Kaga kyrka

The present building, possibly on the site of an earlier church, dates largely from the 1100s, with tradition holding it was founded around 1137 by King Sverker the Elder. Dendrochronological testing of timber in the 1980s suggested construction more likely took place in the 1120s, roughly a decade earlier than the old tradition claimed. The church comprises a rectangular nave with a narrower apse-ended chancel, a north sacristy, a south porch and a west tower topped by a slender spire; the spire's timber has been dated to the winter of 1506-07.

A curious historical quirk helped preserve the church's ancient character. During the Middle Ages, income from Kaga supported a canonry at Linköping Cathedral that carried no local duties, so the canons and bishops who received its tithes had little incentive to alter the building - leaving it largely in its original form, even though this was apparently a source of local embarrassment at the time.

Inside, the nave and chancel are richly decorated with late Gothic wall paintings attributed to the circle of the so-called Risinge Master, possibly with the chancel and nave painted by different hands. Scenes include the Apostles' Creed and, over the triumphal arch, the beheading of John the Baptist at the feast of Herod Antipas, suggesting the saint may once have been the church's patron. A well-preserved image of the local saint Kakwkylla appears above the pulpit. Earlier, twelfth-century Romanesque paintings survive only in areas above the vaults, hidden after brick vaulting was added around the mid-1400s.

A late eighteenth-century plan to demolish the medieval church and replace it with a larger shared building for Kaga and Kärna parishes was only narrowly abandoned when funding fell through - an accident of history to which the church arguably owes its survival. The current furnishings largely date from a 1906-07 renovation under architect Thor Thorén, which also introduced glass paintings and further chancel decoration.

Among the church's notable fittings are an iron-bound south door contemporary with the building, said to be among the oldest in the diocese, a wooden altarpiece with oak figures from a fifteenth-century Östergötland workshop, and a pulpit carved by Niclas Österbom of Norrköping in 1747. A runestone from the eleventh century is set into the church wall, its inscription recording a memorial raised by a son for his father.