Å is a village in

Ibestad Municipality Ibestad ( sme, Ivvárstádik) is a municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. It is part of the traditional region of Central Hålogaland. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Hamnvik. Some of the other larger v ...

Troms og Finnmark Troms og Finnmark (; sme, Romsa ja Finnmárku ; fkv, Tromssa ja Finmarkku; fi, Tromssa ja Finnmark, lit. Troms and Finnmark in English language, English), is a Counties of Norway, county in Northern Norway, northern Norway that was established ...

county,

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

. It is located about east of the town of Harstad on the southwest side of the island of Andørja, along the Bygda

strait A strait is an oceanic landform connecting two seas or two other large areas of water. The surface water generally flows at the same elevation on both sides and through the strait in either direction. Most commonly, it is a narrow ocean channe ...

which goes between the Vågsfjorden and the

Astafjorden Astafjorden is a fjord (more accurately, a strait) in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. It flows through the municipalities of Salangen, Gratangen, Ibestad, and Tjeldsund. The long fjord flows from the Salangen fjord in the east to the Våg ...

. The village of Å and the neighboring villages of

Laupstad Laupstad is a village in Vågan Municipality in Nordland county, Norway. It is located on the island of Austvågøya at the end of the Austnesfjorden, about north of the village of Liland. The European route E10 highway runs through the vill ...

and Ånstad altogether have a total population (2001) of 205 residents. The village is about north of the village of Sørvika where the undersea

Ibestad Tunnel The Ibestad Tunnel is an undersea tunnel in the municipality of Ibestad in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. The tunnel connects the islands of Rolla and Andørja. The western end of the tunnel begins in the village of Hamnvik on Rolla. Then the ...

connects Andørja island to the neighboring island of Rolla, where

Hamnvik Hamnvik is the administrative centre of Ibestad Municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. It is located on the eastern tip of the island of Rolla. The village has a population (2017) of 474 which gives the village a population densit ...

, the municipal center is located. The village is named after the river ''Å-elva'', which flows past it from the nearby mountains of ''Snøtinden'', ''Ristindend'', and ''Åtinden''–all of which are more than above sea level.

Name

The village (originally a farm) was first mentioned in 1375 ("Aam"). The name was originally the plural of the

Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...

word ''á'', which means "(small) river". (There is just one river here, so the plural form might be explained by the fact that the farm was divided in two parts.)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Aa, Ibestad Villages in Troms Ibestad