Jäder Church, Swedish: ''Jäders kyrka'', is a

church building A church, church building or church house is a building used for Christian worship services and other Christian religious activities. The earliest identified Christian church is a house church founded between 233 and 256. From the 11th thro ...

in the village of Jäder,

Eskilstuna Municipality Eskilstuna Municipality ( sv, Eskilstuna kommun) is a municipality in Södermanland County in southeast Sweden, between Lake Mälaren and Lake Hjälmaren. The seat of the municipality is in the city of Eskilstuna. The present municipality was for ...

Södermanland County Södermanland County ( sv, Södermanlands län) is a county or '' län'' on the southeast coast of Sweden. In the local Sörmlandic dialects it is virtually universally shortened and pronounced as Sörmlands län, or simply Sörmland, which is t ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

, approximately 10 km east of

Eskilstuna Eskilstuna () is a city and the seat of Eskilstuna Municipality, Södermanland County, Sweden. The city of Eskilstuna had 67,359 inhabitants in 2015, with a total population of 100,092 inhabitants in Eskilstuna municipality (2014). Eskilstuna has ...

. Belonging to the Lutheran

Church of Sweden The Church of Sweden ( sv, Svenska kyrkan) is an Evangelical Lutheran national church in Sweden. A former state church, headquartered in Uppsala, with around 5.6 million members at year end 2021, it is the largest Christian denomination in Sw ...

, it is part of Kafjärden Parish in the

Diocese of Strängnäs The Diocese of Strängnäs ( sv, Strängnäs stift) is a part of the Lutheran Church of Sweden and has its seat in Strängnäs Cathedral in Strängnäs, south of Lake Mälaren. The diocese is made up of the two provinces Närke and Södermanland ...

. Until 1995, it was the main church of the historical Jäder Parish.

Architecture

Jäder Church is a significant work of Swedish

renaissance architecture Renaissance architecture is the European architecture of the period between the early 15th and early 16th centuries in different regions, demonstrating a conscious revival and development of certain elements of Ancient Greece, ancient Greek and ...

, and is sometimes locally jokingly referred to as ''Rekarne domkyrka'', "

Rekarne Rekarne () is the historical name for the north-western part of the province Södermanland in Sweden. It constitutes the lands on both sides of river Eskilstunaån between Lake Mälaren and Lake Hjälmaren and approximately corresponds to the prese ...

Cathedral", owing to its unusually large size for a village church and extensive renaissance decorations. The church is situated on a hill surrounded by fields and built in stone and brick. It consists of a western

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

, a

choir A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which ...

of similar dimensions in the east, a

sacristy A sacristy, also known as a vestry or preparation room, is a room in Christian churches for the keeping of vestments (such as the alb and chasuble) and other church furnishings, sacred vessels, and parish records. The sacristy is usually located ...

to the north, the Brahe burial chapel opposite the sacristy to the south, a

church porch A church porch is a room-like structure at a church's main entrance. A porch protects from the weather to some extent. Some porches have an outer door, others a simple gate, and in some cases the outer opening is not closed in any way. The porch ...

and a western tower. The burial chapel and the sacristy form the arms of a

latin cross A Latin cross or ''crux immissa'' is a type of cross in which the vertical beam sticks above the crossbeam, with the three upper arms either equally long or with the vertical topmost arm shorter than the two horizontal arms, and always with a mu ...

. The walls have

pointed arch A pointed arch, ogival arch, or Gothic arch is an arch with a pointed crown, whose two curving sides meet at a relatively sharp angle at the top of the arch. This architectural element was particularly important in Gothic architecture. The earlie ...

ed windows, and the

gabled roof A gable roof is a roof consisting of two sections whose upper horizontal edges meet to form its ridge. The most common roof shape in cold or temperate climates, it is constructed of rafters, roof trusses or purlins. The pitch of a gable roof ca ...

is covered in roof

slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...

. The western tower is crowned by a multi-levelled

Neo-Renaissance Renaissance Revival architecture (sometimes referred to as "Neo-Renaissance") is a group of 19th century architectural revival styles which were neither Greek Revival nor Gothic Revival but which instead drew inspiration from a wide range o ...

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spires are ...

. The exterior is mainly characterised by the brick walls and mid-17th century ornamental sandstone decorations on the gables.

Interior

The white-washed walls and vaults give the church interior a largely uniform appearance, although the vaults range in age from the late Middle Ages to the 17th century. The choir has more marked gothic influences. There are several epitaphs for local nobility created in the 17th century by Heinrich Wilhelm. The late Gothic

winged altarpiece A winged altarpiece (also ''folding altar'') or winged retable is a special form of altarpiece (reredos, occasionally retable), common in Northern and Central Europe, in which the central image, either a painting or relief sculpture (or some com ...

in Brabant style was originally commissioned for

Storkyrkan Storkyrkan (, ), also called Stockholms domkyrka (Stockholm Cathedral) and Sankt Nikolai kyrka (Church of Saint Nicholas), is the oldest church in Stockholm. Storkyrkan lies in the centre of Stockholm in Gamla stan, between Stockholm Palace and ...

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

and is one of the foremost examples of this altarpiece style in Sweden, built 1514 in Jan Borman's workshop in Brussels and painted by Jan van Coninxlo the Younger.

History

The northern wall incorporates parts of a Romanesque 12th century church which was expanded upon during the second half of the

13th century The 13th century was the century which lasted from January 1, 1201 ( MCCI) through December 31, 1300 ( MCCC) in accordance with the Julian calendar. The Mongol Empire was founded by Genghis Khan, which stretched from Eastern Asia to Eastern Eu ...

, likely using an aisleless design, with the original medieval porch and sacristy. The tower and vaults were added during the 15th century. During the patronship of Lord High Chancellor Axel Oxenstierna the church was significantly expanded upon and rebuilt, in order to serve as the burial church of the Chancellor and his family. The choir with the

Oxenstierna Oxenstierna ( , ) is a Swedish noble family, originally from Småland in southern Sweden which can be traced up to the middle of the 14th century. The Oxenstierna family held vast estates in Södermanland and Uppland during the late Middle Ages a ...

burial vault was rebuilt between 1641 and 1643. In 1651–1652 the present sacristy and porches were added and the Brahe burial chapel was finished in 1659 to mirror the sacristy. The spire has been replaced several times over the course of the history of the church. The present spire was designed in Neo-Renaissance style by

Helgo Zettervall Helgo Nikolaus Zettervall, older spelling ''Zetterwall'', (21 November 1831 – 17 March 1907) was a Swedish architect and professor of the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts. He is best known for his drastic restorations of churches and other b ...

and finished in 1880.

Burials

Jäder Church was used by the influential

family of nearby Fiholm Castle as a burial church for several generations, and owes it present renaissance appearance mainly to the Swedish statesman

Axel Oxenstierna Axel Gustafsson Oxenstierna af Södermöre (; 1583–1654), Count of Södermöre, was a Swedish statesman. He became a member of the Swedish Privy Council in 1609 and served as Lord High Chancellor of Sweden from 1612 until his death. He was a c ...

, who commissioned the extensive mid-17th century additions to the church. The Brahe burial chapel and vault was commissioned by

Margareta Brahe Margareta Abrahamsdotter Brahe (28 June 1603, Rydboholm – 15 May 1669, Weferlingen) was a Swedish aristocrat and court official, Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg by marriage to Frederick II, Landgrave of Hesse-Homburg. She aroused a lot of attentio ...

for the remains of her two first husbands, Bengt Bengtsson Oxenstierna and Johan Oxenstierna, and finished in 1659. * Anna Åkesdotter Bååt (1579-1649), Countess of Södermöre and wife to Axel Gustafsson Oxenstierna, Maid of honour to Dowager Queen

Catherine Stenbock Catherine Stenbock (Swedish: ''Katarina Gustavsdotter Stenbock''; 22 July 1535 at Torpa, Tranemo Municipality, Västergötland – 13 December 1621 at Strömsholm, Västmanland) was Queen of Sweden from 1552 to 1560 as the third and last wife of ...

. * Axel Gustafsson Oxenstierna af Södermöre (1583-1654), Count of Södermöre, Privy Councillor and statesman, Lord High Chancellor of Sweden 1612-1654 * Axel Eriksson Oxenstierna af Södermöre (1652-1676), Count of Södermöre * Bengt Bengtsson Oxenstierna af Eka och Lindö (1591-1643), Privy Councillor and diplomat, Governor-General of Ingria and Livonia * Carl Gustaf Oxenstierna af Södermöre (1655-1686), Count of Södermöre, diplomat * Erik Axelsson Oxenstierna af Södermöre (1624-1656), Count of Södermöre, Privy Councillor and statesman, Lord High Chancellor of Sweden 1654-1656 * Johan Oxenstierna af Södermöre (1611–1657), Count of Södermöre, Privy Councillor and statesman, Lord Marshal of the Realm * Clas Tott (1630-1674), Count of Karleborg, Field Marshal, Privy Councillor, Governor-General of Livonia

References

* {{Authority control Churches in Södermanland County Churches in the Diocese of Strängnäs