Arninge Church is a Late Romanesque church built of red brick in the 13th century. It has an intricately carved auricular altarpiece created by Henrik Werner in 1644. The church was originally dedicated to the Virgin Mary.
Built of red brick, the church consists of a Romanesque apse, chancel and nave and a Gothic porch. There is a free-standing 14th century timber bell tower adjacent to the church. The chancel has traces of a round-arched south door and of a round-arched window, now bricked up. There are also traces of two Romanesque windows in the south wall of the nave above the porch. The three cross-vaults in the nave are from the Late-Romanesque period.
The altarpiece (1644) was carved in the auricular style by Henrik Werner who also created the altarpiece in Maribo Cathedral. Werner's workshop also produced the carved font (c. 1640). The crucifix on the chancel wall was found on the loft during restoration work in 1937. The figure of Christ is from c. 1300 although the cross itself is more recent. The Renaissance pulpit is from c. 1605.
References:Visby Cathedral (also known as St. Mary’s Church) is the only survived medieval church in Visby. It was originally built for German merchants and inaugurated in 1225. Around the year 1350 the church was enlarged and converted into a basilica. The two-storey magazine was also added then above the nave as a warehouse for merchants.
Following the Reformation, the church was transformed into a parish church for the town of Visby. All other churches were abandoned. Shortly after the Reformation, in 1572, Gotland was made into its own Diocese, and the church designated its cathedral.
There is not much left of the original interior. The font is made of local red marble in the 13th century. The pulpit was made in Lübeck in 1684. There are 400 graves under the church floor.