Tag Archives: quarry

The world’s northernmost medieval marble church

Posted on January 27, 2018 by Per Storemyr

The small, Romanesque Gildeskål church is one of the most complete marble churches in Norway. It resides at the magnificent coast along the Atlantic Ocean far up north, in Nordland county. And it is, presumably, the northernmost marble building in the world. Together with Giske church further south, it is part of outstanding, but little known, medieval marble architecture in Norway, of which Nidaros Cathedral, with thousands of marble columns, is the most spectacular example. Continue reading →

Posted in Archaeology, Marble, New publications, Norway, Old quarries | Tagged Cultural heritage, Gildeskål, marble, Middle Ages, North Atlantic, Norway, old quarries, quarry | Leave a comment

Værnes: Norges mest komplette sandsteinskirke fra middelalderen

Posted on December 17, 2017 by Per Storemyr

Den er dekorert med elementer av kleberstein og klorittskifer, men ellers er det sandstein så langt øyet kan se: Værnes er Norges mest komplette sandsteinskirke fra middelalderen! Den rager i størrelse og volum av brukt sandstein langt over middelalderbyggverk i tilsvarende stein i andre deler av landet! Her er et sammendrag av min artikkel til boken «Værnes kirke – en kulturskatt i stein og tre» som ble utgitt for et par uker siden (november 2016). Det er Grubleseminaret som står bak, med Morten Stige og Kjell Erik Pettersson som fantastiske redaktører av boken! Continue reading →

Posted in Archaeology, New publications, Norway, Old quarries | Tagged chlorite schist, Norway, quarry, sandstone, soapstone, Værnes kirke | 1 Comment

Was Nidaros Cathedral built from stone extracted in a large underground Medieval quarry?

Posted on October 9, 2017 by Per Storemyr

Ancient underground building stone quarries are rather common. They are known since at least the Old Kingdom in Egypt, some 6 500 years ago, when fine limestone was quarried underground close to Cairo (Tura) in order to provide casing stones to the Giza pyramids. But underground quarries are, interestingly, quite rare in the European Middle Ages. Apparently, there was no need to start difficult, large-scale underground operations to build churches, monasteries and cathedrals until the Late Middle Ages, when, for example, the underground limestone quarries in Paris and Caen in France started to become developed toward the gigantic network of tunnels and galleries we know today. Thus, it is remarkable that a huge underground quarry may have been opened around AD 1200 in Trondheim, Norway, in order to provide soapstone for Nidaros Cathedral, the northernmost of Europe’s great medieval cathedrals. Why? Continue reading →

Posted in Ancient Egypt, New publications, Norway, Old quarries | Tagged ancient stone quarrying, Bakkaunet, Kleberstein, Nidaros Cathedral, Nidarosdomen, quarry, soapstone, Trondheim, underground quarry | 2 Comments

Fra Aswan til Hyllestad. Hva er et steinbruddlandskap?

Posted on May 16, 2016 by Per Storemyr

Menneskene har brutt stein til alle mulige formål siden tidenes morgen. Men hva er et steinbruddlandskap? Hva kan vi si om alle de millioner av steder der folk har tatt ut stein? Fra den tidligste steinalder til i dag? Det var temaet jeg fikk til et foredrag på det 14. Hyllestadseminaret i slutten av april 2016, i regi av Norsk Kvernsteinsenter. Dessuten skulle jeg snakke om hvordan steinbruddlandskap kan formidles. Jeg innså raskt at oppgaven var helt umulig. Continue reading →

Posted in Ancient Egypt, Archaeology, New publications, Norway, Old quarries | Tagged Aswan, Cultural heritage, Hyllestad, quarry, quarry landscape | Leave a comment

Gneiss for the Pharaoh: Geology of the Third Millennium BCE Chephren’s Quarries in Southern Egypt

Posted on April 18, 2016 by Per Storemyr

Chephren’s Quarry. A name imbued with splendour. It was not the first quarry from which stone vessels and sculpture were provided in Ancient Egypt, but it was definitely the most spectaular one. Work started here, far south in the Western Desert of Egypt, already by the Predynastic period or earlier. By the Old Kingdom, 4500 years ago, it was a huge work site, comprising 700 quarry pits in the flat desert, covering an area of some 50 square kilometres. With Tom Heldal as the lead author, Ian Shaw, Elizabeth Bloxam and I have now written an account of how geology shaped Chephren’s Quarry. It is a story spanning millions of years, explaining the beauty of this hard, bluish stone – and how it could be exploited. Continue reading →

Posted in Ancient Egypt, Archaeology, New publications, Old quarries | Tagged Ancient Egypt, Chephren's quarry, quarry | Leave a comment

Nidarosdomens grunnfjell. Les utdrag og omtaler av boken!

Posted on August 21, 2015 by Per Storemyr

Min nye bok “Nidarosdomens grunnfjell” er en kulturhistorisk reise i stein, sett fra perspektivet til de som jobbet i steinbruddene – steinbryterne. Vi følger dem fra Det gamle Egypt, gjennom Romerriket og nordover i Europa, helt opp til Trondheim og Nidarosdomen i middelalderen og videre frem til den nye tid. Et meget stort antall steinbrudd i hele Norge ble benyttet til restaurering og gjenreisning av Nidarosdomen – Europas nordligste katedral – fra slutten av 1800-tallet. Mange av bruddene var i drift allerede i middelalderen, noen endog mye tidligere. Fra den nye tid har vi gode kilder. Og de kan hjelpe oss til å forstå hvordan arbeidet gikk for seg i bruddene i middelalderen og enda lengre tilbake i tid.

Få kjøper en bok uten først å ha en anelse om hva den dreier seg om. Derfor finner du i denne artikkelen nok opplysninger til at du bare må få tak i “Nidarosdomens grunnfjell”! Continue reading →

Posted in Ancient Egypt, Archaeology, New projects, New publications, Norway, Old quarries | Tagged ancient stone quarrying, building stone, marble, Nidaros Cathedral, Nidarosdomen, quarry, sandstone, soapstone, Trondheim | 7 Comments

Geologi og kulturminner – bevaring av gamle steinbrudd

Posted on February 10, 2015 by Per Storemyr

“Verdifull naturarv” – det var temaet på NGU-dagen 5-6 februar 2015. Det dreide seg om forvaltning, bruk og vern av Norges geologiske mangfold. Kulturminner og kulturlandskap er en selvfølgelig del av dette temaet og dermed også gamle steinbrudd. De viser på en sjeldent instruktiv måte menneskenes omgang med det geologiske mangfoldet. Men for å kunne formidles, må bruddene bevares! Dette var temaet for mitt foredrag på seminaret. Her kan du lese en lett redigert versjon av innlegget, med tilhørende powerpoint-bilder. Continue reading →

Posted in Archaeology, New publications, Norway, Old quarries | Tagged conservation, quarry | Leave a comment

Jakten på steinbruddene til middelalderens kirke og kloster på Hovedøya ved Oslo

Posted on September 1, 2014 by Per Storemyr

I et aldeles praktfullt sensommervær var jeg siste uke Riksantikvarens utskremte på jakt etter de gamle steinbruddene som ble brukt til å bygge Edmundskirken og cistercienserklosteret på Hovedøya i Oslofjorden. Flere har gjort det samme før meg, men nå var … Continue reading →

Posted in Archaeology, New projects, Norway, Old quarries, Ruins | Tagged Cultural heritage, Hovedøya, Norway, quarry, sandstone | 2 Comments

Moving to work with the Norwegian Millstone Centre at Hyllestad in West Norway

Posted on June 16, 2014 by Per Storemyr

Suddenly it reached the local press, and so the news became very official: Our family will move from Switzerland to Hyllestad in West Norway by the end of July this year. This is not a move to just any kind … Continue reading →

Posted in Archaeology, Norway, Old quarries | Tagged grinding stone, Hyllestad, Kvernsteinsparken, Norway, quarry | 6 Comments

Happy New Year with a cavalcade of stone images from 2013

Posted on December 31, 2013 by Per Storemyr

I want to thank my readers for following my blog in 2013. Happy New Year to you all!

I really do appreciate your loyalty and I hope to be able to write more articles for you about stone – about quarries, monuments and rock art – in 2014 than I did in 2013. In the year that is soon coming to an end I had to focus on various projects and writing for other media than the internet. Many of the great places that I visited and worked at in 2013 may certainly turn up in future blog posts, so I hope you will continue to follow my writings in 2014. As for now, here’s a cavalcade of images from some of the quarries, monuments and rock art sites that touched me over the past twelve months. They span all of history from the Mesolithic to the Early Modern era. Enjoy the slide show! Continue reading →