Granslev church / Granslev kirke and Bidstrup, Houlbjerg herred, Viborg amt.

 

















The church in Granslev has a Romanesque choir and nave in granite ashlars upon a bevel plinth, but the building is marked by a thorough rebuild in 1766, when justitsråd Lichtenberg re-shaped the room into Rococo and let build a tower to the west,a porch to the south and a chapel westernest on the nave's north side, all in red bricks. The tower has heavy corner pilaster strips and a timbered spire with onion dome-parts under a closed lantern and octagonal peak. The choir, porch and chapel have Baroque-winded, but flat round arched glares.

Granslev in March

The interior is also marked by the stamp of the Rococo - the choir has a highplaced grat-vault, and the nave has a flat, plastered ceiling, while the tower room and the chapel have grat-vaults and the porch a barrel-vault. Most of the inventory origin from the Rococo-rebuild. The altarpiece, a pompous Baroque- structure, probably from 1742 with a painting of Christ. Upon the choir wall panelwork and side-cupboards from the same period as the altarpiece. Heavy Renaissance candelabres, similar to those in Haurum and Sall church. A late Gothic layman's crucifix. A Romanesque granite font with double lions of the "classic" type. A font-edge in wood in achantus-Baroque, a South German bowl from ab. 1575 with pomegranates. Above the font a small crown shaped sounding board. A pulpit in Rococo from the rebuild like the pews, a manor gallery with very non-ecclesiastical landscape-paintings, all in blue, and an organ gallery and the organ, which in an examination in 1942 showed to contain a well-preserved work from early Renaissance-period. A large Renaissance-chandelier. In the tower a clockwork, which according to inscription is "færdet" in 1582 by fru Sidsel Oxe by Laurids Sejermester W.B. (Viborg?) In the chapel, which was abandoned as a funeral chapel in 1879, hangs a large naive 1700s painting of Christ. In the churchyard a worn out gravestone with a woman figure, who holds a cross in her hand.

 

































Bidstrup belonged in 1345 to Peder Jensen (Galskyt),  later to hr. Jens Falk of Vallø, with whose daughter Kirsten it came to hr. Henning Podebusk, who owned it in 1419 and 1421. His daughter Marine brought it to Hans Eriksen; he was written to the farm in 1461-68. In 1498 it belonged to Henrik Eriksen Rosenkrantz ( + 1500),  whose sister brought it to rigsråd Predbjørn Podebusk (+ 1541). In an exchange after him the main part came in 1548 to his daughter-in-law Ermegaard Bille (+ 1564) and her son rigsråd Erik Podebusk (+ 1573). His widow Sidsel Oxe kept B. until her death in 1593, and hereafter it went to Erik P's maternal aunt Ingeborg Bille (+ 1608). One part of B. had gone to Jytte Podebusk m. to Knud Gyldenstierne; it was inherited by the children Predbjørn and Karen Gyldenstierne, and with the last mentioned the part came to Axel Gyldenstierne of Tim (+ 1603), whose son Knud Gyldenstierne  (+ 1636) seems to have bought Ingeborg Bille's part.The sons Arild and Axel Gyldenstierne inherited B., after the death of the last mentioned in 1637 B. was owned by the widow Christence Lindenov (+ 1681), her daughter Øllegaard Gyldenstierne, m. to the famous Kaj Lykke, inhabited the farm at her death 1697,but she had in 1686 let it over to her son-in law Johan Rantzau (+ 1708), whose daughter Christiane Barbara Rantzau brought it to her husband Verner Parsberg (+ 1719). She sold the farm to high court judge Mathias de Poulson (+1729), whose son-in-law Anders Vinding (+ 1766) outbought his co-heirs in 1732, but in 1749 sold B. to Gerhard de Lichtenberg (+ 1764),  who in 1763 had B. and the church and the vicarage established into an entailed estate.

Later owners:  Tycho Honnens, Geert Honnens de Lichtenberg. In 1963 fru Margrethe Honnens de Lichtenberg.  

Bidstrup is listed in class A.

A castle Ilensborg is said to have been placed upon Grønhøj, an isolated bank in Langkær southeast of Bidstrup, but there is no trace of a castle bank. A similar name is connected to two dubious castle banks in Vejerslev parish. 

Listed prehistorics: 17 hills and 3 longhills, of which one is 70 m long. All these hills except one are placed in the forests of Bidstrup, most of them are small.

Demolished or destroyed: 48 hills, several, which have been examined, contained graves from Stone Age's single grave culture.

At Vrangstrup is examined a burial site with 5 partly rich graves from late Roman Iron Age.

Names from the Middle Ages: Granslev (1343 Grandeslef); Knudstrup (1472 Knwstorp, 1478 Knudsstrop);  Vrangstrup (1369 Wrongstrup); Bidstrup (1345 Bistorp); Rødemølle (1683 Røe Mølle); Voermølle (1664 Woer Mølle).

Source: Trap Danmark, Århus amt, 1963.


photo 2006/2011: grethe bachmann