Holar / Hólar / Hólar í Hjaltadal / Holum

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Results: 17 records

Click to view images and/or subjects

New Testament - public life of Christ - baptism of Christ - in the Jordan - John the Baptist holding his right hand on Christ's head - God the Father - with dove - angels holding clothes and branch

Scene Description: scene framed in a scrolled cartouche

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

design element - motifs - floral and foliage

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

design element - patterns - scalloped

Scene Description: tiny scallops all around the outer side of the inscription

Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

human figure - head - grotesque of fantastic? - foliage motif

Scene Description: a variant of the Green-Man?

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

human figure - head - grotesque of fantastic? - foliage motif

Scene Description: a variant of the Green-Man?

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

inscription

Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

inscription

Scene Description: inside a scrolled cartouche

Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

scene [unidentified]

Scene Description: the left half of a scene [see 1170808014] for the other half]; is it the Nativity? / the Adoration of the Magi?

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of basin

Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of basin

Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of basin and baptismal dish

Scene Description: the baptismal dish is dated 1485, from the parish church at Reykjahlíð; the font is from the church at Hólar

Image Source: digital image of an 1935 engraving from Joseph-Paul Gaimard [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gaimard18.jpg] [accessed 17 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-PD-Mark / PD Old

view of church exterior - southwest view

Scene Description: the main body of the church; the bell tower is to the left, outside this frame

Image Source: digital photograph taken 2 July 2017 by Joost Limburg

Copyright Instructions: Standing permission

view of church exterior in context

Scene Description: Source caption: "The old church is located in the centre of the village"

Image Source: digital image of a 1819 engraving of a sketch by Captn. Frisak, in Ebenezer Henderson's Iceland; or the Journal of a residence in that island, during the years 1814 and 1815, [British Library HMNTS 010460.s.35.] [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HENDERSON(1819)_VIEW_OF_HOLUM.jpg] [accessed 17 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-PD-Mark / PD-old-70-1923

view of church exterior in context

Scene Description: Hóladómkirkja with its detached tower; a dry-stone wall surrounds the cemetery; the large building at the back is Hólar University College

Image Source: digital photograph taken 16 August 2015 by Villy Fink Isaksen [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Holar_church.jpg] [accessed 17 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-4.0

view of church interior - nave - looking east

Image Source: digital photograph taken 8 June 2004 by Christian Bickel [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hólar04.jpg] [accessed 17 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-2.0-DE

view of font

Scene Description: Source caption: "Skírnarfonturinn í Hóladómkirkju [...] Baptismal font at the Hólar Cathedral, Skagafjörður, Iceland. Made in 1674 by Guðmundur Guðmundsson of Bjarnastaðahlíð, Skagafjörður."

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 23 June 2012 by Navaro [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Skírnarfonturinn_í_Hóladómkirkju.JPG] [accessed 17 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-3.0

view of font - back side

Scene Description: showing the inscriptions on the upper rim and inside the two cartouches; the date '1674' clearly visible here

Image Source: edited detail of a digital photograph taken 23 June 2012 by Navaro [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Skírnarfonturinn_í_Hóladómkirkju.JPG] [accessed 17 September 2016]

Copyright Instructions: CC-BY-SA-3.0

INFORMATION

FontID: 20738HOL

Church/Chapel: Hóladómkirkja

Church Location: Hólar í Hjaltadal, Norðurland vestra, Iceland

Country Name: Iceland

Location: Norðurland vestra, Norðvesturkjördæmi

Directions to Site: Located in the municipality of Skagafjörður, in Hjaltadalur valley, 380 km from Reykjavik

Ecclesiastic Region: Diocese of Hólar

Font Location in Church: Inside the church

Date: 1674

Century and Period: 17th century(late) [altered],

Workshop/Group/Artisan: Guðmundur Guðmundsson

Cognate Fonts: [cf. FontNotes]

Credit and Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Joost Limburg [www.romanicoportugal.info] for his photographs of this church and font

Font Notes: Click to view font notes

The basin of a font from the church at Hólar is illustrated in a 1835 engraving from Joseph-Paul Gaimard, together with a 15th-century baptismal dish from the parish church at Reykjahlíð. Baptismal font of basanite stone made by Guðmundur Guðmundsson, of Bjarnastaðahlíð, in 1674, as indicated in the long inscription on the back side of the basin; the roughly cylindrical basin has four (?) scroll cartouches set at 90-degree angles on the sides; the one at the front contains a Baptism of Christ in the Jordan scene; the others contain inscription in Icelandic, one of which gives the date 1674; the spaces between the cartouches is decorated with floral and foliage arrangements; there is a pattern of tiny disks and another inscription on the upper rim. Mona Bramer Solhaug's Norsk døpefont i Hólar domkirke på Island [https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/268146152.pdf] [accessed 5 October 2022], (Collegium Medievale 2009) "maintains [it] is reworked from a Norwegian medieval font. An inscription confirms that Guðmundur Guðmundsson carved the ornaments in year 1674, figures and inscriptions according to models and a pictorial program provided by Bishop Gísli Þorláksson. Sentences from the Old and the New Testament as well as the motifs of the circumcision and baptism of Christ, framed by curved and enrolled lines, cover the outside of the bowl (cupa). The shaft and base are new, made when the bowl was transformed [...] The bowl of the Hólar font is circular, outer diameter 72 cm, inner diameter 58 cm, and it is 31 cm deep. It fits well into a group of four fonts, which have survived in the western part of Norway. The group has been named “barrel fonts” (“tønnefonter”) by the author. One is in Orre Church just outside Stavanger, two more are in Ulvik Church and Granvin Church in Hardangerfjord in the Bergen district, and the last one is in Røldal Church in the inland. The bowl of the Hólar font shares all the qualities of the barrel fonts, including type of soapstone, form, size, plus some details. The five barrel fonts are made of an exceptionally homogeneous quality of soapstone: a soft, fat and pure type, very suitable for cutting and carving. Soapstone does not exist in the Icelandic bedrock; hence it has been clear for a long time that the stone of the Hólar font obviously has arrived from overseas, and different theories have been presented. The size of the bowl strongly suggests that it has been part of a medieval font originally, because in the Middle Ages the naked child was immersed into the water according to the baptismal ritual, and a fairly large bowl was consequently needed. The Hólar bowl is the largest among the barrel fonts; the one from Granvin is the closest in size. None of the fonts in the group are of the same size; this is a normal fact in the production of medieval fonts. The only decorations on the group of four in Norway are narrow mouldings on top and bottom on the outside of the bowl; hoops on wooden barrels are a close association. All things considered, the barrel fonts constitute an unusually consistent group in Norwegian font production. They are simple and virtually without decoration. However, they reflect a definite capacity for precision of form, a fact which points to the hand of a trained stone mason and probably to a relatively short production period. The geographical diffusion of these fonts indicates that they were made in a workshop, which had some sort of connection with projects of stone buildings in Bergen or Stavanger. The simplicity of the vessels makes them difficult to date, but lack of decoration, on the other hand, link them up with late Romanesque art; a tentative suggestion for a production period might possibly be between 1200 and 1250. This period also fits with the building period of the churches. The Hólar font may very well have been brought to Iceland during these years; the assertion is further supported by two successive elections of Norwegian bishops for the diocese of Hólar in this period, first Bótólfur (1238–1246) and then Heinrekur Kársson (1247– 1260). In all probability one of them ordered an impressive and worthy baptismal font of stone for his cathedral. Imported medieval Norwegian soapstone fonts are also preserved on the Faeroes, in Denmark and in Sweden. Furthermore, the barrel fonts are found in an area of the western part of Norway where the Icelanders traditionally had trade connections. On the whole, all circumstances for a font export from Norway to Iceland lay at hand around 1200–1250."

COORDINATES

UTM: 27W 586498 7291516

MEDIUM AND MEASUREMENTS

Material: stone, soapstone (basanite stone)

Font Shape: cylindrical (mounted)

Basin Interior Shape: round

Basin Exterior Shape: round

Drainage Notes: no lining

Diameter (inside rim): 58 cm*

Diameter (includes rim): 72 cm*

Basin Depth: 31 cm*

Notes on Measurements: * Solhaugh (2009) [NB: measurements of the reworked basin []

INSCRIPTION

Inscription Language: Icelandic & Latin

Inscription Notes: [cf. FontNotes]

Inscription Location: 1 & 2 on the sides; 3 on the upper rim of the basin

Inscription Text: 1) "Þennan Skijrnar Saa Hefur Uthoggvid Gudmundur Gudmundsson Eptir For- læge og firirsogn Vird: H Gijsla Thorlakssonar Biskups a Holum 1674." 2) "LABIUM ÆNEUM TYPUS BAPTISMI EXOD. XXX." 3) "Leifid Børnunum til Mijn Ad Koma Og Bannid þeim þad eigi þui ad þuilijkra er Guds Rijke Matt 19."

Inscription Source: Solhaug (2009)