Gammelstaden or ''Gammelstad'' (''Luleå Old Town'') is a

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localities (Australia), in which a locality is a geographic subdivis ...

situated in

Luleå Municipality Luleå Municipality () is a municipality in Norrbotten County in northern Sweden. Its seat is located in Luleå, which is also the county seat of Norrbotten County. Localities There are 18 localities (or urban areas) in Luleå Municipality: ...

Norrbotten County Norrbotten County ( sv, Norrbottens län; se, Norrbottena leatna, fi, Norrbottenin lääni) is the northernmost county or '' län'' of Sweden. It is also the largest county by land area, almost a quarter of Sweden's total area. It shares border ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

with 4,960 inhabitants in 2010. It is known for the

Gammelstad Church Town Gammelstad Church Town ( sv, Gammelstads kyrkstad) is a UNESCO World Heritage Site situated in Gammelstaden near the city of Luleå, Sweden, at the northern end of the Gulf of Bothnia. It is the best preserved example of a type of town that was on ...

, a

UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...

World Heritage Site A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for h ...

History

A thousand years ago Luleå district consisted of an

archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands, or sometimes a sea containing a small number of scattered islands. Examples of archipelagos include: the Indonesian Archi ...

: the land was ten metres lower than today, pushed down by the weight of ice in the last

ice age An ice age is a long period of reduction in the temperature of Earth's surface and atmosphere, resulting in the presence or expansion of continental and polar ice sheets and alpine glaciers. Earth's climate alternates between ice ages and gree ...

. The church hill of present-day Gammelstad was a small island at the mouth of the Lule river. During the 14th century the area became the centre of a parish stretching from the coast to the Norwegian mountains along the

Kalix Kalix ( sv, Kalix; Kalix dialect: ''Kôlis'', , phonemically ; fi, Kainuu; fit, Kainus) is a locality and the seat of the Kalix Municipality in Norrbotten County, Sweden. The name Kalix is believed to originate from the Sami word ''Gáláseatnu ...

, Lule and Råne rivers. After the

Treaty of Nöteborg The Treaty of Nöteborg, also known as the ''Treaty of Oreshek'' ( sv, Freden i Nöteborg, Russian: ''Ореховский мир,'' fi, Pähkinäsaaren rauha), is a conventional name for the peace treaty signed at Oreshek ( sv, Nöteborg, fi, ...

in 1323,

and

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

disagreed about their northern border. To secure the area the Swedish state entrusted the Lule river valley to burghers from Central Sweden. The church sent out priests and built simple wooden churches, and 1339 was the first year church services were mentioned as having been held in 'Luleå'. Church, taxation and Swedish legislation were used to incorporate what is today Norrbotten into the Swedish state. The building of Nederluleå Church commenced during the fifteenth century. This is a large building, reflecting the economic prosperity of the area, presumably based on trading fur and salmon. In the seventeenth century the rule was applied more strictly that all trade should be centred on the towns where it could be taxed, and in 1621 the town of Luleå was founded on the site of the old marketplace. It was noted as early as 1649 that the harbour had become too shallow owing to the land elevation. The burghers of

Luleå Luleå ( , , locally ; smj, Luleju; fi, Luulaja) is a city on the coast of northern Sweden, and the capital of Norrbotten County, the northernmost county in Sweden. Luleå has 48,728 inhabitants in its urban core (2018) and is the seat of Lu ...

were forced to move their town nearer the coast. This led to the establishment of Luleå New Town and Luleå Old Town, present-day Luleå and Gammelstad, respectively. To the north-east of Gammelstad church, a few blocks with courtyards laid out at right-angles still remain, which have their roots in the 17th century.

References

External links

Gammelstad
at Luleå Municipality

{{authority control Populated places in Luleå Municipality Norrbotten