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The church ruins which tower above the terrain are from the 1800s. This is not the medieval stone church which many believed it to be. This stone church was built after a hurricane thundered through, destroying the previous church on a January day in 1835.
New church
The church was built in 1839 by skilled stonemasons from Overhalla, 18 alen long and 14 alen wide, ‘… very neat and spacious enough for the small congregation’, wrote the pastor who got the church built, the pastor of Værø and Røst Christian August Grønvold. He describes the process and dedication in his memoir, an interesting contemporary depiction of how a travelling scholar experienced Værøy and Røst in the first half of the 1800s.
The pastor describes
‘On my inauguration to the office, there were on Værø around 170 souls and on Røst around 70,’ he says. The church was inaugurated on 21 July 1839.
Hurricane on the island
The altar piece, chalice and cassocks were preserved after the hurricane and are now found in the new church which was built at a different site in 1899 when the stone church became too small for the growing congregation.
The church was demolished when a new church was built, only the stone walls of the original remaining.
Original text: from Elisabeth Johansen / John Roald Pettersen:
LOFOTEN en kulturminnebok, Orkana 2018
Reference work:
Grønvold, Christian August: Mit Liv i Aarene efter 1814.
Meddelt ved Didrik Grønvold. Cammermeyers boghandel 1943
Translation to English: Alasdair Graham-Brown
Photo: Riksantikvaren and Elisabeth Johansen