Tilst Church is a church in

Aarhus Aarhus (, , ; officially spelled Århus from 1948 until 1 January 2011) is the second-largest city in Denmark and the seat of Aarhus Municipality. It is located on the eastern shore of Jutland in the Kattegat sea and approximately northwes ...

Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of Denmark , establishe ...

, situated in the suburb

Tilst Tilst is a suburban area of Aarhus, Denmark, situated some 10 km to the west of Aarhus. The Tilst area is marked by big city blocks and large traditional suburban areas. In the surrounding area are several superstores, which mainly serve the inn ...

8 kilometers north-west of Aarhus city center. Tilst Church is from the 1100s, erected as a typical Danish Romanesque village church. Later additions in the 15th century added a

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

tower and porch. Tilst Church is the only church in Tilst Parish but it is a part of the Tilst- Kasted pastorate which includes Tilst and Kasted Churches. There were 5.163 members of the

Church of Denmark The Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Denmark or National Church, sometimes called the Church of Denmark ( da, Folkekirken, literally: "The People's Church" or unofficially da, Den danske folkekirke, literally: "The Danish People's Church"; kl, ...

living in Tilst Parish on 1 January 2016.

Architecture

The original part of the church, the chancel and nave, probably dates from the latter half of the 12th century and is constructed of split and rough

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies und ...

boulders.

Ashlar Ashlar () is finely dressed (cut, worked) stone, either an individual stone that has been worked until squared, or a structure built from such stones. Ashlar is the finest stone masonry unit, generally rectangular cuboid, mentioned by Vitr ...

is used at the windows, doors and the corners of the building. A couple of the Romanesque round-arched windows are preserved and the molded imposts in the doorways and chancel arch are retained. The original simple church had, as was usual, a wooden ceiling, but this was replaced around the middle of the 15th century by masonry vaulting. In the same

Late Medieval period The Late Middle Ages or Late Medieval Period was the period of European history lasting from AD 1300 to 1500. The Late Middle Ages followed the High Middle Ages and preceded the onset of the early modern period (and in much of Europe, the Rena ...

, which was characterized by considerable activity in church building, a porch was added in front of the nave's south door and later made higher in two stages. The tower, which like the porch is built of brick, must have been erected in the decades before the

Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and i ...

in 1536. In more recent times small repairs have frequently been undertaken, but have not made any essential change. The church was last restored 1959–60.

Murals

The walls and vaulting of both the chancel and nave are decorated with

Late Gothic International Gothic is a period of Gothic art which began in Burgundy, France, and northern Italy in the late 14th and early 15th century. It then spread very widely across Western Europe, hence the name for the period, which was introduced by t ...

murals from c. 1450–75. The simple paintings of the vaults correspond to those of the

Aarhus Cathedral Aarhus Cathedral ( da, Århus Domkirke) is a cathedral in Aarhus, Denmark. It is the longest and tallest church in the country, at in length and in height. The construction of Aarhus Cathedral began in the 12th century and it is the main edific ...

and a number of the village churches in the surrounding districts. The walls in the church were almost entirely decorated with imitations of tapestry, and above this in the chancel and on the north and south walls of the nave are painted various scenes. The greater part of these survive only in fragments. The north and south walls of the chancel had a frieze of the

Apostles An apostle (), in its literal sense, is an emissary, from Ancient Greek ἀπόστολος (''apóstolos''), literally "one who is sent off", from the verb ἀποστέλλειν (''apostéllein''), "to send off". The purpose of such sending ...

, while those of the nave have scenes from

Christ's Passion In Christianity, the Passion (from the Latin verb ''patior, passus sum''; "to suffer, bear, endure", from which also "patience, patient", etc.) is the short final period in the life of Jesus Christ. Depending on one's views, the "Passion" m ...

within an architectonic framework of two stories. A grimacing jester can be seen just inside the south entrance to the church.

Furniture

A Romanesque baptismal font with twin lions on the basin is among the earliest furniture of the church. Some of the

pew A pew () is a long bench seat or enclosed box, used for seating members of a congregation or choir in a church, synagogue or sometimes a courtroom. Overview The first backless stone benches began to appear in English churches in the thi ...

s from 1890 have pinewood bench-ends from 1584 with rustic decoration in low relief. Other bench-ends with the date 1684 and inscriptions presumably came from a parish clerk's seat in the church. Several Baroque tombstones were probably obtained from various churches around Aarhus and then modernized and given new inscriptions.

References

External links

* * Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tilst Church {{DEFAULTSORT:Tilst Church Lutheran churches in Aarhus 12th-century churches in Denmark Lutheran churches converted from Roman Catholicism Churches in the Diocese of Aarhus