Urnes is the last of the Scandinavian animal styles. A slim quadruped, bitten by thinner snakes, loops through itself in figure-eights and closed knots — one ribbon width the whole way, never tapering, never breaking into leaf. Almond eyes and curled lappets on nose and neck are the only ornament the beast is allowed.

The style is named for the north portal of Urnes stave church above the Sognefjord, where nine centuries of weather took the ore-pine to a dark grey-brown and left the cut ridges catching the light. In Uppland the same line runs as runic bands across hundreds of granite stones, painted in red lead, ochre, soot and chalk.