Karl (Charles) XI is perhaps the Swedish king that most enjoyed spending time in Kungsör and he had this church built for the Royal Manor. It took from 1690 to 1700 to build the church but unfortunately the king never saw it when it was finished. He died in 1697 when a lot of work remained to be done on the interior. To mark the bicentennial of his death, a large gilded copper crown was mounted on the church dome in 1897.
The church was designed by Nicodemus Tessin, the Younger, and the altarpiece and silver collection were designed by Burchardt and David Klöcker Ehrenstral. The church was opened in the year 1700 and is an original Baroque church characterized by a number of King Karl XI’s personal touches. The pulpit is from the Tre Kronor palace chapel.
For guided tours of the church, please contact the parish registrar’s office.
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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.