Kvinnherad

View of the Sæbøvik area

View of Halsnøy Abbey

The 13th century Ænes Church

The parish of Qvindherred was established as a municipality on 1 January 1838 (see formannskapsdistrikt law). On 1 January 1907, a small area northwest of the villages of Ølve and Husa (population: 67) was transferred from neighboring Tysnes municipality to Kvinnherad. During the 1960s, there were many municipal mergers across Norway due to the work of the Schei Committee. On 1 January 1965, the following areas were merged into one large municipality of Kvinnherad:[6]

• All of Skånevik municipality located north of the Skånevikfjorden-Åkrafjorden and west of the Åkra area (population: 1,189)
• All of Fjelberg municipality (population: 2,308)
• All of the old Kvinnherad municipality (population: 5,831)
• All of Varaldsøy municipality, except for the Mundheim area, (population: 511)

On 1 January 2013, the southwestern part of the Folgefonna peninsula (south of Kysnesstranda) was transferred from Kvinnherad to the neighboring Jondal municipality. This removed forty residents and 37.1 square kilometres (14.3 sq mi) of land area from the municipality.[7]

The economy of Kvinnherad is based on the rich water resources within its boundaries. This includes power production, aluminium production (Sør-Norge Aluminium), fish farming, shipbuilding (Eidsvik Skipsbyggeri, Hellesøy Verft, Bergen Group Halsnøy), and lifeboat production (Umoe Schat-Harding, Norsafe, Eide Marine Tech, Noreq). These industries are spread throughout the municipality.

Kvinnherad has two local newspapers, Kvinnheringen and Grenda, as well as a local TV channel, TV Sydvest.

All municipalities in Norway are 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.[12] The municipality falls under the Haugaland og Sunnhordland District Court and the Gulating Court of Appeal.

The municipality is located along the large Hardangerfjorden, mostly on the southeast side of the fjord on the Folgefonna peninsula, but also a small part on the other side. It includes several notable islands in the fjord including Varaldsøy, Fjelbergøya, Borgundøya, and Halsnøya.[3]

The large Folgefonna National Park, which surrounds the Folgefonna glacier, is partially located in Kvinnherad. The northern part of the municipality is often referred to as Mauranger. It is the area surrounding the Maurangsfjorden. The notable Bondhusbreen glacier is located just south of that fjord, near the village of Sundal. The Jondal Tunnel and Folgefonna Tunnel both connect Mauranger with neighboring Odda and Jondal by cutting through the large mountains surrounding Mauranger.[3]

The municipality has many large lakes including Blådalsvatnet, Juklavatnet, and Onarheimsvatnet. Many of these lakes are utilized for hydroelectric power generation.

Kvinnherad is a popular tourist location because of its natural landscape as well as several places of interest. The most notable of which include Kvinnherad Church, the Bondhusbreen glacier, the shipping mural in Høylandsbygd, and Radiohola. Rosendal, the administrative centre of the municipality, is the site of the greatest tourist attraction in Kvinnherad: the Barony Rosendal. The Barony is the only one of its kind in Norway. It is a museum, which offers valuable information about the Union with Denmark, an important period of Norwegian history.[3] It was one of the locations of the 1958 film "The Vikings" starring Kirk Douglas, Tony Curtis, Janet Leigh and Ernest Borgnine. Many of the citizens of Kvinnherad/Hardanger, Norway were used as extras.[35]

• 
  Kvinnherad Church in Rosendal
• 
  The Barony Rosendal
• 
  Husnes and the Hardangerfjord
• 
  Bondhusbreen glacier
• 
  View from Gjermundshamn across the Hardangerfjord, with Varaldsøy island and Folgefonna glacier

Jens Tvedt, 1935

Hans Inge Myrvold, 2017

• Axel Gyntersberg (ca.1525 – 1588 in Kvinnherad), a Norwegian nobleman and feudal overlord
• Johannes Lauritsson (ca.1540 – ca.1620), a wealthy Norwegian landowner, lived Valen 1563-1578
• Axel Rosenkrantz (1670 in Kvinnherad – 1723), a landowner and baron, owned the Barony Rosendal
• Andreas Lavik (1854–1918), a revivalist, temperance advocate, magazine editor, farmer, headmaster and politician; lived in Kvinnherad from 1885, where he was Mayor for eight years
• Jens Tvedt (1857 in Kvinnherad – 1935), a Norwegian novelist and writer of short stories
• Gisle Midttun (1881 in Kvinnherad – 1940), a Norwegian cultural historian and museologist
• Olav Midttun (1883 in Mauranger – 1972), a philologist, biographer and magazine editor
• Ragnvald Vaage (1889 in Husnes – 1966), a Norwegian poet, novelist and children's writer
• Sigurd Valvatne DSO DSC (born 1913 in Kvinnherad), a naval officer and submariner
• Frank Meidell Falch (1920 in Kvinnherad – 2013), a Norwegian media director and politician
• Egil Myklebust (born 1942 in Kvinnherad), a businessperson and lawyer, CEO of SAS Group
• Lars Amund Vaage (born 1952 at Sunde), a novelist
• Endre Hellestveit (born 1976 in Rosendal), a Norwegian actor [36]
• Hans Inge Myrvold (born 1985), a Norwegian politician, Mayor of Kvinnherad in 2019
• Erlend Bratland (born 1991 in Husnes), a Norwegian singer, won Norske Talenter 2008

• Municipal fact sheet from Statistics Norway (in Norwegian)
• http://www.kvinnherad.kommune.no (in Norwegian)
• http://www.baroniet.uio.no (in Norwegian)
• Kvinnheradguiden.no (in Norwegian)
• Kvinnheringen.no (in Norwegian)
• Grenda.no (in Norwegian)
• Innsida.no (in Norwegian)
• Husnes Ungdomsskule (in Norwegian)