Smøla is the 19th largest
island
An island (or isle) is an isolated piece of habitat that is surrounded by a dramatically different habitat, such as water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. An isla ...
in
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 ...
. The island is located in
Smøla Municipality in
Møre og Romsdal
Møre og Romsdal (; en, Møre and Romsdal) is a county in the northernmost part of Western Norway. It borders the counties of Trøndelag, Innlandet, and Vestland. The county administration is located in the town of Molde, while Ålesund is t ...
county; the vast majority of the municipality is the island. The island has a good road network across the island that connects it to many of the small surrounding islands, however, it does not have any outside road connections to the rest of Norway. The only regular ferry service is via the small island of
Edøya to the south of Smøla which one can drive to from Smøla.
The population of the island is mostly employed in the
fishing
Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment, but may also be caught from fish stocking, stocked bodies of water such as fish pond, ponds, canals, park wetlands and reservoirs. ...
industry or in industries that support the fishing industry. There is also a window factory on the island. There is some dairy and vegetable farming (especially carrots) on the island also.
Geography
The island lies to the north of the
Edøyfjorden and to the west of the
Ramsøyfjorden, about north of the town of
Kristiansund. The islands of
Hitra and
Frøya lie to the northeast,
Skardsøya and
Ertvågsøya to the southeast,
Stabblandet and
Tustna to the south, and the open
Norwegian Sea to the west and north.
The island is very low and marshy with only 5% of the land cultivated into agricultural use. The highest point on the island is the high ''Nerdvikberget''. The island is surrounded by literally thousands of small islets including the historically-important island of
Edøya. Due to the flat, unobstructed nature of the island, the
Smøla Wind Farm is located on the northwestern part of the island.
History
Scientists of the ''Institute of Geodesy and Geoinformationtechnique'' of the
Technical University of Berlin
The Technical University of Berlin (official name both in English and german: link=no, Technische Universität Berlin, also known as TU Berlin and Berlin Institute of Technology) is a public research university located in Berlin, Germany. It was ...
were testing the antique maps of
Ptolemy
Claudius Ptolemy (; grc-gre, Πτολεμαῖος, ; la, Claudius Ptolemaeus; AD) was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist, who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were of importanc ...
and recognized a pattern of calculation mistakes that occurred when one tried to convert the old coordinates from Ptolemy into modern cartographical maps. The scientists believe that, when one compensates for these mistakes, the mythological location
Thule
Thule ( grc-gre, Θούλη, Thoúlē; la, Thūlē) is the most northerly location mentioned in ancient Greek and Roman literature and cartography. Modern interpretations have included Orkney, Shetland, northern Scotland, the island of Saar ...
corresponds to the island of Smøla.
The island has been governed by a variety of municipalities over the years. At one point it was divided over 3 different municipalities:
Brattvær,
Hopen, and
Edøy. Today, there are 3 churches on the island (
Brattvær Church,
Hopen Church, and
Edøy Church), each was the main church for those respective municipalities. Since 1960, the whole island has been part of the same municipality. The largest population centres on the island are the villages of
Hopen (in the north) and
Råket-
Dyrnes (in the northwest).
Media gallery
See also
*
List of islands of Norway
References
{{authority control
Islands of Møre og Romsdal
Smøla