Tautra is an

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 the

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the ...

Frosta Frosta is the smallest municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. The administrative centre is the village of Frosta. The municipality is located along the Trondheimsfjord, on the Frosta peninsula, just north of the city of Trondheim. It also ...

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,

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 ...

. It is located in the

Trondheimsfjord The Trondheim Fjord or Trondheimsfjorden (), an inlet of the Norwegian Sea, is Norway's third-longest fjord at long. It is located in the west-central part of the country in Trøndelag county, and it stretches from the municipality of Ørland i ...

, just north of the city of

Trondheim Trondheim ( , , ; sma, Tråante), historically Kaupangen, Nidaros and Trondhjem (), is a city and municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. As of 2020, it had a population of 205,332, was the third most populous municipality in Norway, an ...

. The island is connected to the rest of Frosta by a long

causeway A causeway is a track, road or railway on the upper point of an embankment across "a low, or wet place, or piece of water". It can be constructed of earth, masonry, wood, or concrete. One of the earliest known wooden causeways is the Sweet Tr ...

bridge.

The island is located almost in the middle of the

, in the heartland of what once was the central area of the

Vikings Vikings ; non, víkingr is the modern name given to seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded and se ...

. The remains of the

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

Tuterø Abbey, a

Cistercian The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint B ...

monastery, that was established here in 1207 and dissolved during the

Protestant Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and i ...

. The monastery was placed strategically, very close to the

Frostating The Frostating was an early Norwegian court. It was one of the four major Thing (assembly), Things in medieval Norway. The Frostating had its seat at Tinghaugen in what is now the municipality of Frosta in Trøndelag county, Norway. The name ...

assembly site—the central law-making institution in this region of Norway. In that context, the Cistercian

monk A monk (, from el, μοναχός, ''monachos'', "single, solitary" via Latin ) is a person who practices religious asceticism by monastic living, either alone or with any number of other monks. A monk may be a person who decides to dedic ...

s of Tautra monastery became a part of the nation-building in Norway. In 2003, Queen Sonja laid the

cornerstone The cornerstone (or foundation stone or setting stone) is the first stone set in the construction of a masonry foundation. All other stones will be set in reference to this stone, thus determining the position of the entire structure. Over tim ...

of Tautra Abbey, a new

Cistercian nunnery Cistercian nuns are female members of the Cistercian Order, a religious order belonging to the Roman Catholic branch of the Catholic Church. History The first Cistercian monastery for women, Le Tart Abbey, was established at Tart-l'Abbaye in ...

on the island. A large part of the island and its surrounding water is designated as protected under the

Ramsar Convention The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance Especially as Waterfowl Habitat is an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable use of Ramsar sites (wetlands). It is also known as the Convention on Wetlands. It ...

due to the rich bird life in the area. Now, there are organized professional guided tours for bird watching as well as about the nature and history on Tautra.

References

External links

Tautra Abbey
Ramsar sites in Norway Islands of Trøndelag Frosta {{Trøndelag-geo-stub

See also

References

External links