Tvedestrand Municipality Tvedestrand kommune
Municipality
View of Tvedestrand
Flag Coat of arms
Agder within Norway
Tvedestrand within Agder
Coordinates: 58°37′26″N 08°55′40″E / 58.62389°N 8.92778°E / 58.62389; 8.92778
Country	Norway
County	Agder
District	Østre Agder
Established	1 Jan 1838
• Created as	Formannskapsdistrikt
Administrative centre	Tvedestrand
Government
• Mayor (2020)	Marianne Landaas (H)
Area
• Total	215.04 km2 (83.03 sq mi)
• Land	203.94 km2 (78.74 sq mi)
• Water	11.10 km2 (4.29 sq mi)  5.2%
• Rank	#298 in Norway
Population  (2023)
• Total	6,184
• Rank	#154 in Norway
• Density	30.3/km2 (78/sq mi)
• Change (10 years)	+2%
Demonym	Tvedestrand-folk[1]
Official language [2]
• Norwegian form	Bokmål
Time zone	UTC+01:00 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+02:00 (CEST)
ISO 3166 code	NO-4213[3]
Website	Official website
Data from Statistics Norway

Tvedestrand^ⓘ is municipality in Agder county, Norway. It is located in the traditional district of Sørlandet. The administrative center is the town of Tvedestrand. There are many villages in the municipality including Dypvåg, Fiane, Gjeving, Gødderstad, Grønland, Kilen, Klåholmen, Krokvåg, Laget, Lyngør, Nesgrenda, Østerå, Sagesund, Sandvika, and Songe.^[4]

The town of Tvedestrand has a white-painted town center with irregular streets climbing steep hills around the harbor. The natural environment of the area makes it a tourist destination. The municipality includes numerous islands, which makes it popular in the summer for boaters. The number of people in the municipality practically doubles in the summer, due to vacationers. There are approximately 1,700 summer cottages ("hytter") around the fjord and coastal areas. Tvedestrand has over 2,000 buildings that are more than 100 years old.^[5]

The 215-square-kilometre (83 sq mi) municipality is the 298th largest by area out of the 356 municipalities in Norway. Tvedestrand is the 154th most populous municipality in Norway with a population of 6,184. The municipality's population density is 30.3 inhabitants per square kilometre (78/sq mi) and its population has increased by 2% over the previous 10-year period.^[6][7]

General information

The town of Tvedestrand was established as a municipality on 1 January 1838 (see formannskapsdistrikt law). During the 1960s, there were many municipal mergers across Norway due to the work of the Schei Committee. On 1 January 1960, the rural municipalities of Dypvåg (population: 1,805) and Holt (population: 3,759) were merged with the town of Tvedestrand (population: 868) to form a new municipality named Tvedestrand.^[8]

On 1 January 1962, the Strengereid area (population: 375) of Tvedestrand was transferred to neighboring Moland municipality. Then on 1 January 1964, the Holtegården area (population: 5) was transferred from Moland to Tvedestrand. The uninhabited Folevatnet area in Tvedestrand was transferred to the municipality of Risør on 1 January 1984.^[8]

Name

The town and municipality is named after the old Tveite farm (Old Norse: Þveitar) since that is the location of the present town of Tvedestrand. The first element is the farm name which is the genitive case of the word þveit which means "clearing" or "small farm". The last element is strǫnd which means "beach" or "strand". Thus this is the beach of the Tveit farm.^[4][9]

Coat of arms

The coat of arms was granted on 4 April 1986. The official blazon is "Azure, a tern volant argent" (Norwegian: I blått en oppflyvende sølv terne). This means the arms have a blue field (background) and the charge is a tern, a type of local seabird. The tern has a tincture of argent which means it is commonly colored white, but if it is made out of metal, then silver is used. The blue color in the field and the tern were chosen to represent the sea since the municipality was historically dependent on it for its economy. The arms were designed by Daniel Rike. The municipal flag has the same design as the coat of arms.^[10][11][12]

Churches

The Church of Norway has three parishes (sokn) within the municipality of Tvedestrand. It is part of the Aust-Nedenes prosti (deanery) in the Diocese of Agder og Telemark.

History

Holt Church probably dates from the twelfth century and it has an ancient baptismal font. The interior was decorated by Torsten Hoff.

Around 1600, Tvedestrand was mainly a harbour for the Berge and Tveite farms’ boats, hence the name Tvedestrand (strand means beach or coast in Norwegian).

Lyngør was the site of the Battle of Lyngør between English and Dano-Norwegian forces during the Napoleonic Wars resulting in the sinking of the frigate of the Dano-Norwegian forces, Najaden by the British ship-of-the-line Dictator in 1812.

The town, as it now exists, was built in the 19th century as a harbour for Norway's longest existing iron works, Næs jernverk. Lying in the parish of Holt, Næs jernverk has one of the largest and most significant of the surviving mansions in Sørlandet, built by Ulrich Schnell. Schnell bought up various iron works in the neighborhood and set up several sawmills in the district. He obtained a special license to export timber directly from Tvedestrand, establishing the basis for an international harbor.^[13]

Government

Tvedestrand Municipality is responsible for primary education (through 10th grade), outpatient health services, senior citizen services, welfare and other social services, zoning, economic development, and municipal roads and utilities. The municipality is governed by a municipal council of directly elected representatives. The mayor is indirectly elected by a vote of the municipal council.^[14] The municipality is under the jurisdiction of the Agder District Court and the Agder Court of Appeal.

Municipal council

The municipal council (Kommunestyre) of Tvedestrand is made up of 23 representatives that are elected to four-year terms. The tables below show the current and historical composition of the council by political party.