Blog Posts
Norway: Bergen – Travel Guide
Norway: Bergen – Troldhaugen
Norway: Bergen – Bryggen Wharf
Norway: Nærøyfjord
Norway: Urnes Stave Church
Norway: Briksdalsbreen Glacier
Vestland is a county in Norway. The county is located in Western Norway, and its administrative centre is Bergen, where the executive and political leadership is based. The County Governor is based in Hermansverk. Vestland is one of two counties in Norway that have Nynorsk as their official written language form.
Vestland was created on 1 January 2020, when the former counties of Hordaland and Sogn og Fjordane were merged.
Vestland county is a newly created county, but it has been inhabited for millennia. The area was made up of many petty kingdoms under the Gulating during the Middle Ages. The northern part was the known as Firdafylke (now the Fjordane region; Nordfjord-Sunnfjord), the central are was known as Sygnafylke (now the Sogn region), and the southern part was known as Hordafylke.
In the early 16th century, Norway was divided into four len. The Bergenhus len was headquartered in Bergen and encompassed much of western and northern Norway including Firdafylke, Sygnafylke, Hordafylke, and Sunnmørafylke (in the present day Møre og Romsdal county). The new Bergenhus len was administered from the Bergenhus Fortress in the city of Bergen.
