Norwegian cheese Cheese has been part of the Norwegian diet since time immemorial. Every summer, the historical Norwegian farmers sent their cows...
The Norwegian cheese slicer | Ostehøvel
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Norwegian tools and objects
The Norwegian kjenge | A wooden drinking bowl
Pronunciation Kjenge The kjenge is predominantly used for drinking beer. It is usually round, whereas the kane has a more elongated shape, like a...
The old Norwegian farm | Farmhands could only leave twice a year
Summer and winter Today, the Norwegians think of the year in terms of 4 main seasons: spring, summer, autumn, and winter. But the old Norwegian...
Norwegian Buhund | Herding dog and keeper of ancient traditions
A Buhund is not necessarily equal to a buhund When we talk about a Norwegian buhund, we must distinguish between: The spitz dog type and its place...
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Norwegian railway history | The pioneer era 1851-1868
Preparing for progress For thousands of years, the Norwegians relied on boats, horses, reindeer, and their own two feet to transport both goods and...
Norwegian to English dictionary | The best for genealogists?
In North America and other parts of the world, there are millions of descendants of the nearly 1 million Norwegians who emigrated in the 1800s and...
The Norwegian kjenge | A wooden drinking bowl
Pronunciation Kjenge The kjenge is predominantly used for drinking beer. It is usually round, whereas the kane has a more elongated shape, like a...
The old Norwegian farm | Finding Ole Johan Nyaas and his barn
The photo DigitaltMuseum is Norway’s digital photo museum and the home of more than 2 million photographs. This is where I found the historical...
Norwegian clothing | The sweater from Setesdal
Wool is the thing The Norwegians still turn to wool when preparing for the might of the cold winter. The woollen material breathes, and you usually...
Norwegian food history | Milk from the domesticated animals
Food preservation Daily life for the historical Norwegians – living in a climate with long, frosty winters and short summers – was all about...
The old Norwegian farm | The cotter’s holding | Husmannsplass
Let us start with the beginning In English, a Norwegian husmann is often referred to as a cotter, and his home as a cotter's holding - a...
The old Norwegians needed no money
Picture this; the year is AD 1478. A family lives on a small farm in a mountainous part of Norway. The holding consists of a few simple buildings,...
The Norwegian summer pasture farm | Preserving milk in a bog
Bogmilk The Norwegian word myrmelk is composed of two words: myr + melk = myrmelk. Myr means peat bog or wetland - and melk means milk, so in...
Stabbur | The food storehouse on the old Norwegian farm
Keeping the rodents out The Norwegians placed the stabbur on top of wooden stilts or boulders; specifically designed to keep rodents and other...
Queen Maud of Norway | Edward was her father
Edward was born on 9 November 1841, at Buckingham Palace in London. He was Victoria and Albert’s second of nine children. Edward - or Bertie as he...
Norwegian food and drink | The Viking pizza
Norway’s new national dish In today’s Norway, people eat pizza like never before. Jokingly, it is said to be Norway’s new national dish. But...
Norwegian ski history | Hunting in deep snow
Rock carvings found at Rødøy In 1933, ethnographer Gutorm Gjessing discovered the above rock carving on the island of Rødøy, in the Norwegian region...
Norway has the second longest coastline in the world
From Sweden to Russia In the south, Norway’s coastline begins at the border with Sweden, in the region of Østfold, in the very south-eastern corner...
Reindeer | An ancient presence in the Norwegian mountains
Followed the melting ice In Scandinavia, the last ice age ended some twelve thousand years ago, and the early Norwegians were hunter-gatherers....
Norwegian wooden buildings | One thousand years old
The old log house technique In 2002, Peter Kvernland Thomsen wrote a book about how to build wooden log houses; what the Norwegians call lafting. He...
When a bear attacked Norwegian milkmaid Kari Moen in 1836
On her way to the mountain pasture farm One early summer's day in 1836, milkmaid - budeie - Kari Moen was on her way to the Sauherad mountains, to...
The old Norwegian farm | How machinery changed the landscape
A patchwork of fields When we travel through today's Norwegian agricultural landscape, we often see large and undulating fields with well-sifted...
Strandsitter | A Norwegian beach dweller
The old coastal Norway Throughout history and well into our own time, Norway was a society predominantly based on farming, fishing, gathering, and...
Night fishing using a spear and a torch | Lystring
A leister is an ancient tool Lystring is the gerund form of the Norwegian verb å lystre - pronounced [ly`strə]. The word comes from the Old Norse...
The royal palace in Oslo | Built by a French general
The historical backdrop Between AD 1380 and AD 1814, Norway was de facto under Danish rule; with Denmark’s monarchs ruling Norway from Copenhagen....
A man died after being bitten by a wolf | Norway AD 1720
Vellik was the son of Anders and Mildri, tenants on the farm Nordvoll, and was the oldest of 6 siblings. Vellik married Marit Skarålia in 1716, and...
The old Norwegian farm | A nation built on porridge | Grøt
Grain and water Porridge, flatbread, and lefse - a soft grain-based flatbread - were staple foods on the old Norwegian farm. Historically, today’s...
The Sami | Sleeping on a bed of glowing embers
In his writings on Sami history, Yngve Ryd retells this fascinating Sami historical observation, shared by Ola Omma. The mountain willow When...
Kløvhest | Means packhorse in Norwegian
Pronunciation Kløvhest The grammar A compound word made up of: kløv + hest | noun | masculine | the indefinite form: en kløvhest (a kløvhest) | the...
The old Norwegian farm | The old calendar-stick
Mother Nature dictated If we go back far enough in time, most of the Norwegians were either fisher-hunter-gatherers - or farmers - or a varied...
The Sami | The Sami flag days calendar
The Sami flag days calendar lists the official flag days across Sapmi: the historical Sami territories located across Norway, Sweden, Finland, and...
Norwegian baking through the seasons
"Nevada Berg takes readers back into her Norwegian kitchen, offering a year’s worth of new baking...