Øvre Sirdal
Encyclopedia
Øvre Sirdal is a former municipality
Former municipalities of Norway
This is a list of former municipalities of Norway, i.e. municipalities that no longer exist.When the local council system was introduced in Norway in 1837-38, the country had 392 municipalities. In 1958 the number had grown to a total of 744 rural municipalities, 64 city municipalities as well as a...

 in Vest-Agder
Vest-Agder
In the 16th century, Dutch merchant vessels began to visit ports in southern Norway to purchase salmon and other goods. Soon thereafter the export of timber began, as oak from southern Norway was exceptionally well suited for shipbuilding...

 county
Counties of Norway
Norway is divided into 19 administrative regions, called counties . The counties form the primary first-level subdivisions of Norway and are further divided into 430 municipalities...

 in Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

. It is located in the northern part of the present-day municipality of Sirdal
Sirdal
Sirdal is a municipality in Vest-Agder county, Norway. Sirdal was separated from Bakke in 1849. Sirdal was divided into Tonstad and Øvre Sirdal on 1 January 1905, but these were again merged to recreate Sirdal on 1 January 1960....

.

Name

The name Øvre Sirdal means "upper Sirdal" since it was created from the northern part of the old Sirdal municipality. The Old Norse
Old Norse
Old Norse is a North Germanic language that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....

 form of the name was Sírudalr. The first element is the genitive case
Genitive case
In grammar, genitive is the grammatical case that marks a noun as modifying another noun...

 of the river name Síra
Sira River
Sira River flows in Norway. It flows through the village Sira in Vest-Agder....

and the last element is dalr which means "valley
Valley
In geology, a valley or dale is a depression with predominant extent in one direction. A very deep river valley may be called a canyon or gorge.The terms U-shaped and V-shaped are descriptive terms of geography to characterize the form of valleys...

" or "dale". The meaning of the rivername is unknown (maybe "strong stream").

History

The municipality of Øvre Sirdal was established on 1 January 1905 when the old Sirdal formannskapsdistrikt
Formannskapsdistrikt
Formannskapsdistrikt was the name for a Norwegian local self-government districts put into force in 1838. This system of municipality was created in a bill approved by the Storting and signed into law by King Carl Johan on 14 January 1837...

 was split into two municipalities: Øvre Sirdal (population: 753) and Tonstad
Tonstad
Tonstad is the administrative centre of the municipality of Sirdal in Vest-Agder, Norway. In 2005, its population was 751. It is also a former municipality that is located along the Sirdalsvatnet in the southern part of the present-day municipality of Sirdal....

. On 1 January 1960, Øvre Sirdal was merged together with the neighboring municipality of Tonstad and the Øksendal area of the municipality of Bakke
Bakke, Norway
Bakke is a former municipality in Vest-Agder county in Norway. It is located along the eastern shore of Lundevatn along the Rogaland county border.-History:...

 to form a new municipality of Sirdal
Sirdal
Sirdal is a municipality in Vest-Agder county, Norway. Sirdal was separated from Bakke in 1849. Sirdal was divided into Tonstad and Øvre Sirdal on 1 January 1905, but these were again merged to recreate Sirdal on 1 January 1960....

.

External links

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