Zillis - St. Martin

In 831 an "ecclesia plebeia" is mentioned here, dedicated to Saint Martin. Excavations proved, that earlier churches did exist on the same spot from about 500 on. The church of today was erected in the early 12th century.

St. Martin is world famous for the painted ceiling inside, created by an unknown artist around 1109 to 1114. It is still almost complete. Only very few of these works have survived the times in Europe. The only such ceiling I have ever seen is in St. Michael, Hildesheim, Germany.

The ceiling here consists of 153 square panels (9 rows of 17 panels) of about 90 cm sides. They were painted upright and then inserted into the ceiling.

Actually the painting reads like a map. There is a kind of frame, as the 48 panels outer panels (apart from the corner fields) show scenes on water - an ocean. The corners have angels, that may symbolize the four winds (directions). The "inner" 105 panels depict scenes on "land". Here themes are the life of Jesus - and Saint Martin, whom the church is devoted to.

There are a couple of horrible sea-monsters.
Here the sea-elephant.