Kalpana Kalpana (Editor)

Strängnäs Cathedral

Updated on
Edit
Like
Comment
Share on FacebookTweet on TwitterShare on LinkedInShare on Reddit
Location
  
Denomination
  
Church of Sweden

Phone
  
+46 152 245 00

Bishop
  
Country
  
Opened
  
1291

Strängnäs Cathedral

Address
  
Biskopsgränd 2, 645 30 Strängnäs, Sweden

Similar
  
Church of Sweden, Roggebiblioteket, Uppsala Cathedral, Västerås Cathedral, Linköping Cathedral

Strängnäs Cathedral (Swedish: Strängnäs domkyrka) is a cathedral church in Strängnäs, Sweden, since the Protestant Reformation the seat of the Lutheran Diocese of Strängnäs.

Contents

Architecture

It is built mainly of bricks in the characteristic Scandinavian Brick Gothic style. The original church was built of wood, probably during the first decades of the 12th century, on a spot where pagan rituals used to take place and where the missionary Saint Eskil was killed during the mid 11th century. The wooden church was not rebuilt in stone and bricks until 1340, just after Strängnäs became a diocese.

The cathedral contains a mixture of decorative styles. The nave, chancel, and sanctuary are highly traditional, with a very large triptych reredos dominating the high altar at the east end of the building. However, two of the side chapels have been refurbished in highly contemporary style, with modern altars, and abstract artistic decoration and religious symbolism.

Prominent burials

The cathedral contains the burials of Charles IX of Sweden, Sten Sture the Elder and Maria of Palatinate-Simmern.

Strängnäs Cathedral Library

Strängnäs Cathedral Library is one of the oldest surviving and working libraries in Sweden. It dates its origin to the year 1316 when Strängnäs Dominican monastery (according to a record kept by a will) received a widow's donation of books. The library was then built consciously by the bishops Kort Rogge and John Matthiæ. During the 1600s, it was expanded by Christina, Queen of Sweden, through the addition of the spoils of war, especially from the cities of Prague, Olmutz and Nikolsburg. During the 1700s the library expanded through gifts and bequests from learned diocesan clergy. During the 1800s it was kept in the former school building's main hall, and is now in the special Library chancel in the cathedral's northwestern corner, where a permanent cathedral librarian is the custodian. Dr Henrik Aminson (1814-1885) published in 1863 a comprehensive printed directory Bibliotheca Templi Cathedralis Stregnensis, quae maximam partem ex Germania Capta est circa finem belli triginta annorum, descripta, 1-2, of over 600 pages.

References

Strängnäs Cathedral Wikipedia


Similar Topics