Lärbro Church
Lärbro Church is a medieval church in Lärbro on the Swedish island of Gotland. The church is located at a former strategically important spot, as testified by the adjacent fortified tower. The presently visible, Gothic church replaced an earlier Romanesque church during the 13th and 14th century. The octagonal church tower is one of the most unusual on the island, not comparable to any other church towers outside Visby. It may have been built to house a chapel dedicated to Saint Olaf. The rest of the church is in a more traditional style, similar to other churches on Gotland. Inside, it contains medieval murals and an altarpiece from 1400, among other furnishings. The cemetery of the church contains several graves of victims from Nazi concentration camps who were taken to a field hospital in Lärbro after World War II to be treated. The church is in the Diocese of Visby of the Church of Sweden.
Location and surroundings
Lärbro Church is located in Lärbro, just west of a small valley. Archaeologists have discovered the remains of two ancient causeways connecting the two sides of the swampy valley nearby. The location of both the church and a defensive tower, a so-called , adjacent to it can thus be explained by its former strategic location. The tower dates from the 11th or 12th century. It is well-preserved, five storey tall stone tower built for defensive purposes. The ground floor and the top floor have ceilings supported by barrel vaults. On the third floor there are traces of an original dansker. Communication between the floor originally seems to have been possible via a ladder, but today an external wooden staircase provides access to the tower. Today the tower is used for temporary exhibitions.Two medieval lychgates in the cemetery wall were demolished in 1885.
During World War II, a field hospital was built in Lärbro. At the time of its completion in 1942 it was one of the most modern of its kind in Sweden. Since Sweden never entered the war, the field hospital never had to be used by the Swedish Armed Forces. Instead, it was used to treat sick and wounded refugees and victims of the war from the rest of Europe. Among those treated in the field hospital were refugees fleeing the occupation of the Baltic states, German soldiers and around 500 victims from the Nazi concentration camps Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. Some of those treated in the field hospital did not survive, and were buried in the cemetery of Lärbro Church. Today, there are 45 graves from this time at the cemetery, including nine Jewish graves. There is a memorial stone erected by the Jewish community in Stockholm at the cemetery, and a stone commemorating the Polish citizens who were treated at the hospital and are buried in the cemetery was inaugurated by the Polish ambassador to Sweden in 2010.
who are buried at the cemetery.
History
The current church was preceded by an earlier, Romanesque stone church which consisted of a nave and a chancel with an apse, and a tower which may have been added later. It was probably built at the end of the 12th century. Some parts of this earlier church have been incorporated in the present church. This includes the present portal to the sacristy and its decorated tympanum, which was originally the chancel portal of the earlier church. A few elements of the nave, chancel and the base of the tower also remain from this first church in Lärbro.At the end of the 13th century, a complete rebuilding of the church was initiated, resulting in the present Gothic building. The chancel and sacristy was replaced first, during the third quarter of the 13th century. The new nave was built at the end the same century. Several decades later the unusual tower was built, in the 1340s. It was originally probably about taller; in a storm in 1522 the top part was severely damaged and had to be demolished. No major alterations have been made since then. A renovation was carried out between 1953 and 1955 under the leadership of architect. A number of redundant buttresses supporting the tower was then removed.
Architecture
Tower
The most unusual feature of Lärbro Church is the octagonal tower, which is also one of the most singular medieval buildings on Gotland. The only other churches on Gotland with octagonal features are the church ruin of Helgeand in Visby and the side towers of Visby Cathedral. The tower appears to be the work of a workshop which was active at several churches on Gotland during the 14th century and known today by the notname. Apart from the octagonal shape, the pinnacles and gargoyles adorning the tower also appear to have Visby Cathedral as their model.The corners of the tower are decorated with lesenes of limestone. Approximately half-way up, the tower is indented somewhat, the lower part thus being broader than the upper part. The lesenes here end in pinnacles which stand out between the gables which end the wall sections. Under each pinnacle is a gargoyle, functioning as a water spout. Just below the gables, all around the tower, are pairs of pointed arch windows leading to a gallery which runs around the tower. The upper part of the tower was probably originally similarly decorated. The wooden roof is not original but probably of the original shape. The tower has an additional two Gothic windows decorated with tracery, one in the south wall and a smaller in the west wall above the portal. The portal itself is decorated with reliefs on the outermost posts, depicting saints Peter, Paul, Olaf and a fourth unknown saint. The capitals are decorated with sculptures depicting scenes from the life of Christ. On stylistic grounds, it has been suggested that the sculptor who made them also made the capitals at the chancel portals of Lummelunda and Hablingbo churches. Inside, the ground floor of the tower is covered by an eight-celled vault and lit by the large windows, creating a light and relatively lavish room, in contrast to most other churches on Gotland. It gives less the impression of being an anteroom and could be desribed as the focal point of the whole church. In one of the upper floors of the tower, the same eight-celled vault appears again. Unusually, the original wooden scaffolding used by the medieval builders has also been preserved there.
It is not known why the tower was built in this way. The most prevalent theory is that it was used as a chapel dedicated to Saint Olaf. A local legend connects the saint with the area around Lärbro, and as noted a sculpture of the saint also features on the tower portal. The shape of the tower could then possibly be a reference to the octagonal chapel in Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim, Norway, where the relics of the saint are kept.
Nave and chancel
The nave and chancel are on the other hand typical for medieval churches on Gotland. They appear to have been conceived in a single plan, even though they were built at slightly different times. The chancel is also stylistically closely related to the tower at Stenkyrka Church. It has a straight eastern wall and a group of three lancet windows, a common feature among the churches on Gotland. The nave receives light from two Gothic windows in the south wall and one in the north wall. Its portal is decorated with floral ornamentation and a single figure, again possibly depicting Saint Olaf. It is made of alternating grey and reddish limestone. The chancel portal is also decorated with purely ornamental elements. Inside, the nave is divided by two central pillars, constructed of alternating red and grey limestone, and six corbels into six bays.Murals and furnishings
Lärbro Church is decorated with an unusual set of medieval murals. They date from the construction period and can be found in the nave and chancel, where some of them have incorporated architectural details, e.g. a corbel has been used to form the head of a painted dragon. Other murals are purely ornamental, and some also depict more traditional religious subjects such as the Crucifixion and saints.The altarpiece of the church is from 1400 or the late 14th century, depicting Mary and the Twelve Apostles. It was altered in 1746 when many of the wooden statuettes were mixed up and marked with incorrect labels. It is tall and wide. It is similar to the altarpiece in Gammelgarn Church and probably made in Sweden. The baptismal font of the church is made of sandstone and dates from the end of the 17th century, and is decorated with festoons. The church also possesses a chair made of lathed wooden elements and dating from the 13th century. There are also a number of medieval tombstones in the floor of the church. The church organ is from 1955, but the church also has an organ from 1819 in the tower room. The pulpit is from 1718, and the pews are probably from the same period.