Namdalen ( sma, Nååmesjevuemie) is a traditional district in the central part of

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, 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 ...

, consisting of the municipalities Namsos, Grong, Overhalla, Røyrvik,

Nærøysund Nærøysund is a municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. It is located in the traditional district of Namdalen. The municipality was established on 1 January 2020 after the merger of the old municipalities of Vikna and Nærøy. The municip ...

, Høylandet, Flatanger, Lierne, Leka, and Namsskogan, all in

Trøndelag Trøndelag (; sma, Trööndelage) is a county in the central part of Norway. It was created in 1687, then named Trondhjem County ( no, Trondhjems Amt); in 1804 the county was split into Nord-Trøndelag and Sør-Trøndelag by the King of Denma ...

county. The district has tree

towns A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an or ...

: Namsos, Rørvik and

Kolvereid Kolvereid is a town in the municipality of Nærøysund in Trøndelag county, Norway. The town of Kolvereid is located at the west end of the Kolvereidvågen bay, off of the inner part of the Foldafjord. The Norwegian County Road 770 runs throug ...

. The whole district covers about and has about 35,000 residents (2009). The district surrounds the Namdalen valley and the river Namsen, one of the best

salmon Salmon () is the common name for several commercially important species of euryhaline ray-finned fish from the family Salmonidae, which are native to tributaries of the North Atlantic (genus '' Salmo'') and North Pacific (genus '' Onco ...

rivers in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

(only the Tana river in

Finnmark Finnmark (; se, Finnmárku ; fkv, Finmarku; fi, Ruija ; russian: Финнмарк) was a county in the northern part of Norway, and it is scheduled to become a county again in 2024. On 1 January 2020, Finnmark was merged with the neighbour ...

yields a larger catch of salmon).

Agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people ...

and

forestry Forestry is the science and craft of creating, managing, planting, using, conserving and repairing forests, woodlands, and associated resources for human and environmental benefits. Forestry is practiced in plantations and natural stands. ...

have always been important in Namdalen.

Norway spruce ''Picea abies'', the Norway spruce or European spruce, is a species of spruce native to Northern, Central and Eastern Europe. It has branchlets that typically hang downwards, and the largest cones of any spruce, 9–17 cm long. It is very close ...

is the most prevalent tree species. The

grain A grain is a small, hard, dry fruit ( caryopsis) – with or without an attached hull layer – harvested for human or animal consumption. A grain crop is a grain-producing plant. The two main types of commercial grain crops are cereals and legum ...

fields in the lower part of the valley are among the most northern in Norway. Part of the forest in the coastal and lowland part of the valley belong to the Scandinavian coastal conifer forests type, while the upper part of the valley has long and cold winters. In the early

Viking Age The Viking Age () was the period during the Middle Ages when Norsemen known as Vikings undertook large-scale raiding, colonizing, conquest, and trading throughout Europe and reached North America. It followed the Migration Period and the Germ ...

, before

Harald Fairhair Harald Fairhair no, Harald hårfagre Modern Icelandic: ( – ) was a Norwegian king. According to traditions current in Norway and Iceland in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, he reigned from 872 to 930 and was the first King of No ...

, Namdalen was a

petty kingdom A petty kingdom is a kingdom described as minor or "petty" (from the French 'petit' meaning small) by contrast to an empire or unified kingdom that either preceded or succeeded it (e.g. the numerous kingdoms of Anglo-Saxon England unified into ...

. The former

Namdal District Court Namdal District Court ( no, Namdal tingrett) was a district court in Trøndelag county, Norway. The court was based in the town of Namsos in Namsos municipality. The court existed until 2021. It served the municipalities of Flatanger, Fosnes, ...

covered the same general area.

European route E6 European route E6 ( no, Europavei 6, sv, Europaväg 6, or simply E6) is the main north-south thoroughfare through Norway as well as the west coast of Sweden. It is long and runs from the southern tip of Sweden at Trelleborg, into Norway and thr ...

and the Nordland Line run throughout the valley.

Name

The

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

form of the name was ''Naumudalr''. The first element is the genitive case of the river name ''Nauma'' (now Namsen) and the last element is ''dalr'' which means "

valley A valley is an elongated low area often running between hills or mountains, which will typically contain a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams ove ...

" or "

dale Dale or dales may refer to: Locations * Dale (landform), an open valley * Dale (place name element) Geography ;Australia * The Dales (Christmas Island), in the Indian Ocean ;Canada * Dale, Ontario ;Ethiopia * Dale (woreda), district ;Norway * ...

". The meaning of the river name is unknown.

Namdalen in Literature

Namdalen is the location of many of the stories of Olav Duun, a well-known early twentieth century Norwegian author. His most famous works, the

hexalogy A hexalogy (from Greek ἑξα- ''hexa-'', "six" and -λογία ''-logia'', "discourse") is a compound literary or narrative work that is made up of six distinct works. The word apparently first appeared in English as a borrowing from German, in d ...

known as ''

The People of Juvik ''The People of Juvik'' is a series of six historical novels by Norwegian author Olav Duun. The books chronicle the lives of the Juvikings, an old Norwegian landowning peasant family living on Islands off the coast of Namdalen, Trøndelag. Th ...

'' (''Juvikfolket''), takes place on the fictional farm of Haaberg, as well as other locations in Namdalen.

References

Districts of Trøndelag Petty kingdoms of Norway Valleys of Trøndelag {{Trøndelag-geo-stub