Gerechtigkeitsspirale, Public artwork at St. Valentin Church, Kiedrich, Germany.
The Gerechtigkeitsspirale is a stone artwork located on a parapet plate within St. Valentin Church, featuring text arranged in a spiral pattern that draws the eye inward. The work was created by Erhart Falckener, a master carpenter from the Rheingau region, and dates back roughly 700 years.
The artwork was carved by master carpenter Erhart Falckener into a parapet plate within St. Valentin Church, which was built around 1300. This creation stands as evidence of the skilled craftsmanship and artistic ambition that flourished in the Rheingau region during the late medieval period.
The spiral arrangement of text shows how medieval craftsmen combined writing with stone decoration in ways that surprised visitors then and now. This method of embedding messages into architectural surfaces reflected how people communicated important ideas through physical structures rather than just words on paper.
The artwork can be viewed inside the church and is best appreciated in natural daylight when the interior is well lit. Plan your visit outside of service times so you can examine the details without distractions.
The spiral shape of the text was an unusual choice that allowed longer messages to fit into a compact design. This creative solution shows how craftspeople of that era solved spatial challenges through artistic innovation rather than simply breaking the text into lines.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 60,000 contributors worldwide.
