On 20 April 1535, Stockholmers recorded a remarkable sky spectacle over the city described as several solar signs with rings, and a version soon appeared in Storkyrkan where the event was tied to a painted image now called the Vädersolstavlan. 1 2
Origins and source of the report
The surviving frame inscription on the painting preserves the core report in Latin, Swedish, and German, with a date tied to 1535 and a morning time window, linking the work directly to the reported heavens event in Stockholm. 3 4 The same archival tradition in Stockholm sources identifies Olaus Petri as the intended commissioner and says the painting entered church circulation soon after the event. 1 5
Named observers
Contemporary and near-contemporary references name Olaus Petri and the master of the mint Anders Hansson as figures who treated the phenomenon with urgency, and modern summaries preserve their reactions as part of the event’s earliest documented interpretation cycle. 1 4 The tradition also includes the broader civic context of Storkyrkan witnesses seeing the signs within an atmosphere of reform-era tension. 6
Interpretation trajectory
The painting’s survival created a layered history of meaning. Early church-centered interpretation treated the signs as potentially divine warnings and was entangled with theological dispute. Later records note censorship and delayed publication effects around the Vasa-reformation narrative, with subsequent scholarship and restoration work repositioning the work as a historical-urban document and atmospheric phenomenon image. 1 2 The 1998–1999 technical work and dendrochronology clarified that the visible painting is a 1636 copy rather than the original 1535 panel, reshaping provenance arguments while preserving the event’s documentary significance. 6 3