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Bishop’s chair. Made using mortised and pegged construction. Decorated with carvings of animals, humans, and geometric forms.

This chair is a copy of a bishop’s chair from the Tyldal stave church, (modern village of Tylldal, south of Tynset), Østerdalen, Hedmark, Norway. The church no longer exists, but the chair was known as a rare example of Viking woodcarver’s art. The original is from the 13th century, believed to have been carved by a professional artist probably in Trondheim, and is now in the collection of the University of Oslo’s Kulturhistorisk Museum (museum of cultural history).

Sent in 1929 by Norsk Folkemuseum in Oslo as part of a larger group of gifts from Norwegian museums in honor of 100 years of immigration.