Hólar Cathedral ( Icelandic: ''Hóladómkirkja'') is a

Church of Iceland The Evangelical Lutheran Church of Iceland ( is, Hin evangelíska lúterska kirkja), also called the National Church ( is, Þjóðkirkjan), is the officially established Christian church in Iceland. The church professes the Lutheran faith an ...

cathedral church located in

Hólar Hólar (; also Hólar í Hjaltadal ) is a small community in the Skagafjörður district of northern Iceland. Location Hólar is in the Hjaltadalur valley, some from the national capital of Reykjavík. It has a population of around 100. It is th ...

Iceland Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its s ...

. The church is the official church of the Bishop of Hólar, currently Solveig Lára Guðmundsdóttir.

History

The Cathedral lost its cathedral status in 1801 when the Diocese of Hólar was dissolved and amalgamated in the united Diocese of Iceland. It became a cathedral once more in 1909 when the diocese was re-established, this time as a suffragan see, with the bishop of Hólar being the suffragan bishop to the

Bishop of Iceland The following is a list of Lutheran bishops of Iceland. List See also *List of Skálholt bishops *List of Hólar bishops A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to: People * List (surname) Organizations * ...

. The present church stands in the place of 6 other previous churches, the first one built in 1050 by Oxa Hjaltasonar. The second was built between 1050 and 1106. The third built after 1106 by Bishop

Jón Ögmundsson Jón Ögmundsson or Ogmundarson ( la, Ioannes Ögmundi filius; 1052–23 April 1121), also known as John of Holar and Jon Helgi Ogmundarson, was an Icelandic bishop and local Icelandic saint. In 1106, the second Icelandic diocese, Hólar, was cre ...

. The fourth was built around 1300 by Bishop Jörundur Þorsteinsson while the fifth one was built around 1394 by Bishop Pétur Nikulásson. The sixth was constructed by Halldóru Guðbrandsdóttur around 1627, it being the first Lutheran church since the reformation. The final and present church was built between 1757 and 1763 through the initiatives of Bishop Gísli Magnússon. The cathedral was consecrated on November 20, 1763.

Tower

The church building never had a steeple however a tower was built in 1950 adjacent to the church as a memorial to the last catholic bishop of Hólar

Jón Arason Jón Arason (1484 – November 7, 1550) was an Icelandic Roman Catholic bishop and poet, who was executed in his struggle against the imposition of the Protestant Reformation in Iceland. Background Jón Arason was born in Gryta, educated at Mu ...

and his two sons who were killed in 1550 as a result of their opposition to the reformation."Holar Cathedral"
''Nordic Adventure Travel''. Retrieved on 15 August 2017.

References

{{reflist Church of Iceland Cathedrals in Iceland 18th-century Lutheran churches Churches completed in 1763