Helgøya is an island in the lake

Mjøsa Mjøsa is the largest lake in Norway and the fourth deepest in Norway and Europe. It is located in the southern part of Norway, about north of the city of Oslo. Its main tributary is the river Gudbrandsdalslågen flowing in from the north; the ...

. The island is located in

Ringsaker Municipality Ringsaker () is a List of municipalities of Norway, municipality in Innlandet county, Norway. It is located in the Traditional districts of Norway, traditional district of Hedmarken. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Br ...

Innlandet Innlandet is a Counties of Norway, county in Norway. It was created on 1 January 2020 with the merger of the old counties of Oppland and Hedmark (Jevnaker Municipality and Lunner Municipality were transferred to the neighboring county of Viken ( ...

county,

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

. The island is the largest freshwater island in Norway. The island is located south of the

Nes The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan on 15 July 1983 as the and was later released as the redesigned NES in several test markets in the ...

peninsula, and it has been connected to the mainland by the Nessundet Bridge since 1957. The island was formerly a part of the

Nes Municipality Nes is a municipality in Akershus county, Norway. It is part of the traditional region of Romerike. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Årnes. Name The municipality (originally the parish) is named after the o ...

until 1964. The island consists of 32 farms. The most notable of these are the old manor ''Hovinsholm'' which had its own church until 1612. Another old farm is ''Eik'' ('

oak An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northern Hemisp ...

') which is the source of the name of the tallest hill on the island: ''Eksberget''. Another farm is ''Høvelsrud'' with its 17th century gardens. The island is generally rich in traces of medieval history.

Helgøya Church Helgøya Church () is a parish church of the Church of Norway in Ringsaker Municipality in Innlandet county, Norway. It is located on the island of Helgøya. It is one of the churches for the Nes parish which is part of the Ringsaker prosti (dean ...

(''Helgøya kirke'') was inaugurated on 7 December 1870. The chapel was built in timber and blockwork in the

Gothic Revival Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic or neo-Gothic) is an Architectural style, architectural movement that after a gradual build-up beginning in the second half of the 17th century became a widespread movement in the first half ...

style. The church has about 200 seats. The building was restored and partially rebuilt in the 1970s.

Name

The

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was 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 ...

forms of the name were ''Helgøy'' and ''Øyin helga'', both meaning 'holy island'. The farm name ''Hovin'' ( - later re-named ''Hovinsholm'') on the southern tip of the island is a compound of '' hof'' which means "pagan temple (for the

Norse gods Norse is a demonym for Norsemen, a Medieval North Germanic ethnolinguistic group ancestral to modern Scandinavians, defined as speakers of Old Norse from about the 9th to the 13th centuries. Norse may also refer to: Culture and religion * Nors ...

)" and ''vin'' which means "meadow".

Name

See also

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Further reading