresses that it is difficult to separate the reputation of the nation from that of the king in 16th-century Scandinavia, since politics and the use of power were to a great degree a personal matter, where the illustrious appearance and behaviour of the king as well as appropriate artistic surroundings were decisive. The importance of personal reputation meant that a lot of the activities which we today call propaganda, including the use of art and heraldry, were in reality largely direct or indirect attacks on the reputation of the royal opponent. The controversy about the three crowns was not settled in the war 1563–1570, yet the article suggests that the Danish king provided his new royal castle Kronborg in Elsinore, built 1574–1585, with spires and weather vanes decorated with three crowns, as a deliberate statement that the Danish king had no intention of giving up this powerful symbol
Maria Cinthio & Anders Ödman (förf. och red.): Vägar mot Lund. En antologi om stadens uppkomst, tidigaste utveckling och entreprenaden bakom de stora stenbyggnaderna. Historiska media, Lund 2018.
Get PDFEtt ”väl utsmyckat skrin” för Katarina av Vadstena? En omtolkning av det broderade relikvariet i Linköpings domkyrkomuseum
Get PDFTitle: A “well adorned shrine” for St Katarina of Vadstena? A reinterpretation of the embroided reliquary in Linköping Diocesan Museum
This article discusses an embroided skull reliquary in the keeping of Linköping Cathedral’s Diocesan Museum in Sweden. It is one of four still extant similar reliquaries from Vadstena Abbey. The reliquary has previously been examined by Agnes Branting & Andreas Lindblom (Medeltida vävnader och broderier i Sverige 1928) and later discussed by Axel L. Romdahl in Fornvännen (1929) as well as by Carl R. af Ugglas (1935). In 2001, Inger Estham described it in a publication on textile objects in Linköping Cathedral and suggested that it was made for the feast of the translation of Bishop Nils Hermansson in 1515. A renewed analysis of the reliquary, which takes the embroidery techniques, the loss of ornaments and the iconography into consideration, supports the assumed provenance from Vadstena Abbey. The hitherto unnoticed decoration on the lid, in the shape of a typical Birgittine nun’s crown, suggests that the relics belonged to someone in the Birgittine context. Based on this observation, together with an iconographical and stilistic analysis, this article argues for a rejection of the connection between the reliquary and the translation of Bishop Nils Hermansson. It is further suggested that the dating of the reliquary must be adjusted to a time not later than the translation feast of Katarina of Vadstena in 1489, and that it might even have originally been made to encase her skull
