Norrlanda kyrka

The earliest church on this site dated from the later twelfth century, and the tower at its western end, begun in the early 1200s, survives from that period. During the later 1200s or around 1300 the original Romanesque chancel was replaced by the present chancel and sacristy, and by the mid-1300s a new nave had been built, along with the church's most celebrated feature: a south portal carved by the anonymous medieval stonemason known as Egypticus. The tower was probably heightened around the same time.

The church's whitewashed exterior, corner dressings and cut-stone surrounds are typical of Gotland's rural medieval churches. Inside, the nave is covered by two tall tent vaults, and a tall, wide pointed triumphal arch leads through to the chancel, which is lit by a large triple window in its east wall. Two medieval porches (stigluckor) survive at the churchyard entrances; the northern one has an unusual arrangement, its pointed arch divided by an arcade wall into a larger and a smaller opening.

The wall paintings in the chancel and nave, still visible today, are attributed to the mid-fifteenth-century workshop of the so-called Passion Master. Their survival gives the interior much of its interest for visitors, alongside earlier medieval features such as two surviving side altars, one of which supports the eighteenth-century pulpit.

Among the furnishings, the sandstone font dates from 1735 but stands on the base of an earlier, medieval font. A bell hanging in the tower is thought to have been cast around 1250, making it one of the older objects still in everyday use in the building. A remarkable medieval organ, built sometime between 1370 and 1430, was long associated with the church but is now preserved at the Swedish History Museum rather than in the building itself; the present organ, built in Copenhagen in the 1950s, arrived at Norrlanda in 1985 having previously served another church.