Kingdom of Norway II

  General Description   The Kingdom of Norway (also Norwegian Empire or Old Norse Noregsveldi) originally covered the west coast of Norway and was allied with an earldom in Þrándheimur (modern Trøndelag). It then expanded to eastern Norway in the middle of the 11th century CE, around Viken and modern-day Oslo, including Båhuslen in modern Sweden, and northwards to Hålogaland, Lofoten and Finnmark.
Orkney and Shetland became part of the kingdom as early as 875, according to legend, and became an earldom. The Faroe Islands became part of the kingdom of Norway in 1035 CE, and the Hebrides and Man in the 12th century. Iceland and Greenland were added to its territory in 1256-64 and 1262 respectively. In 1266, however, Man and the Hebrides became part of the Kingdom of Scotland. The ’peak’ of the kingdom was thus in the 1260s. Each part of the kingdom had its own assembly: four in Norway and a separate assembly for each of the islands or archipelagoes in the realm. Here the chieftains gathered yearly to discuss and decide on key matters for each assembly area. The Icelandic, Faroese and Man assemblies still exist.
Population and political organization
The kingdom of Norway was originally a composite of kingdoms or earldoms, with the king of Norway a king of kings. Its extent and composition relied in large part on the fortunes of the royal dynasty, with repeated periods of partition by inheritance and reunification. A fully stable dynasty was only established in about 1240, after a long period of civil war. Royal power was instrumental in introducing Christianity to Norway around 1000, and the church was an important prop to royal power thereafter, providing the bureaucratic framework. The orientation of the Norwegian kingdom shifted after 1314, from North Atlantic expansion to an eastern emphasis, participating in intra-Scandinavian power struggles. In 1397 it joined the Kalmar Union, the kingdom covering the whole of the Swedish, Danish and Norwegian realms. From 1523 to 1814 it was a part of the Danish-Norwegian kingdom, and the Danish king was also the Norwegian king. The population reached about 400,000-600,000 in 1350, before the Black Death, but by 1520 repeated epidemics had reduced the population to around 120,000.
This description was provided by Árni Daniel Júlíusson and edited by Jenny Reddish.