Distinctive feature of the stave church

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Stave churches in Norway began to appear with the arrival of Christianity. Between the eleventh and sixteenth centuries, about 1,700 wooden frame churches were built. Only 28 buildings have survived to this day, and the stave church in Borgund is one of them. This frame church was built in honor of the Apostle Andrew the First-Called. The material for the wooden church was the sacred tree of the Scandinavians – ash.

wooden churches

A in Borgund are the figures of dragons, which are located on the ridges of the church roof. When building a Christian church, ancient architects did not forget their pagan gods - therefore, in the decor you can see not only dragons, but also runic amulets, which were carved to protect against enemies.

wooden churches

The ancient frame churches had special database decorations – the facades of the buildings were painted with multi-colored paints. In order to preserve the wooden structure in its original form, in the middle of the 20th century it was preserved with a special composition, which included resin. That is why the stave church in Borgund is now black.

The largest bay of the Adriatic Sea is the Bay of Kotor, also known as Boka Bay. The length of this longest and most winding fjord of the Mediterranean is 28 kilometers, in the narrowest places its width does not exceed one kilometer.


The area adjacent to the bay has been inhabited since time immemorial. Along the shores of the Bay of Boka there are many pretty medieval towns, each with its own interesting sights , architectural highlights and unique monuments. There are a large number of ancient Catholic and Orthodox churches here. The areas surrounding the bay belong to Croatia and Montenegro.