Hulterstads kyrka

The first church here is thought to have been a basilica with three aisles, probably built under Danish direction, since Sweden then belonged to the archdiocese of Lund. Excavated foundations found beneath the present floor during a 1951 restoration confirmed this earlier layout, and some accounts suggest the medieval church may even have had a broad twin tower to the west. As times grew more troubled, the church was adapted for defence, and in the 1200s the western tower was rebuilt with fire-resistant floors and stair passages within thick walls; this sturdy tower survived when the rest of the medieval church was later pulled down.

By the 1700s, a growing population needed more space, and after debate about whether to extend or rebuild, the congregation settled in 1803 for a fresh design: a spacious single-hall church in the Empire style, with large round-arched windows and a chancel wall backed by a sacristy. The medieval tower was kept but given a smaller lantern top, later fitted with a clock. Two bells hang in the tower: one cast in 1631 by Jürgen Putensen, the other cast in Stockholm in 1780.

Inside, the most striking feature is the chancel, with an altar-pulpit reached by stairs from the sacristy — an arrangement fashionable in the early 1800s before falling out of liturgical favour elsewhere. Hulterstad is one of a handful of Öland churches, along with Ås and Ventlinge, where the pulpit has never been moved from this original position. It is decorated with gilded emblems of the Passion and a Trinity symbol with the Hebrew name of God above the pulpit door. The font, carved from sandstone, dates from the 1100s, making it older than almost anything else surviving in the church.

Visitors can see a small collection of runestones and fragments, uncovered under the floor during restoration work, now displayed in the porch. The organ, built in 1868 by Per Larsson Åkerman of Stockholm with a case designed by Ludvig Hedin, was restored in the 1980s. A model sailing ship, a votive gift from 1978, hangs as a reminder of the parish's seafaring links.

In the churchyard's north-east corner stands a memorial to the crew of the warship Kronan, which sank in 1676 during a great naval battle off Öland's southern point with the loss of some 800 men; bodies washed ashore were buried at Hulterstad and neighbouring Stenåsa. The monument, raised by a naval veterans' association, consists of a large anchor, stone blocks fitted with iron rings, and a small memorial stone.