Avaldsnes is a village in Karmøy municipality in Rogaland county, Norway . The village is located on the northeastern part of the island of Karmøy , along the Karmsundet strait, just south of the town of Haugesund . The village was an ancient centre of power on the west coast of Norway and is the site of one of Norway's more important areas of cultural history. The trading port of Notow and the Avaldsnes Church are two notable historic sites in Avaldsnes.
77-450: The village was the administrative centre of the old municipality of Avaldsnes which existed from 1838 until 1965. The 3.13-square-kilometre (770-acre) village has a population (2019) of 2,890 and a population density of 923 inhabitants per square kilometre (2,390/sq mi). Avaldsnes has been described as "Norway's oldest capital" because it was the primary residency of Harald Fairhair who unified Norway into one kingdom. Avaldsnes
154-404: A chef-lieu ( French pronunciation: [ʃɛfljø] , plural form chefs-lieux , literally 'chief place' or 'main place'), is a town or city that is important from an administrative perspective. The capital of an Algerian province is called a chef-lieu . The capital of a district , the next largest division, is also called a chef-lieu , whilst the capital of the lowest division,
231-521: A dialect continuum of more or less mutually intelligible local and regional varieties; some Norwegian and Swedish dialects , in particular, are very close. These Scandinavian languages, together with Faroese and Icelandic as well as some extinct languages , constitute the North Germanic languages. Faroese and Icelandic are not mutually intelligible with Norwegian in their spoken form because continental Scandinavian has diverged from them. While
308-615: A central city as chef-lieu of delegation . In the United Kingdom it is the centre of a local authority , which is distinct from a historic county with a county town. Norwegian language Norwegian ( endonym : norsk [ˈnɔʂːk] ) is a North Germanic language from the Indo-European language family spoken mainly in Norway , where it is an official language. Along with Swedish and Danish , Norwegian forms
385-435: A distinct dialect at the level of farm clusters. Dialects are in some cases so dissimilar as to be unintelligible to unfamiliar listeners. Many linguists note a trend toward regionalization of dialects that diminishes the differences at such local levels; there is, however, a renewed interest in preserving dialects. Norwegian nouns are inflected for number (singular/plural) and for definiteness (indefinite/definite). In
462-409: A district ( liwa ), or a governorate ( muhafazah ). Luxembourg is divided into two judicial arrondissements (Luxembourg City, Diekirch), four electoral circonscriptions (constituencies), twelve cantons , as well as 100 communes (municipalities; Luxembourgish: Gemengen ). Arrondissements, districts and cantons have each a chef-lieu and are named after it. The same is true for each commune which
539-539: A few dialects, definite nouns are also inflected for the dative case . Norwegian nouns belong to three noun classes (genders): masculine, feminine and neuter. All feminine nouns can optionally be inflected using masculine noun class morphology in Bokmål due to its Danish heritage. In comparison, the use of all three genders (including the feminine) is mandatory in Nynorsk. All Norwegian dialects have traditionally retained all
616-541: A fierce battle at the Bloodheights ( Slaget på Blodeheia ved Avaldsnes ) against the sons of his half-brother King Eirik Bloodaxe . The forces of King Haakon won the battle and he would reign as King of Norway until his death during 961. This site contains the only Norwegian example of Bronze Age burial mounds lined up in a row. A ship burial from the time of the Merovingian dynasty (approximately 680-750 AD) found here
693-515: A height of 5 metres (16 ft), but it was flattened under the leadership of Pastor Lyder Brun in 1835. The mound turned out to be Norway's richest grave from the Roman period. The Avaldsnes find ( Norwegian : Avaldsnesfunnet ) contained a neck ring of 600 grams (19 ozt ) of pure gold, weapons, bandolier mountings and various Roman tubs of silver and bronze. Mary's Needle, known in Norwegian as
770-400: A high, sharply falling pitch in the first syllable and a low pitch in the beginning of the second syllable. In both accents, these pitch movements are followed by a rise of intonational nature (phrase accent)—the size (and presence) of which signals emphasis or focus, and corresponds in function to the normal accent in languages that lack lexical tone , such as English. That rise culminates in
847-494: A noun, unlike English which has a separate article, the , to indicate the same. In general, almost all nouns in Bokmål follow these patterns (like the words in the examples above): In contrast, almost all nouns in Nynorsk follow these patterns (the noun gender system is more pronounced than in Bokmål): There is in general no way to infer what grammatical gender a specific noun has, but there are some patterns of nouns where
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#1732858226851924-421: A single language, to be called Samnorsk . A 1946 poll showed that this policy was supported by 79% of Norwegians at the time. However, opponents of the official policy still managed to create a massive protest movement against Samnorsk in the 1950s, fighting in particular the use of "radical" forms in Bokmål text books in schools. In the reform in 1959, the 1938 reform was partially reversed in Bokmål, but Nynorsk
1001-428: A single vote. The name Nynorsk , the linguistic term for modern Norwegian , was chosen to contrast with Danish and emphasise the historical connection to Old Norwegian. Today, this meaning is often lost, and it is commonly mistaken as a "new" Norwegian in contrast to the "real" Norwegian Bokmål. Bokmål and Nynorsk were made closer by a reform in 1938. This was a result of a state policy to merge Nynorsk and Bokmål into
1078-434: A trestle construction with curving walls and a double curved roof covered with wooden shingles. Administrative centre An administrative centre is a seat of regional administration or local government, or a county town , or the place where the central administration of a commune , is located. In countries with French as administrative language (such as Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland and many African countries),
1155-413: Is Bokmål will study Nynorsk as a mandatory subject throughout both elementary and high school. A 2005 poll indicates that 86.3% use primarily Bokmål as their daily written language, 5.5% use both Bokmål and Nynorsk, and 7.5% use primarily Nynorsk. Thus, 13% are frequently writing Nynorsk, though the majority speak dialects that resemble Nynorsk more closely than Bokmål. Broadly speaking, Nynorsk writing
1232-411: Is a language form based on Norwegian dialects and puristic opposition to Danish. The now-abandoned official policy to merge Bokmål and Nynorsk into one common language called Samnorsk through a series of spelling reforms has created a wide spectrum of varieties of both Bokmål and Nynorsk. The unofficial form known as Riksmål is considered more conservative than Bokmål and is far closer to Danish while
1309-506: Is a term commonly ascribed to the settlement that serves as a municipal administrative centre. This level handles the local administrative and political tasks of the surrounding settlements. Since central place theory was the guiding principle during the municipal reform 1962–1977, most municipalities were dominated by a larger urban area where the political seat was located. Most municipalities are named for their central locality, but there are several exceptions. There are many deviations from
1386-539: Is believed to have been named after the legendary King Augvald , who allegedly had his seat in the area surrounding the Karmsundet strait. It was here that there was an ancient centre of power at Avaldsnes. At this point, the shipping route is forced into a narrow passage that runs along Avaldsnes. It is likely this for this reason that such power and riches were generated through the ages. King Harald Fairhair chose Avaldsnes for his main royal estate in about 870 making it
1463-401: Is commonly described as a large oar-powered vessel, with a breadth of 2.5 to 6 metres (8 ft 2 in to 19 ft 8 in). Grønhaug (Green Mound), the site of another ship burial, is situated 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) north of the church site. It was examined by Haakon Shetelig in 1902, and contained an approximately 15-metre (49 ft) long boat with remains of a man's grave from
1540-589: Is composed of more than one town or village. Usually (with a few exceptions), the commune is named after the communal chef-lieu. In Russia , several million-plus cities in federal districts have the official status of an administrative centre: Moscow (as the main city of the Central Federal District ), Vladivostok , Volgograd , Yekaterinburg , Nizhny Novgorod , Novosibirsk , Pyatigorsk , Rostov-on-Don and St. Petersburg . The main cities of regions and municipal districts are also called unofficially
1617-597: Is regulated by the Norwegian Academy , which determines acceptable spelling, grammar, and vocabulary. There is also an unofficial form of Nynorsk, called Høgnorsk , discarding the post-1917 reforms, and thus close to Ivar Aasen's original Landsmål. It is supported by Ivar Aasen-sambandet , but has found no widespread use. In 2010, 86.5% of the pupils in the primary and lower secondary schools in Norway receive education in Bokmål, while 13.0% receive education in Nynorsk. From
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#17328582268511694-477: Is the oldest ship burial uncovered within the Nordic countries. Storhaug (Great Mound), a ship's burial mound, can be found to the north of the royal estate at Avaldsnes. Excavation of this burial mound started in 1886. The ship at Storhaug was made of oak and was placed in a north–south orientation. Stone walls of approximately 1 metre (3.3 ft) in height and width were built around the great ship. The Storhaug ship
1771-459: Is to write in dialect for informal use. When writing an SMS, Facebook update, or fridge note, many people, especially young ones, write approximations of the way they talk rather than using Bokmål or Nynorsk. There is general agreement that a wide range of differences makes it difficult to estimate the number of different Norwegian dialects. Variations in grammar, syntax, vocabulary, and pronunciation cut across geographical boundaries and can create
1848-583: Is today to a large extent the same language as Bokmål though somewhat closer to the Danish language. It is regulated by the unofficial Norwegian Academy , which translates the name as 'Standard Norwegian'. The other is Høgnorsk ('High Norwegian'), a more purist form of Nynorsk, which maintains the language in an original form as given by Ivar Aasen and rejects most of the reforms from the 20th century; this form has limited use. Nynorsk and Bokmål provide standards for how to write Norwegian, but not for how to speak
1925-405: Is uvular [ ʁ ] or [ χ ] . And in the dialects of North-Western Norway, it is realized as [ r ] , much like the trilled ⟨rr⟩ of Spanish. Norwegian is a pitch-accent language with two distinct pitch patterns, like Swedish. They are used to differentiate two-syllable words with otherwise identical pronunciation. For example, in many East Norwegian dialects,
2002-490: Is widespread in western Norway, though not in major urban areas, and also in the upper parts of mountain valleys in the southern and eastern parts of Norway. Examples are Setesdal , the western part of Telemark county ( fylke ) and several municipalities in Hallingdal , Valdres , and Gudbrandsdalen . It is little used elsewhere, but 30–40 years ago, it also had strongholds in many rural parts of Trøndelag (mid-Norway) and
2079-459: The Dano-Norwegian language that replaced Middle Norwegian as the elite language after the union of Denmark–Norway in the 16th and 17th centuries and then evolved in Norway, while Nynorsk was developed based upon a collective of spoken Norwegian dialects. Norwegian is one of the two official languages in Norway, along with Sámi , a Finno-Ugric language spoken by less than one percent of
2156-568: The Germanic languages evolved, further branching off into the North Germanic languages , of which Norwegian is one. Proto-Norse is thought to have evolved as a northern dialect of Proto-Germanic during the first centuries AD in what is today Southern Sweden. It is the earliest stage of a characteristically North Germanic language, and the language attested in the Elder Futhark inscriptions,
2233-614: The Hanseatic League between 1250 and 1450 in the main Scandinavian cities brought large Middle Low German –speaking populations to Norway. The influence of their language on Scandinavian is comparable with that of French on English after the Norman conquest . In the late Middle Ages, dialects began to develop in Scandinavia because the population was rural and little travel occurred. When
2310-550: The Reformation came from Germany, Martin Luther 's High German translation of the Bible was quickly translated into Swedish, Danish, and Icelandic. Norway entered a union with Denmark in 1397 and Danish, over time, replaced Middle Norwegian as the language of the elite, the church, literature, and the law. When the union with Denmark ended in 1814, the Dano-Norwegian koiné had become
2387-496: The Stockholm metropolitan area . The term central locality has no legal standing and it is unclear how it should be applied to these municipalities. Some municipalities appointing one or several localities to be the central locality. A residence city (Swedish: "residensstad") is the town or city which is the political and administrative seat of the county . This level handles the more regional political and administrative tasks of
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2464-502: The Västra Götaland Region . The term chef-lieu is applied to the capital of each Swiss canton . In 16 of the 26 cantons, the territory is subdivided into districts. Every district also has a location nominated as chef-lieu and each has a prefect. The term chef-lieu is used to designate the capital of each gouvernorat (department). Each of the 24 gouvernorats is subdivided into delegations (districts) which each have
2541-468: The municipalities , is called agglomération de chef-lieu (chef-lieu agglomeration ) and is abbreviated as A.C.L. The chef-lieu in Belgium is the administrative centre of each of the ten provinces of Belgium . Three of these cities also give their name to their province ( Antwerp , Liège and Namur ). The chef-lieu of a département is known as the préfecture . This is the town or city where
2618-469: The prefect of the department (and all services under their control) are situated, in a building known as the prefecture . In every French region , one of the departments has pre-eminence over the others, and the prefect carries the title of Prefect of region X..., Prefect of Department Z... and the city where the regional prefect is found is known as chef-lieu of the region or, more commonly, Regional prefecture . The services are, however, controlled by
2695-459: The 10th century. Dendrochronological studies carried out in 2009 show that the ships from Oseberg, Grønhaug, and Storhaug along with the boat found at Storhaug were all built from oak from the same area of Southwest Norway. Flagghaugen (Flag Hill), from the Old Norse word haugr meaning hill or mound, is situated just north of the church. Originally it had a diameter of 43 metres (141 ft) and
2772-475: The 1990s, the chef-lieu has transitioned from the location of the Governor, Commandant, or Prefect and their staff, to the location of Commune, Cercles of Mali / Departments of Niger , and Regional Councils and a variety of decentralized bodies. The chefs-lieux of a Region, Cercle or Département, is usually also a Communal chef-lieu. Both nations collect these councils in a "High Council of Collectivites" seated at
2849-475: The 20th century, being used by large newspapers, encyclopedias, and a significant proportion of the population of the capital Oslo, surrounding areas, and other urban areas, as well as much of the literary tradition. Since the reforms of 1981 and 2003 (effective in 2005), the official Bokmål can be adapted to be almost identical with modern Riksmål. The differences between written Riksmål and Bokmål are comparable to American and British English differences . Riksmål
2926-450: The Ministry of Culture, official spelling, grammar, and vocabulary for the Norwegian language. The board's work has been subject to considerable controversy throughout the years. Both Nynorsk and Bokmål have a great variety of optional forms. The Bokmål that uses the forms that are close to Riksmål is called moderate or conservative , depending on one's viewpoint, while the Bokmål that uses
3003-491: The administration being devolved usually to the Secretary-general of the departmental prefecture , who functions as sub-prefect for the arrondissement. The chef-lieu of a canton is usually the biggest city or town within the canton, but has only a nominal role. No specific services are controlled by it. In past decades, there was always a Gendarmerie , a treasurer and a justice of the peace. The chef-lieu indicates
3080-430: The administrative centre or simply the centre. The only exception to this rule is the republics , for which the term " capital " is used to refer to the seat of government. The capital of Russia is also an entity to which the term "administrative centre" does not apply. In Sweden there are two levels of administrative centre; the local municipal and the regional county . Central locality ( Swedish : "centralort")
3157-496: The administrative subdivisions down to the Commune level each have a formal place of administrative headquarters, titled the chef-lieu. The larger portion of the terminology of administrative division is inherited from colonial rule as part of French West Africa , and has survived and been somewhat modified over time. In both nations there have been remarkably parallel histories. With the decentralization process begun in both nations in
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3234-450: The central locality principle. Some municipalities are dominated by two or more towns of similar size, and sometimes they share the municipal administration, with the municipality having its official address in one of the towns. For example, both Skillingaryd and Vaggeryd are central localities of Vaggeryd Municipality . Conversely, there are municipalities within metropolitan areas . For example, there are twenty-six municipalities within
3311-497: The county, such as healthcare and public transport . The name comes from that this is the town or city where the governor ( Swedish : "landshövding") have their residence . There are some exceptions to this, however. In the newer amalgamated "greater counties", often referred to as "regions", the administrative centre is placed in one of the older residence cities . Examples of this is Malmö in Region Scania and Gothenburg in
3388-399: The dialects and comparing the dialects among the different regions. He examined the development of Icelandic , which had largely escaped the influences under which Norwegian had come. He called his work, which was published in several books from 1848 to 1873, Landsmål , meaning 'national language'. The name Landsmål is sometimes interpreted as 'rural language' or 'country language', but this
3465-577: The dialects. The retroflex consonants only appear in East Norwegian dialects as a result of sandhi , combining / ɾ / with / d / , / l / , / n / , / s / , and / t / . The realization of the rhotic / ɾ / depends on the dialect. In Eastern, Central, and Northern Norwegian dialects, it is a flap [ ɾ ] , whereas in Western and Southern Norway, and for some speakers also in Eastern Norway, it
3542-644: The eighth grade onwards, pupils are required to learn both. Out of the 431 municipalities in Norway, 161 have declared that they wish to communicate with the central authorities in Bokmål, 116 (representing 12% of the population) in Nynorsk, while 156 are neutral. Of 4,549 state publications in 2000, 8% were in Nynorsk, and 92% in Bokmål. The large national newspapers ( Aftenposten , Dagbladet , and VG ) are published in Bokmål or Riksmål. Some major regional newspapers (including Bergens Tidende and Stavanger Aftenblad ), many political journals, and many local newspapers use both Bokmål and Nynorsk. A newer trend
3619-403: The final syllable of an accentual phrase, while the utterance-final fall common in most languages is either very small or absent. There are significant variations in pitch accent between dialects. Thus, in most of western and northern Norway (the so-called high-pitch dialects) accent 1 is falling, while accent 2 is rising in the first syllable and falling in the second syllable or somewhere around
3696-496: The forms that are close to Nynorsk is called radical . Nynorsk has forms that are close to the original Landsmål and forms that are close to Bokmål. Opponents of the spelling reforms aimed at bringing Bokmål closer to Nynorsk have retained the name Riksmål and employ spelling and grammar that predate the Samnorsk movement. Riksmål and conservative versions of Bokmål have been the de facto standard written language of Norway for most of
3773-555: The language. No standard of spoken Norwegian is officially sanctioned, and most Norwegians speak their own dialects in all circumstances. Thus, unlike in many other countries, the use of any Norwegian dialect, whether it coincides with the written norms or not, is accepted as correct spoken Norwegian. However, in areas where East Norwegian dialects are used, a tendency exists to accept a de facto spoken standard for this particular regional dialect, Urban East Norwegian or Standard East Norwegian (Norwegian: Standard østnorsk ), in which
3850-625: The local population. Around 1030, Christianity came to Scandinavia , bringing with it an influx of Latin borrowings and the Roman alphabet . These new words were related to church practices and ceremonies, although many other loanwords related to general culture also entered the language. The Scandinavian languages at this time are not considered to be separate languages, although there were minor differences among what are customarily called Old Icelandic, Old Norwegian , Old Gutnish , Old Danish, and Old Swedish . The economic and political dominance of
3927-479: The mother tongue of around 1% of the population. From the 1840s, some writers experimented with a Norwegianised Danish by incorporating words that were descriptive of Norwegian scenery and folk life, and adopting a more Norwegian syntax. Knud Knudsen proposed to change spelling and inflection in accordance with the Dano-Norwegian koiné , known as "cultivated everyday speech." A small adjustment in this direction
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#17328582268514004-622: The nation's capital. Smaller sub-divisions in Mali's Communes (Villages, Tribal councils, Quarters) are administered from or identified as a Place / Site ( Site in French), so the chef-lieu is literally the Chief-Place even at the lowest level. In the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , the administrative centres are known as "chief towns" or nahias . Nahias may be in charge of a sub-district ( qda ),
4081-417: The oldest form of the runic alphabets . A number of inscriptions are memorials to the dead, while others are magical in content. The oldest are carved on loose objects, while later ones are chiseled in runestones . They are the oldest written record of any Germanic language. East Germanic languages West Germanic languages Icelandic Faroese Norwegian Danish Swedish Around 800 AD,
4158-402: The oldest royal seat in Norway. According to legend, Olav Trygvason built Avaldsnes Church , apparently as a manor chapel for the king's residence. This would probably have been quite a small stave church . Construction of the present day church, called "St. Olav's Church of Avaldsnes" ( Norwegian : Olavskirken ) was started approximately 1250 AD, on the order of King Håkon Håkonsson . It
4235-784: The population. Norwegian is one of the working languages of the Nordic Council . Under the Nordic Language Convention , citizens of the Nordic countries who speak Norwegian have the opportunity to use it when interacting with official bodies in other Nordic countries without being liable for any interpretation or translation costs. Like most of the languages in Europe, Norwegian derives from Proto-Indo-European . As early Indo-Europeans spread across Europe, they became isolated from each other and new languages developed. In northwest Europe,
4312-405: The prefecture of the department. The chef-lieu of an arrondissement , commonly known as the sous-préfecture is the city or town where the sub-prefect of the arrondissement (and the services directly under their control) are situated, in a building called the sub-prefecture . The arrondissement where the département prefecture is located does not normally have a sub-prefect or sub-prefecture,
4389-462: The principal city of the provinces of New Caledonia. So Nouméa is the chef-lieu of South Province. But the chef-lieu can also mean the principal area within a town. So Wé is part of the town of Lifou , but is the chef-lieu of Lifou. In the Loyalty Islands and the other islands, the name of the chef-lieu differs from that of the name of the town. For the towns of the mainland, the chef-lieu has
4466-442: The principles of Norwegian orthography, e.g. zebra in Norwegian is written sebra . Due to historical reasons, some otherwise Norwegian family names are also written using these letters. Some letters may be modified by diacritics : é , è , ê , ó , ò , and ô . In Nynorsk, ì and ù and ỳ are occasionally seen as well. The diacritics are not compulsory, but may in a few cases distinguish between different meanings of
4543-586: The same name as the town. Nouméa is a town composed only of Nouméa. Many of the West African states which gained independence from France in the mid-20th century also inherited the French administrative structure of Departments and Communes, headed by a Chief-Lieu . States still using Chief-Lieu to identify the administrative headquarters of a government subdivision include Senegal , Burkina Faso , Benin , Mali , and Niger . Taking Niger and Mali as examples,
4620-719: The script was simplified to the Younger Futhark , and inscriptions became more abundant. At the same time, the beginning of the Viking Age led to the spread of Old Norse to Iceland , Greenland , and the Faroe Islands . Viking colonies also existed in parts of the British Isles , France ( Normandy ), North America, and Kievan Rus . In all of these places except Iceland and the Faroes, Old Norse speakers went extinct or were absorbed into
4697-515: The sewing needle of Virgin Mary ( Norwegian : Jomfru Marias synål ) is the only one remaining of several monumental stones which once stood around the church area. The stone has been somewhat taller, but, towering at 7.2 metres (24 ft) it is still the second largest of its kind in Norway. The stone leans in towards the church wall—the distance to the wall is in fact only 9.2 centimetres (3.6 in). A saga tells that "the day of Judgement will come when
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#17328582268514774-503: The site of St. Olav's Church. To best preserve the integrity of the church stemming from the Middle Ages as well as the historical landscape, most of the centre is located underground. There is a replica of a farm from the Viking Age with several buildings, including reproductions of a longhouse and boathouses on the island of Bukkøy. The 25-metre (82 ft) long house at the Viking farm is
4851-606: The southern part of northern Norway ( Nordland county). Today, Nynorsk is the official language of not only four of the nineteen Norwegian counties but also various municipalities in five other counties. NRK , the Norwegian broadcasting corporation, broadcasts in both Bokmål and Nynorsk, and all governmental agencies are required to support both written languages. Bokmål is used in 92% of all written publications, and Nynorsk in 8% (2000). Like some other European countries, Norway has an official "advisory board"— Språkrådet (Norwegian Language Council)— that determines, after approval from
4928-405: The stone comes into contact with the church wall". A popular story tells us about a minister in ages past who climbed the monument and cutting off a piece from the stone when it came dangerously near the church wall. Nordvegen History Centre ( Norwegian : Nordvegen historiesenter ) was opened in 2005, in order to raise the profile of the historical qualities of Avaldsnes. The centre is located by
5005-554: The syllable boundary. The pitch accents (as well as the peculiar phrase accent in the low-tone dialects) give the Norwegian language a "singing" quality that makes it easy to distinguish from other languages. Accent 1 generally occurs in words that were monosyllabic in Old Norse , and accent 2 in words that were polysyllabic. The Norwegian alphabet has 29 letters. The letters c , q , w , x and z are only used in loanwords . As loanwords are assimilated into Norwegian, their spelling might change to reflect Norwegian pronunciation and
5082-401: The three grammatical genders from Old Norse to some extent. The only exceptions are the dialect of Bergen and a few upper class sociolects at the west end of Oslo that have completely lost the feminine gender. According to Marit Westergaard , approximately 80% of nouns in Norwegian are masculine. Norwegian and other Scandinavian languages use a suffix to indicate definiteness of
5159-475: The two Germanic languages with the greatest numbers of speakers, English and German, have close similarities with Norwegian, neither is mutually intelligible with it. Norwegian is a descendant of Old Norse , the common language of the Germanic peoples living in Scandinavia during the Viking Age . Today there are two official forms of written Norwegian, Bokmål (Riksmål) and Nynorsk (Landsmål), each with its own variants. Bokmål developed from
5236-426: The unofficial Høgnorsk is more conservative than Nynorsk and is far closer to Faroese , Icelandic and Old Norse . Norwegians are educated in both Bokmål and Nynorsk. Each student gets assigned a native form based on which school they go to, whence the other form (known as Sidemål ) will be a mandatory school subject from elementary school through high school. For instance, a Norwegian whose main language form
5313-447: The vocabulary coincides with Bokmål. Outside Eastern Norway , this spoken variation is not used. From the 16th to the 19th centuries, Danish was the standard written language of Norway. As a result, the development of modern written Norwegian has been subject to strong controversy related to nationalism , rural versus urban discourse, and Norway's literary history. Historically, Bokmål is a Norwegianised variety of Danish, while Nynorsk
5390-551: The website of the University of Vienna . The village was selected as the millennium site for Rogaland county. Rich discoveries from prehistory have been made in the entire area. Reheia (also known as Blodheia) is located approximately 1 kilometre (1,100 yd) west of the Church. King Harald I of Norway located his main farm at Avaldsnes in about 870. In 953, King Haakon the Good fought
5467-427: The word bønder ('farmers') is pronounced using the simpler tone 1, while bønner ('beans' or 'prayers') uses the more complex tone 2. Though spelling differences occasionally differentiate written words, in most cases the minimal pairs are written alike, since written Norwegian has no explicit accent marks. In most eastern low-tone dialects, accent 1 uses a low flat pitch in the first syllable, while accent 2 uses
5544-560: The word, e.g.: for ('for/to'), fór ('went'), fòr ('furrow') and fôr ('fodder'). Loanwords may be spelled with other diacritics, most notably ï, ü , á and à . The two legally recognized forms of written Norwegian are Bokmål (literally 'book tongue') and Nynorsk ('new Norwegian'), which are regulated by the Language Council of Norway ( Språkrådet ). Two other written forms without official status also exist. One, called Riksmål ('national language'),
5621-451: Was changed further towards Bokmål. Since then Bokmål has reverted even further toward traditional Riksmål, while Nynorsk still adheres to the 1959 standard. Therefore, a small minority of Nynorsk enthusiasts use a more conservative standard called Høgnorsk . The Samnorsk policy had little influence after 1960, and was officially abandoned in 2002. While the sound systems of Norwegian and Swedish are similar, considerable variation exists among
5698-480: Was clearly not Aasen's intended meaning. The name of the Danish language in Norway was a topic of hot dispute throughout the 19th century. Its proponents claimed that it was a language common to Norway and Denmark, and no more Danish than Norwegian. The proponents of Landsmål thought that the Danish character of the language should not be concealed. In 1899, Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson proposed the neutral name Riksmål , meaning 'national language' like Landsmål , and this
5775-453: Was implemented in the first official reform of the Danish language in Norway in 1862 and more extensively after his death in two official reforms in 1907 and 1917. Meanwhile, a nationalistic movement strove for the development of a new written Norwegian. Ivar Aasen , a botanist and self-taught linguist, began his work to create a new Norwegian language at the age of 22. He traveled around the country collecting words and examples of grammar from
5852-581: Was not completed until nearly 1320. Dedicated to St. Olav , it was one of the greatest Norwegian stone churches from the Middle Ages and it was one of only four royal collegiate churches in Norway. The church was an important station of the Pilgrim's Route to Nidaros which ran along the coast. "Written sources indicate that Avaldsnes was the predecessor of the later established Hansa kontor in Bergen", according to
5929-641: Was officially adopted along with the 1907 spelling reform. The name Riksmål is sometimes interpreted as 'state language', but this meaning is secondary at best. (Compare to Danish rigsmål from where the name was borrowed.) After the personal union with Sweden was dissolved in 1905, both languages were developed further and reached what is now considered their classic forms after a reform in 1917. Riksmål was, in 1929, officially renamed Bokmål (literally 'book language'), and Landsmål to Nynorsk (literally 'new Norwegian'). A proposition to substitute Danish-Norwegian ( dansk-norsk ) for Bokmål lost in parliament by
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