Farsø church, Himmerland, Vesthimmerlands Kommune

Farsø Sogn is a parish in western Himmerland in Vesthimmerlands Kommune..Until the reform in 1970 it was in Gislum herred (Aalborg Amt). Farsø Kirke is situated in Farsø village 12 km west of the town Aars. The church was restored and had the walls replaced in 1991.

The church in Farsø was possibly inaugurated to Our Lady in the Middle Ages. The choir and nave are Romanesque in finely carved granite ashlars above a double plinth. Both original doors are preserved. The southdoor is bricked up. In front of the southdoor is a Romanesque grave stone. In the southern wall of the choir is a somewhat worn-out chess board ashlar. At the northern wall of the nave is a grave stone for Anne Cathrine Ørum of Farsø, who died in 1726, the grave stone is a re-used Romanesque profile ashlar, around the stone are several Romanesque building remains. The north door is still in use , here is a tympanum with a double lion like the lions on the baptismal font. In the porch is a rune stone; the inscription is: Toste og Esben rejste denne sten over Tue..... in the bottom of the stone is a Viking ship, maybe this is Nagelfar, the death ship in the Ragnarok-legend. (the Armageddon). The tower was built in the late Gothic period, the porch is from present time. Upon the new church yard is an obelisque-like stone, decorated with cross-shaped birds, carved by Erik Heide. 

Upon the church yard south of the church is a grave site for veterinarian Hans Jensen (died 1923) and his daughter, the author Thit Jensen (died 1957). Hans Jensen was the father of the author Johannes V. Jensen and Thit Jensen. Some years before her death Thit Jensen moved to Farsø and lived directly south of the church. Johannes V. Jensen is buried in Bispebjerg church yard in Copenhagen.

The Romanesque choir arch is preserved with a slant plinth. The choir has a beamed ceiling, the nave had a vault in the late Gothic period. The altar piece is from the late 1800s, the painting made in 1943. The original painting is now placed upon the church wall. The pulpit is from the beginning of the 1600s. The Romanesque granite font has double lions and male heads in strong reliefs.

Upon the triumph wall to the north hangs a crucifix, carved by Johannes Josephsen from Viborg in 1965, the figure is carved after the ivory crucitfix from ab. 1250 in Herlufsholms kirke. In the choir is an epitaph from 1651 for Søren Hanssøn Wiborg. A sculpture by Thorvald Odgaard hangs upon the southern wall of the nave from 2004. It shows the angel by the empty grave.

In Farsø is a museum for Johannes V. Jensen  and memorial rooms for Thit Jensen.


http://www.jensenmuseet.dk/


http://www.visitvesthimmerland.dk/thit-jensens-mindestue-gdk623594

Upon the nave was in 1904 revealed frescoes from the middle of the 1500s. The motifs were from the old and the new testament. The frescoes are attributed the Torum master and was paid by Poul Vognsen and wife Anne Hansdatter Bildt of Støtterup. (in the 1500s) The frescoes were washed over again. In 1989 some frescoes were revealed and restored in the first bay of the nave.

photos from wikipedia

Johannes V. Jensen:

Fovlum/Foulum church, Himmerland

Fovlum church, wikipedia

Fovlum/Foulum Kirke
Vesthimmerlands Kommune, Region Nordjylland 
Before 1970: Gislum Herred, Aalborg Amt. 

Fovlum church in Himmerland lies in the village Fovlum 7 km southwest of Farsø. The church  is one of the best preserved Romanesque granite churches in Denmark. The apse, choir and nave  are built in granite ashlars in ab. 1125-1175 -  and a porch was added in 1879 ( in Romanesque style in red bricks upon a granite plinth). The two church portals are preserved, both with frame stones formed like half pillars with richly profiled corbels and buestik with rundstave (curved and round sticks) . Above the bricked south door is a relief of an animal flanked by two spear-armed warriors. In the tympanum below is a traceable, weathered relief of a bird -  maybe the Holy dove. The male entrance is bricked with ashlars, and among those is a chessboard like a similar ashlar in Skarp Salling church's triumph wall.

photo: Google Earth

The Romanesque windows are kept in the apse and on the north side of the church. In the porch are five gravtræer (grave-trees) = grave frames in oak, with inscriptions from the 1600s. They were brought to light from the church floor in connection to a restore in the 1870s. Both the pulpit from the ab. 1600s and the altarpiece from 1633 are equipped with newer paintings. Only the painting in the top piece of the altarpiece is original.

Upon the church yard is a bell frame -  and until 1872 was a long dolmen. The church was reinaugurated in 2012 after a restore with a new altarpiece painted by Anita Houvenaeghel (born 1945) -  and the church has got a new colorized kneeler, pulpit, pews and loft in order to create a full colorness. 

Fovlum, chessboard, wikipedia

Source from a website of Fovlum church.
The Danish writer Martin A. Hansen travelled in his time round Denmark and visited the Danish churches. He called the church in Fovlum "the noblest building in the country". Few Danish churches have been kept as original as Fovlum church. The long dolmen in the churchyard is now traceable as a long east-west rise above the earth.

The stone master in charge of the church building more than 800 years ago might also have built Skarp Salling church and the original cathedral in Viborg.

photo: Google Earth

The north wall of Fovlum church is untouched while the south wall is was worn out from changing temperatures and was rebricked about 100 years ago and equipped with larger windows. The porch was built outside the original woman entrance. The big planks on the wall are gravestones in wood frpm the 1600s which were placed as a lid upon the graves inside the church.

The big crucifix is new and created by the artist Erik Heide from Mors (island in Limfjorden) , who also made some gravestones in the church yard , a water stone by Ullits school and a monolite of flying birds which form small crosses at a new church yard in the village Farsø.

The church walls were red in the Middle Ages. They are now white washed and in a few places the red colour breaks through the white.

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