Visions of Heaven and Earth

Eleven golden altars and seven crucifixes from Medieval Denmark are presented and analyzed as central manifestations of the contacts to leading European centers of art and theology during the long 12th century. Shaping and installation of the golden works of art were done to the praise of the Lord and to the benefit of the individual congregation, the clergy and the church patrons or benefactors. The two volumes present 16 thematic chapters by 25 authors and a catalogue with 51 numbers, including archaeological findings and objects, which according to documentary sources are known to have been lost. New results are exposed, based on technical and scientific analyses of the wood, the fire-gilded copperplates and the precious rock crystals, along with dendrochronological datings. The iconography, liturgical function and style of the individual works are interpreted in context, comprising a close reading of the inscriptions on the altars and a presentation of the history of the altars and crucifixes since the Middle Ages with a particular description of the musealization of nearly all of these during the 19th century.