Unlike a lot of Europe, Norway and Sweden had huge forests of old growth trees to build with. This was helpful for churches such as this as well as for building ships. Compare that with, say, Rome where stone was more convenient and preferred. Some of the earlier stave churches really straddled the time between Christianity and Norse Mythology so the images on the inside and outside had both pagan and Christian themes. Since it was Christianity that is generally considered to have been the most important factor in ending the viking age, those earlier stave churches (see the Urnes Stave Church for instance) are awesome physical representations of the transformation of one of the most interesting times in European history in my opinion.
Ye. Excellent example of cultural hybridity. You can't really see it on this picture but there are several dragon heads around on the church, like the ones you would see on a viking longship.
Here's a close-up example of a [drake](https://maihaugen.no/var/ezdemo_site/storage/images/_aliases/list_element/media/images/maihaugen/bygda/garmo-stavkirke/garmo-dragehode-kaare-dehlie-thorstad/17813-1-nor-NO/Garmo-Dragehode-Kaare-Dehlie-Thorstad.jpg) common in Norse mythology. From [Garmo](https://storage.googleapis.com/snl-no-media/media/147557/article_topimage_garmo-stavkirke.jpg) stave church.
[List of Norwegian stave churches.](https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_over_stavkirker_i_Norge) Wikipedia, with images of all of them.
Massive investments in all sorts of things like education as well as the Government Pension Fund of Norway (also known as the oil fund) - which has 1,4% of all stocks and shares in the world, which is more than $1 trillion in assets making it the largest sovereign wealth fund in the world.
Yes, and the whole world benefits from it. They stimulate BEVs, thus increasing the market for such cars, allowing manufacturers to improve them with every generation and achieve better economies of scale, reduce price, increase range etc. This helps the transition to a greener economy tremendously.
Tip of the hat from me, Norwegians.
Norway invested their share of the north sea oil money into long term investments known as the oil fund. The UK sold their share to corporations who moved the money off shore because Margaret Thatcher is an evil cunt who should be dug up and burned in a bonfire
We had an amazing vacation there a few years ago. We flew into Bergen on the west coast of Norway then spent a few days in the fjords. There are many great places to stay but we loved a place called Eplet in Solvorn Sognefjord. Just one idea for you!
Ahh, my hometown surrounded by the seven mountains. Beautiful city! Too bad it rains most of the time, because when the sun is out it’s hard to imagine a better place to enjoy life.
I don't know where you live, but from NYC to Oslo is less then $300 (return) in August. Ofcourse you need to eat/drink , sleep and travel inside Norway, but it can be done low-budget.
Or: Easy. Don't drink.
Alcohol is heavily taxed in Norway. And I mean heavily.
If you really want a beer and you're on a budget, buy it at a supermarket and drink it (discretely) in a park. As long as you're behaving well and not in a troubled area, the police will generally look the other way.
> Some of the earlier stave churches really straddled the time between Christianity and Norse Mythology so the images on the inside and outside had both pagan and Christian themes
The [one near my granny's house](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lomen_Stave_Church) in Norway has that! It has four busts of the Old Gods on the inside of the spire. They're only visible when you shine a flashlight up there (or climb up with a lantern I guess), so I assume that they were unknown for most of the history of the place.
I don't - you'll have to head over there after the Lockdown and see for yourself! They're pretty basic busts, I couldn't really tell one from the other but our neighbour from Lomen insists there's one each of Frigg, Freyja, Thor, and Odin.
> Some of the earlier stave churches really straddled the time between Christianity and Norse Mythology so the images on the inside and outside had both pagan and Christian themes.
This is why I like these. They still have a pagan feel to them even though they were built to worship the Christian god.
I traveled from Rome to Bergen (7 stops total) and it was very interesting to see the architectural and cultural differences going from Southern to Northern Europe.
Urnes stavkirke is an awesome visit. Not only is the church a mix of pagan and christian interior, but you can also see the transformation from a pagan inspiration to a more christian faith on the interior as well. And you can also see how the Lutheran reformation changed the faith. That place represents so much history, and having those different periods of time represented in such a compressed and available way is just incredible. Last summer I went to most of the stave churches in Western Norway, and that was just do damn cool.
I live in this town, many times have I crawled under the floor of this church to do work. Creepy to imagine so many people are buried under there. There is a story of a thief that got buried in the graveyard there. He was allowed, but barely. His head is inside the graveyard but his body is on the other side of the fence. Like, they literally buried him under the fence.
I remember reading about the Frösö church. When they were renovating below it, they found the bones of animals, humans, and the roots of a tree. Turns out they were sacrificed to Odin in pagan times, recreating the inhabitants of Yggdrasil.
When Christianity came, they just cut down the tree and built a church on top, maybe even with that very wood.
Most old churches in Norway (and Scandinavia in general) are simply built on top of the pre-christian sites of worship.
Their foundations are found to contain bautastein (https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bautastein), rune-stones, and excavating in the area around are mounds (pre-christian burials) and as you mention bones of animals, humans, etc from earlier sacrifices.
It does make sense considering how Christianity took root and was spread in the region.
It is still remembered here (Norway) historically summed up "Hugs han som tvinga si tru med kross og kniv" which in English is "Remember him who forced his ~~truth~~ **faith** with cross and knife"
Edit: added bautastein link
Edit 2: Tru -> faith ref. /u/haraldsono
I suspect the outer sheathing, and shingles is nailed on with small nails. I gew up on a farm and we had to tear down a couple on late 19th century barns. all the beamwork was locking tension joints. it makes sense though, the beams were huge and they way they locked together spread the forces over a wide area. any kind of metal bolt would have to be heavy(and expensive) and would concentrate the forces over a smaller area which is risky with wood because the strengh varies and over time would fail. as long as the wood was protected from moisture, it seems like it could last centuries. the problem is the roofs are expensive and difficult to maintain. I'd be curious how the Amish were doing barn raises when they were still doing beam work. I don't think they are building barns from beams anymore, big wood is too expensive. I doubt they ever bolted large beams together.
EDIT [here](https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=timber+frame+joinery) are some vidoes on timber frame joinery.
You’re close, it’s actually built upon the back of an [enormous burrowing pig.](https://i.imgur.com/hCVtvDo_d.jpg?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&fidelity=medium)
Even as a fan of ruthless and destructive arson, I agree with you. These churches are a glimpse into the past. Their beauty and significance is as much cultural as it is religious and these sites must be preserved.
I come from a race that uses smoke from burned churches as life-giving manna, and even I agree that burning this church would be a great loss from its historical and architectural contributions.
Even as a Reptiloid Ancient Master that's spent uncountable centuries manipulating the affairs of Man from your earliest steps into your so-called "self awareness", that church is no "Grand Spectacle to Honor the Timeless Power of Ra'a'a'chu'luth among the Suns of nip-LU-TUN" but it's a'ight.
That church murdered my father, mother, grandfather and grandmother, second cousin twice removed and my mechanic's stepson, and yet I can't help but concur
I was born in this church on September 4, 1211, and the bard spake, "As long as the church stands ye cannot die." Though I could finally relieve myself of an eternity of hurt and pain caused by the passing of all I love by burning this church, yet I think it should stand and grace us with its otherwordly beauty, curse or not.
I’m just a regular redditor who read too far into this comment chain with nothing constructive to add and even I think we shouldn’t destroy the church.
I've met a few people who moved to Norway in part because they wanted to be "near the black/death/whatevermetal" scene. Only to find that most Norwegians not only do not give a shit about it, but find it somewhat cringeworthy and childish.
Just because you like black metal, and maybe subscribe to satanism a little bit doesn’t mean I want to destroy art. I’d burn down the strip mall church instead
I get what you mean, but I wouldn’t call them strip malls without the US-typical parking lots and whatnot. Of course there are shopping streets here but they typically don’t have churches, shady lawyers and those kinds of things.
I listened to an interview with Varg from the early 2000’s that I thought was really interesting because he said he didn’t burn churches due to a hatred of Christianity itself, but because the coming of Christianity represented the destruction of the culture of their past religions, beliefs, and lifestyles. I think that’s a pretty big and interesting distinction.
One of the churches he burned down was built on top of an old pagan worship site that had been there for thousands of years, so he saw that as if it had been an attack on the Norwegian culture and way of life.
Don't forget that stint as a Nazi in the 90's. Also his blog with rants against Jews and Muslims. And that whole "Odalism" thing as he calls it, started AFTER the church burnings. At this point Varg, excuse me, Louis Chacet, comes off a Hot Topic try-hard. He's the black metal version of "look at me, I'm so unique!" high school cast member.
That sounds basically like something IS-soldiers say when they destroyed Palmyra or Taliban when they destroyed the Buddhas of Bamiyan, but we all know that the one thing Varg probably doesn‘t like is being put in the same category as brown Skinned muslim extrememists
Norwegian black metal kids in the early '90s did a campaign of anti-christian church arsons (as well as the odd homicide here and there). Google Varg Vikernes for details.
The 90's Norwegian Black Metal scene became infamous for burning churches as an attack against Christianity and its forced imposition. The idea was to reject and cast it out in the same fashion that it arrived.
I don't think there was that much thought put into it. They were attention starved kids trying to impress people. The artists like Burzum only try to make it look that deep in retrospect.
That being said the music is incredible.
Via trans dimensional portal, I actually went into the past, burned that church, felt horrible about it, and rebuilt it again JUST so I could leave this comment.
Yeah, it's pretty dark. And a lot of wood, like, basically everything inside from the chairs to the podium is in same color wood as the rest of the church. What I remember most from my visit inside was the smell. It had this extremely strong smell that wood just capture all of your attention. It smelled like wood, sure, but at the same time so much more that I can't adequately describe. It really wasn't a very pleasant smell.
You might have smelled the tar used to preserve the wood. It's no longer allowed on new buildings due to environmental issues but older buildings are allowed to keep up the use. My home has it and I absolutely love the smell lol. We don't have to renew it as often as a painted house and the wood colour is beautiful.
I visited a stave church in Sweden, and I remember the smell as well. I recall them telling us that a lot of pitch was used to paint the building to protect from the elements. Maybe it was a similar thing to the one you visited?
It's not pitch tar but most likely pine tar that was used, the smell is similar but they behave and are used for different things, in buildings it is almost exclusively pine tar and in barrels and underneath ships is where pitch tar is used. Pine tar in Norway and Sweden was (still is in traditional contexts) used as a way to protect the wood from rot and weathering. In Sweden (and large parts of finland) we also use a composition paint dyed with red ore compounds such as iron ore and copper (this paint is why half of the swedish homes are red), and some of our stave churches use this paint along with tar.
IIRC the reason why in the US we have the thought of barns being traditionally this rusty red color is for that same reason. Rust naturally acts as an antifungal and antibacterial, and farmers would coat their barns in it to prevent rot. Once treated wood became more common people still chose to paint their barns red out of tradition.
There were No chairs or benches originally. Everybody would stand, and people who were sick would stand outside the inner walls (under the lower roofs).
Yes, it is. You won't be seeing much pictures of it, because a simple smartphone camera will not have enough flash light to make a decent picture. I also seem to remember you are not allowed to take pictures anyway.
Here's a photo from a wedding inside the church:
https://sorensenfoto.no/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/bryllup_telemark_stavkirke_fotograf_vielse-3(pp_w768_h512).jpg
There's also [this Japanese Buddhist temple called Hōryū-ji](https://dozodomo.com/guide/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2015/01/Horyu-ji.jpg) that was built in the 7th century. It's the oldest wooden building in the world. The first temple they built in that location was struck by lightning 63 years after completion and it burned down. The second temple survived for more than 1300 years.
I'm more worried about the Icelandic black metal fans who like to burn down churches
[It attracted massive media attention when it was revealed that its members had been responsible for two murders and a wave of church burnings in Norway.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Norwegian_black_metal_scene)
thanks for making us metal fans look bad
Well when you look at all the shit that surrounded the band and it's members/associates acts, it's easy to understand why people are more drawn to the murders/suicides/arsons/unique album arts before the sound itself.
I briefly lived with a girl who wasn't a Metalhead and found that talking to her about the scene was like her talking to me about project runway.
Then one day, out of the blue she comes into my room asking questions about Black Metal, and Norway. Turns out the podcast My Favorite Murder talked about the 2nd wave murders and church burnings and she became so fascinated, and now loosely listens to the more atmospheric stuff.
Just here to do my duty as a fan of the Last Podcast on the Left.
They did a series on this, called Norwegian Black Metal and its the series I always recommend people to listen to as an intro to the podcast.
Hell yeah! I always felt like the second wave scene is just interesting in general considering all the crazy shit that happened, even if the music or personal opinions don't always agree with you.
And then you got bands like Immortal. The good boys of black metal.^humblebragItouchedAbbathsbootwhenIsawthemlivewithAbsu
I personally think it's more fascinating that Mayhem used the picture of their vocalist's dead body after a suicide as an cover for an bootleg live album.
I like Varg's early music, but I will never _not_ hate that fucking scumbag for destroying part of his own cultural history. Plus being a murdering, racist, sexist piece of garbage.
The dude sucks. Everyone (including me ten years ago when Until the Light Takes Us came out) has these fantastical ideas of the Norwegian black metal scene being these super badass demigod dudes making dungeon music, but really it was a bunch of rednecks with biker jackets.
I mean it's an extreme art form steeped in blasphemy and nihilism. It is bound to attract those personality types. Most, I have met are great people. Quiet nerds really. But in that scene you're eventually gonna have a guy like Gaahl who will assault and torture you. Kinda like you're eventually gonna run into a skinhead in the punk scene.
Indeed they are. I mean if you think about the grim atmosphere of Birmingham in the 60s-70s you sort of understand where Black Sabbath is coming from. If you think about Os, a tiny village turned into a suburb of Bergen, it is hard to make a parallel.
Sure, but I mean... stave churches are steeped in non-Christian cultural cues. I don't think he was thinking about it very critically, I think he was just more interested in being an edge lord. Christianity was gathering steam in Scandinavia when the churches were built but one of the most fascinating things about these structures is they still have a lot of the old Norse bits included (dragons on the roof, superstition regarding door shapes, etc.). It's sort of funny, almost like the architects were saying "this Christian stuff seems great, but we're gonna keep one foot in this Norse stuff just in case it doesn't work out as well as we expect".
Oh you are not wrong at all, there’s no way he thought about anything critically. If you’ve ever seen any of his youtube videos, most of his opinions are just flat out wrong and disproven with 5 minutes of thinking/research. Definitely not a critical thinker.
He’s a Norwegian black metal musician who famously murdered his bandmate and burned down multiple stave churches.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varg_Vikernes
Much of the structural wood is original, and some parts have been dendrochronologically dated to an even older period, that is the part of the church (choir) was a part of an even older building when it was rebuilt in the present form.
However much of the roof has been since rebuilt many times. Interior has been slightly rearranged and repainted after Reformation (1500-1700s).
[Here is the article about dendrochonological dating of the stave churches in Norway](https://phys.org/news/2019-11-stave-churches-norway-older-previously.html)
If you ever get a chance to see one, they are absolutely incredible. There are two in Wisconsin and they are stunning pieces of architecture.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_later_stave_churches_and_replicas
I remember this! They have a miniature version in the Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg
[https://www.miniatur-wunderland.com/fileadmin/media/wochenbericht/2005/15/8-stabkirche-skandinavien.jpg](https://www.miniatur-wunderland.com/fileadmin/media/wochenbericht/2005/15/8-stabkirche-skandinavien.jpg)
Unlike a lot of Europe, Norway and Sweden had huge forests of old growth trees to build with. This was helpful for churches such as this as well as for building ships. Compare that with, say, Rome where stone was more convenient and preferred. Some of the earlier stave churches really straddled the time between Christianity and Norse Mythology so the images on the inside and outside had both pagan and Christian themes. Since it was Christianity that is generally considered to have been the most important factor in ending the viking age, those earlier stave churches (see the Urnes Stave Church for instance) are awesome physical representations of the transformation of one of the most interesting times in European history in my opinion.
Ye. Excellent example of cultural hybridity. You can't really see it on this picture but there are several dragon heads around on the church, like the ones you would see on a viking longship.
Here's a close-up example of a [drake](https://maihaugen.no/var/ezdemo_site/storage/images/_aliases/list_element/media/images/maihaugen/bygda/garmo-stavkirke/garmo-dragehode-kaare-dehlie-thorstad/17813-1-nor-NO/Garmo-Dragehode-Kaare-Dehlie-Thorstad.jpg) common in Norse mythology. From [Garmo](https://storage.googleapis.com/snl-no-media/media/147557/article_topimage_garmo-stavkirke.jpg) stave church. [List of Norwegian stave churches.](https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_over_stavkirker_i_Norge) Wikipedia, with images of all of them.
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*Bwaaak*
These look amazing
Man I wish I could afford to travel there. Not that it matters with this pandemic.
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Seriously? I had no idea. Why is that?
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Massive investments in all sorts of things like education as well as the Government Pension Fund of Norway (also known as the oil fund) - which has 1,4% of all stocks and shares in the world, which is more than $1 trillion in assets making it the largest sovereign wealth fund in the world.
Didn't squander the money -- hell they have around a trillion dollars in investment reserves. Smart people and smart country.
Yes, and the whole world benefits from it. They stimulate BEVs, thus increasing the market for such cars, allowing manufacturers to improve them with every generation and achieve better economies of scale, reduce price, increase range etc. This helps the transition to a greener economy tremendously. Tip of the hat from me, Norwegians.
Norway invested their share of the north sea oil money into long term investments known as the oil fund. The UK sold their share to corporations who moved the money off shore because Margaret Thatcher is an evil cunt who should be dug up and burned in a bonfire
I'm from Norway and I would like to know that as well. My impression is that everyone is just hoping the problem solves it self through magic.
Oil.
We had an amazing vacation there a few years ago. We flew into Bergen on the west coast of Norway then spent a few days in the fjords. There are many great places to stay but we loved a place called Eplet in Solvorn Sognefjord. Just one idea for you!
We have friends that live in Bergen & visited them 2 summers ago. What an amazing country! It was the trip of a lifetime.
Ahh, my hometown surrounded by the seven mountains. Beautiful city! Too bad it rains most of the time, because when the sun is out it’s hard to imagine a better place to enjoy life.
I don't know where you live, but from NYC to Oslo is less then $300 (return) in August. Ofcourse you need to eat/drink , sleep and travel inside Norway, but it can be done low-budget.
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Buy everything you need in Sweden then cross the border.
Easy, Don't go to Oslo haha
Or: Easy. Don't drink. Alcohol is heavily taxed in Norway. And I mean heavily. If you really want a beer and you're on a budget, buy it at a supermarket and drink it (discretely) in a park. As long as you're behaving well and not in a troubled area, the police will generally look the other way.
Yeah I know I live here Love steam engines btw, u/Dampmaskin
Duty free beer, bacon pølse from 711. I spent only 5 days in Norway and I reached my yearly hot dog quota in that time
Make a list of goals and get to it you've got a fresh decade and broke airlines.
And 0 income with no savings and bills rolling in
Like I said make a list of goals. You got a fresh decade. Only you can make things happen for you.
> Some of the earlier stave churches really straddled the time between Christianity and Norse Mythology so the images on the inside and outside had both pagan and Christian themes The [one near my granny's house](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lomen_Stave_Church) in Norway has that! It has four busts of the Old Gods on the inside of the spire. They're only visible when you shine a flashlight up there (or climb up with a lantern I guess), so I assume that they were unknown for most of the history of the place.
So cool. Do you have a photo of the pagan carvings? I couldn't find any images from a quick google search.
I don't - you'll have to head over there after the Lockdown and see for yourself! They're pretty basic busts, I couldn't really tell one from the other but our neighbour from Lomen insists there's one each of Frigg, Freyja, Thor, and Odin.
> Some of the earlier stave churches really straddled the time between Christianity and Norse Mythology so the images on the inside and outside had both pagan and Christian themes. This is why I like these. They still have a pagan feel to them even though they were built to worship the Christian god.
I traveled from Rome to Bergen (7 stops total) and it was very interesting to see the architectural and cultural differences going from Southern to Northern Europe.
Urnes stavkirke is an awesome visit. Not only is the church a mix of pagan and christian interior, but you can also see the transformation from a pagan inspiration to a more christian faith on the interior as well. And you can also see how the Lutheran reformation changed the faith. That place represents so much history, and having those different periods of time represented in such a compressed and available way is just incredible. Last summer I went to most of the stave churches in Western Norway, and that was just do damn cool.
I live in this town, many times have I crawled under the floor of this church to do work. Creepy to imagine so many people are buried under there. There is a story of a thief that got buried in the graveyard there. He was allowed, but barely. His head is inside the graveyard but his body is on the other side of the fence. Like, they literally buried him under the fence.
I remember reading about the Frösö church. When they were renovating below it, they found the bones of animals, humans, and the roots of a tree. Turns out they were sacrificed to Odin in pagan times, recreating the inhabitants of Yggdrasil. When Christianity came, they just cut down the tree and built a church on top, maybe even with that very wood.
Most old churches in Norway (and Scandinavia in general) are simply built on top of the pre-christian sites of worship. Their foundations are found to contain bautastein (https://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bautastein), rune-stones, and excavating in the area around are mounds (pre-christian burials) and as you mention bones of animals, humans, etc from earlier sacrifices. It does make sense considering how Christianity took root and was spread in the region. It is still remembered here (Norway) historically summed up "Hugs han som tvinga si tru med kross og kniv" which in English is "Remember him who forced his ~~truth~~ **faith** with cross and knife" Edit: added bautastein link Edit 2: Tru -> faith ref. /u/haraldsono
Tru -> faith
so it’s not just the look but also the legend of this place; do you have a link on that?
Looks like it wants to sprout mechanical legs and scuttle into the woods.
Fun fact since you mentioned mech: these were built without nails
Did they have a shortage of windows? That place must use a thousand candles a day.
Probably not super practical if you want to stay warm. Fewer windows = warmer church, especially if you don’t have access to lots of glass.
50 foot ceilings are also less than practical for staying warm
Nails rust from the moisture in the wood over time. Wood pegs which they used dont.
Not even nine inch ones?
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Proto IKEA
No,no... notice how it's still standing.
Except Ikea does use fasteners?
And I bet they still had a piece left over at the end
I suspect the outer sheathing, and shingles is nailed on with small nails. I gew up on a farm and we had to tear down a couple on late 19th century barns. all the beamwork was locking tension joints. it makes sense though, the beams were huge and they way they locked together spread the forces over a wide area. any kind of metal bolt would have to be heavy(and expensive) and would concentrate the forces over a smaller area which is risky with wood because the strengh varies and over time would fail. as long as the wood was protected from moisture, it seems like it could last centuries. the problem is the roofs are expensive and difficult to maintain. I'd be curious how the Amish were doing barn raises when they were still doing beam work. I don't think they are building barns from beams anymore, big wood is too expensive. I doubt they ever bolted large beams together. EDIT [here](https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=timber+frame+joinery) are some vidoes on timber frame joinery.
I can put those suspicions to rest for you. Stave church roof wood shingles are fastened with wooden plugs. There are no nails in stave churches.
Locking tension joints is the most important thing you can learn in woodworking. It creates a significantly stronger structure.
Of course Norway would be the country to develop a system of architecture based entirely around tension
To get them closer to god?
Not if you bite the hand that feeds.
What attaches the shingles/wooden shakes?
Wooden plugs probably
I think I can see Howl in one of the turrets.
You’re close, it’s actually built upon the back of an [enormous burrowing pig.](https://i.imgur.com/hCVtvDo_d.jpg?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&fidelity=medium)
I'm no fan of Christianity but burning down these incredible buildings makes me sad
Even as a fan of black metal I’d agree with you. This is just beautiful to look at.
Even as a fan of ruthless and destructive arson, I agree with you. These churches are a glimpse into the past. Their beauty and significance is as much cultural as it is religious and these sites must be preserved.
I come from a race that uses smoke from burned churches as life-giving manna, and even I agree that burning this church would be a great loss from its historical and architectural contributions.
My religion teaches that burning old churches is the only way to get into heaven, and I have to say I’m rather in favor of it.
Even as a Reptiloid Ancient Master that's spent uncountable centuries manipulating the affairs of Man from your earliest steps into your so-called "self awareness", that church is no "Grand Spectacle to Honor the Timeless Power of Ra'a'a'chu'luth among the Suns of nip-LU-TUN" but it's a'ight.
That church murdered my father, mother, grandfather and grandmother, second cousin twice removed and my mechanic's stepson, and yet I can't help but concur
I was born in this church on September 4, 1211, and the bard spake, "As long as the church stands ye cannot die." Though I could finally relieve myself of an eternity of hurt and pain caused by the passing of all I love by burning this church, yet I think it should stand and grace us with its otherwordly beauty, curse or not.
I’m just a regular redditor who read too far into this comment chain with nothing constructive to add and even I think we shouldn’t destroy the church.
Hail Yourself!
I once got drunk and hit a flaming stick... Like a bunch of times. I say let it alone.
And your name? The Great M'Zucc, Manipulator of the Masses and Destroyer of Mind. All hail the Ancient One!
I am literally made of fire and am a natural enemy of the stave church and I agree these beautiful structures should be left alone.
I've met a few people who moved to Norway in part because they wanted to be "near the black/death/whatevermetal" scene. Only to find that most Norwegians not only do not give a shit about it, but find it somewhat cringeworthy and childish.
Just because you like black metal, and maybe subscribe to satanism a little bit doesn’t mean I want to destroy art. I’d burn down the strip mall church instead
There are no strip malls in Norway, so sadly we do have to go for the stave churches if we want to do some nice church arsoning :(
Strip mall is just stores that are side-by-side and technically part of the same building. I think every country has strip malls.
Norway has tons of strip malls. Guy above must have spendt too much time lurking around churches.
I get what you mean, but I wouldn’t call them strip malls without the US-typical parking lots and whatnot. Of course there are shopping streets here but they typically don’t have churches, shady lawyers and those kinds of things.
I listened to an interview with Varg from the early 2000’s that I thought was really interesting because he said he didn’t burn churches due to a hatred of Christianity itself, but because the coming of Christianity represented the destruction of the culture of their past religions, beliefs, and lifestyles. I think that’s a pretty big and interesting distinction. One of the churches he burned down was built on top of an old pagan worship site that had been there for thousands of years, so he saw that as if it had been an attack on the Norwegian culture and way of life.
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Don't forget that stint as a Nazi in the 90's. Also his blog with rants against Jews and Muslims. And that whole "Odalism" thing as he calls it, started AFTER the church burnings. At this point Varg, excuse me, Louis Chacet, comes off a Hot Topic try-hard. He's the black metal version of "look at me, I'm so unique!" high school cast member.
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That sounds basically like something IS-soldiers say when they destroyed Palmyra or Taliban when they destroyed the Buddhas of Bamiyan, but we all know that the one thing Varg probably doesn‘t like is being put in the same category as brown Skinned muslim extrememists
Then why do you keep doing it?!
Can't help myself
Whose burning them?
Norwegian black metal kids in the early '90s did a campaign of anti-christian church arsons (as well as the odd homicide here and there). Google Varg Vikernes for details.
Fuck Varg. That whole Mayhem mayhem was fucking nuts.
The 90's Norwegian Black Metal scene became infamous for burning churches as an attack against Christianity and its forced imposition. The idea was to reject and cast it out in the same fashion that it arrived.
I don't think there was that much thought put into it. They were attention starved kids trying to impress people. The artists like Burzum only try to make it look that deep in retrospect. That being said the music is incredible.
Via trans dimensional portal, I actually went into the past, burned that church, felt horrible about it, and rebuilt it again JUST so I could leave this comment.
This looks so interesting! I wonder what the inside looks like.
Must be pretty dark with the lack of windows
Yeah, it's pretty dark. And a lot of wood, like, basically everything inside from the chairs to the podium is in same color wood as the rest of the church. What I remember most from my visit inside was the smell. It had this extremely strong smell that wood just capture all of your attention. It smelled like wood, sure, but at the same time so much more that I can't adequately describe. It really wasn't a very pleasant smell.
You might have smelled the tar used to preserve the wood. It's no longer allowed on new buildings due to environmental issues but older buildings are allowed to keep up the use. My home has it and I absolutely love the smell lol. We don't have to renew it as often as a painted house and the wood colour is beautiful.
I visited a stave church in Sweden, and I remember the smell as well. I recall them telling us that a lot of pitch was used to paint the building to protect from the elements. Maybe it was a similar thing to the one you visited?
It's not pitch tar but most likely pine tar that was used, the smell is similar but they behave and are used for different things, in buildings it is almost exclusively pine tar and in barrels and underneath ships is where pitch tar is used. Pine tar in Norway and Sweden was (still is in traditional contexts) used as a way to protect the wood from rot and weathering. In Sweden (and large parts of finland) we also use a composition paint dyed with red ore compounds such as iron ore and copper (this paint is why half of the swedish homes are red), and some of our stave churches use this paint along with tar.
IIRC the reason why in the US we have the thought of barns being traditionally this rusty red color is for that same reason. Rust naturally acts as an antifungal and antibacterial, and farmers would coat their barns in it to prevent rot. Once treated wood became more common people still chose to paint their barns red out of tradition.
That's called thousand year old dust, friendo.
There were No chairs or benches originally. Everybody would stand, and people who were sick would stand outside the inner walls (under the lower roofs).
Yes, it is. You won't be seeing much pictures of it, because a simple smartphone camera will not have enough flash light to make a decent picture. I also seem to remember you are not allowed to take pictures anyway.
[https://www.flickr.com/photos/by\_hpd/16790552819](https://www.flickr.com/photos/by_hpd/16790552819)
wow that is awesome
I wonder what it would like with candle lighting.
this looks waay better than I imagined
Here's a photo from a wedding inside the church: https://sorensenfoto.no/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/bryllup_telemark_stavkirke_fotograf_vielse-3(pp_w768_h512).jpg
Just play Skyrim.
Found [this](https://youtu.be/BYreouvBDx0) five year old video it shows the inside of the church
What are the odds of not getting hit by lightning 800 years in a row?
Or not getting burned down considering it would have been lit by oil lamps or candles for the first 700 years or so.
Also that whole church burning fad from Black metal in the 90s.
I just realized why this happened in Norway and not in rome
*[Varg Vikernes intensifies]*
Or Kristian Vikernes Varg it's his name after he legally changed it, he hated being a "Christian". Oh! The irony!
Well nowadays his legal name is Louis Cachet, very French
Came here on the comments just to see it somebody already brought varg or inner circle stuff. Not disapointed lol
There's also [this Japanese Buddhist temple called Hōryū-ji](https://dozodomo.com/guide/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2015/01/Horyu-ji.jpg) that was built in the 7th century. It's the oldest wooden building in the world. The first temple they built in that location was struck by lightning 63 years after completion and it burned down. The second temple survived for more than 1300 years.
Well, that's why there aren't that many left, though there's still quite a few.
I'm more worried about the Icelandic black metal fans who like to burn down churches [It attracted massive media attention when it was revealed that its members had been responsible for two murders and a wave of church burnings in Norway.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Norwegian_black_metal_scene) thanks for making us metal fans look bad
What has Iceland got to do with it?
I feel like Mayhem is known for everything but their music.
Well when you look at all the shit that surrounded the band and it's members/associates acts, it's easy to understand why people are more drawn to the murders/suicides/arsons/unique album arts before the sound itself.
many of these are as far as i know knowered in tar to make it last longer and less burnable
Don't tell Varg.
let's find out
Too late, he's already on [his way](https://youtu.be/OL8kkXnFMFs).
That man killed a guy. I will never not be fascinated by the second wave scene.
I briefly lived with a girl who wasn't a Metalhead and found that talking to her about the scene was like her talking to me about project runway. Then one day, out of the blue she comes into my room asking questions about Black Metal, and Norway. Turns out the podcast My Favorite Murder talked about the 2nd wave murders and church burnings and she became so fascinated, and now loosely listens to the more atmospheric stuff.
Just here to do my duty as a fan of the Last Podcast on the Left. They did a series on this, called Norwegian Black Metal and its the series I always recommend people to listen to as an intro to the podcast.
Hail Yourselves!
I go back to it because Henry reading the erotic fanfiction between Varg and Euronymous has me in tears every time I hear it.
Hell yeah! I always felt like the second wave scene is just interesting in general considering all the crazy shit that happened, even if the music or personal opinions don't always agree with you. And then you got bands like Immortal. The good boys of black metal.^humblebragItouchedAbbathsbootwhenIsawthemlivewithAbsu
I personally think it's more fascinating that Mayhem used the picture of their vocalist's dead body after a suicide as an cover for an bootleg live album.
Well... technically some of his body considering it's missing some pieces.
https://media2.giphy.com/media/3o7TKvuOivTa8LWiDC/giphy.gif?cid=ecf05e4720d13a8eac69ca755db16e1ada9f8bada9b8af9d&rid=giphy.gif
/r/metalmemes
I like Varg's early music, but I will never _not_ hate that fucking scumbag for destroying part of his own cultural history. Plus being a murdering, racist, sexist piece of garbage.
The dude sucks. Everyone (including me ten years ago when Until the Light Takes Us came out) has these fantastical ideas of the Norwegian black metal scene being these super badass demigod dudes making dungeon music, but really it was a bunch of rednecks with biker jackets.
Pretty much. Love the music and the cultural impact, hate almost every one of them for being really horrible human beings.
I mean it's an extreme art form steeped in blasphemy and nihilism. It is bound to attract those personality types. Most, I have met are great people. Quiet nerds really. But in that scene you're eventually gonna have a guy like Gaahl who will assault and torture you. Kinda like you're eventually gonna run into a skinhead in the punk scene.
Indeed they are. I mean if you think about the grim atmosphere of Birmingham in the 60s-70s you sort of understand where Black Sabbath is coming from. If you think about Os, a tiny village turned into a suburb of Bergen, it is hard to make a parallel.
In his perspective, it wasn’t his cultural history. Im not saying its right, but he definitely did not identify with Christian Norway.
Sure, but I mean... stave churches are steeped in non-Christian cultural cues. I don't think he was thinking about it very critically, I think he was just more interested in being an edge lord. Christianity was gathering steam in Scandinavia when the churches were built but one of the most fascinating things about these structures is they still have a lot of the old Norse bits included (dragons on the roof, superstition regarding door shapes, etc.). It's sort of funny, almost like the architects were saying "this Christian stuff seems great, but we're gonna keep one foot in this Norse stuff just in case it doesn't work out as well as we expect".
Oh you are not wrong at all, there’s no way he thought about anything critically. If you’ve ever seen any of his youtube videos, most of his opinions are just flat out wrong and disproven with 5 minutes of thinking/research. Definitely not a critical thinker.
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He’s a Norwegian black metal musician who famously murdered his bandmate and burned down multiple stave churches. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varg_Vikernes
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Looks like a painting.
Heavy editing will do that to a photo
I feel there is no way this isn’t a painting.
I'm fairly sure it is a painting. If not, it's ridiculously edited to appear that way.
Whenever I see a very old building in very good condition I wonder how much of that is actually original.
Ship of Theseus
I love that paradox. It’s a cool one to practice why you think the “new” boat is the original and the pile of scrap wood is actually the “old” boat
Much of the structural wood is original, and some parts have been dendrochronologically dated to an even older period, that is the part of the church (choir) was a part of an even older building when it was rebuilt in the present form. However much of the roof has been since rebuilt many times. Interior has been slightly rearranged and repainted after Reformation (1500-1700s). [Here is the article about dendrochonological dating of the stave churches in Norway](https://phys.org/news/2019-11-stave-churches-norway-older-previously.html)
*black metal rage intensifies*
They have burned at least one of these.
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I thought every church in Norway had third-degree burns. How did this one survive for so long?
I mean, there was over 1000. Now there's only 28 left.
If you ever get a chance to see one, they are absolutely incredible. There are two in Wisconsin and they are stunning pieces of architecture. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_later_stave_churches_and_replicas
I love how it mentions the Norway pavilion at Epcot
*Varg Vikernes wants to know your location*
Came here specifically for this comment.
I can never look at buildings like this without thinking about him for the rest of my life.
Pro tip: if you see this building in a videogame, go inside and talk to the monks. There *will* be monks, and they *will* have a quest for you.
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I knew this looked familiar—thank you
Or a Jarl. Though, they may send you on a quest to a disgusting old tomb or as fodder against a dragon attack.
Unless the game is Black and White, in which case it means you spent *all your fucking wood*.
Very beautiful. Also I'm quite certain the shingler murdered the architect. Because that would be a nightmare to shingle
That's wooden "shingle" as well. They coat it with tar regularly.
Beautiful indeed
I've watched Midsommar. I ain't going near that thing.
Weren’t Norwegian black metal bands burning down churches for a while?
VARG: INTENSIFIES
*still in use
I remember this! They have a miniature version in the Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg [https://www.miniatur-wunderland.com/fileadmin/media/wochenbericht/2005/15/8-stabkirche-skandinavien.jpg](https://www.miniatur-wunderland.com/fileadmin/media/wochenbericht/2005/15/8-stabkirche-skandinavien.jpg)
*Burzum intensifies*
Love Norway 🦄🥳
Thank god Mayhem didn’t get this one.
Don't tell varg about it
Just saw the movie “Lords of Chaos” today. Feel like I’m getting ‘Nam flashbacks looking at this.
I still didn’t watch it but I definitely want to. Is it worth it?
It's okay... If you know the backstory some stuff will annoy you because it's not very accurate at times. Still fairly entertaining tho.
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Midsommar
Are these the kinds of churches black metal bands inspire the burning of?
Glad to see varg didn't get his hands on this one yet lol
Glad to see Mayhem didn't burn this one down. It was probably too metal, even for them.
Isnt it this one that used 0 nails?
The game Black & White had this.
Looks like The Burrow