Details
Founded: 1641-1643Category: Religious sites in Finland
Historical period: Swedish Empire (Finland)
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Mietoinen Church was built in 1641-1643 and it’s one of the rare stone churches built after the Reformation in the 17th century. It was funded by Henrik Fleming, who was the owner of near Lehtinen manor. The church has been reconstructed several times in the 19th century, and the tower was added in 1818-1819. There are some medieval artefacts inside the church, like the wooden crucifix from the 16th century.
Mietoinen church replaced the previous wooden church known as the Hietamäki chapel. First record of the chapel dates back to year 1366, but the site has been used as cemetery from the Iron Ages.
Easter Aquhorthies stone circle, located near Inverurie, is one of the best-preserved examples of a recumbent stone circle, and one of the few that still have their full complement of stones. It consists of a ring of nine stones, eight of which are grey granite and one red jasper. Two more grey granite stones flank a recumbent of red granite flecked with crystals and lines of quartz. The circle is particularly notable for its builders' use of polychromy in the stones, with the reddish ones situated on the SSW side and the grey ones opposite.
The placename Aquhorthies derives from a Scottish Gaelic word meaning 'field of prayer', and may indicate a 'long continuity of sanctity' between the Stone or Bronze Age circle builders and their much later Gaelic successors millennia later. The circle's surroundings were landscaped in the late 19th century, and it sits within a small fenced and walled enclosure. A stone dyke, known as a roundel, was built around the circle some time between 1847 and 1866–7.
