Rating
4.2/5 (based on Google user reviews)
Interesting Sites Nearby
User Reviews
Annette Gran (7 years ago)
Vegard Gunnestad (8 years ago)
Syver Stensholt (9 years ago)
The earliest existing historical records of the church date back to the year 1392, but the church was not necessarily built that year. The original part of the building was possibly built sometime around the year 1200, although the church presently uses 1392 as the year of its founding (celebrating its 600th anniversary in 1992). In 1992, dendrochronological dating was carried out to determine the age of the church, but it was inconclusive. The stone church was initially built with a rectangular nave and a smaller, rectangular chancel with a lower roofline. It was built in a Romanesque style, typically seen in churches built in the 12th and early 13th centuries in Norway. The building is constructed of stone, with the walls measuring about 120 centimetres (47 in) thick. Later, a wooden church porch was built at the main entrance. Extensive repairs were carried out in 1686 (a wall and a new tower on top of the nave, and second floor seating galleries in the nave). In 1932, a sacristy was built on the south side of the chancel. In 1951, the sacristy was taken down and rebuilt on the east end of the chancel.
The church was owned by the county of Jarlsberg from 1673 to 1766, when it was bought by some farmers in the village of Hem. In 1913, ownership of the church was transferred to the parish.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.