Hansted Church is a parish church for the Hanstholm citizens and is situated outside the city.
Interior
The Romanesque granite font, a Thybo-type with relief lions.
The Danish word for this bench is 'Degnestol', ( School-Teacher's chair), which was the place where the parish school teacher sat during the church services. In 'the old days' the church did not own an organ, so he was the one who led the hymn singing. It was of course of great advantage if the teacher had a fine voice. This wasn't always the case.
A fine head with a cut off top, carved in wood. He is probably St. Dionysios. It origins from a former side altar and is from ab. 1500.
In the southern wall is an engraved picture of a ship with one mast, probably a trade ship engraved during the Middle Ages while Hanstholm town still had a trading harbour. Later the harbour sanded up. This medieval ship is the model for the modern city Hanstholm's City Arms.
Entrance to Hansted church with a lovely red painted fence. The white chalked porch is from the 1800s.
The small church, which is placed high upon a cliff close to the North Sea, has a Romanesque choir and nave and a porch to the north from the 1800s. The Romanesque building is in granite ashlars. The north door is in use but the south door has disappeared. From original windows is one in the north wall of the choir with a monolit cover stone and a window to the east in the north wall of the nave is visible under the plaster. Upon an ashlar in the south wall is a carved a picture of a one-mast ship - and upon the place of the disappeared south door is an ashlar with a carved buesegment (curved segment).
The church inside has beamed ceilings and the pretty shaped choir arch has profiled kragsten. Both the gables are rewalled at present , the west gable in 1862 and the choir gable probably in 1930. The Romanesque granite ashlar communion table has a monolit top and is covered by a panel from the 1850s with copy paintings of Rafael's Angels. The altar piece from ab. 1590 is a Lutheranian triptychon type with a top piece from the 1850s and a painting from 1855. The altar piece came probably originally from Sjørrind church and came to Hansted in 1650. From a former late Gothic side altar piece is a left a pretty male head from ab. 1500 with a cut-off crown, probably an image of St. Dionysius. A Romanesque granite font in Thybo-type with two relief-carved lions upon the basin. A pulpit with sections from the Renaissance but very re-newed in ab. 1862. A parish clerk stool from ab. 1600 with a Renaissance panel. The church bell is from 1794 by D.C. Herbst and is placed in a bricked gallow by the east gable. Earlier the bell-house was placed upon a flattened prehistoric hill at the church yard.
Close to Hansted church is Hanstholm Lighthouse and the Keeper's house, built 1843.
Opposite Hansted church are fields with cattle and a view to the outskirts of Hanstholm. In ancient times the Hanstholm area was a big island. During the Middle Ages the town Hanstholm was an important trading town, which supposedly worked as a center of trade between Norway and the Thy-district in North West Jutland.
Hanstholm Reserve is a huge protected area. The landscape is very beautiful and magnificent with hills, heaths, moors and lakes and creates an important sanctuary for birds. Hanstholm Reserve is of immense geological, botanical and zoological importance.
Names in the Middle Ages and 1600s:
Hansted (1555 Handsted).
Gårddal (1652 Gaardall); Nørby (1608 Nørhandsted); Bådsgård (1567 Boesgaard, 1582 Bordtzgaard); Hanstholm (*1455 Hanszholm, end of 1400s Hanzstedholm)
Source: Trap Danmark, Thisted amt, 1961.
photo 15 June 2006:grethe bachmann
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