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Image 1
Bosse as Indra's daughter at the 1907 première of
A Dream Play (1902) by
August Strindberg (19 February 1878 – 2 November 1961) was a Swedish–Norwegian actress. A celebrity in her day, Bosse is now most commonly remembered as the third wife of the playwright
August Strindberg. Bosse began her career in a minor company run by her forceful older sister
Alma Fahlstrøm in Kristiania (now
Oslo, the capital of Norway). Having secured an engagement at the
Royal Dramatic Theatre, the main drama venue of Sweden's capital
Stockholm, Bosse caught the attention of Strindberg with her intelligent acting and exotic "oriental" appearance.
After a whirlwind courtship, which unfolds in detail in Strindberg's letters and diary, Strindberg and Bosse were married in 1901, when he was 52 and she 23. Strindberg wrote a number of major roles for Bosse during their short and stormy relationship, especially in 1900–01, a period of great creativity and productivity for him. Like his previous two marriages, the relationship failed as a result of Strindberg's jealousy, which some biographers have characterized as
paranoid. (
Full article...)
Image 3
Amundsen, Hanssen, Hassel, and Wisting at
Polheim at the South Pole
The first ever expedition to reach the
Geographic South Pole was led by the Norwegian explorer
Roald Amundsen. He and four other crew members made it to the geographical south pole on 14
December 1911, which would prove to be five weeks ahead of the competitive British party led by
Robert Falcon Scott as part of the
Terra Nova Expedition. Amundsen and his team returned safely to their base, and about a year later heard that Scott and his four companions had perished on their return journey.
Amundsen's initial plans had focused on the Arctic and the conquest of the
North Pole by means of an extended drift in an icebound ship. He obtained the use of
Fridtjof Nansen's polar exploration ship
Fram, and undertook extensive fundraising in a country that had gained its independence only some
six years earlier. Preparations for this expedition were disrupted when, in 1909, the rival American explorers
Frederick Cook and
Robert Peary each claimed to have reached the North Pole - both claims are highly disputed. Amundsen then changed his plan and began to prepare for a conquest of the South Pole; uncertain of the extent to which the public and his backers would support him, he kept this revised objective secret. When he set out in June
1910, he led even his crew to believe they were embarking on an Arctic drift, and revealed their true Antarctic destination only when
Fram was leaving their last port of call,
Madeira, on 9 September 1910. (
Full article...)
Image 4Operation Mascot was an unsuccessful British carrier air raid conducted against the
German battleship Tirpitz at her anchorage in
Kaafjord, Norway, on 17 July 1944. The attack was one of a
series of strikes against the battleship launched from aircraft carriers between April and August 1944, and was initiated after Allied intelligence determined that the damage inflicted during the
Operation Tungsten raid on 3 April had been repaired.
A force of 44 British
dive bombers and 40
fighters took off from three aircraft carriers in the early hours of 17 July. German
radar stations detected these aircraft while they were en route to Kaafjord, and
Tirpitz was protected by a
smoke screen by the time the strike force arrived. Few of the British airmen were able to spot the battleship, and their attacks did not inflict any significant damage. German losses were limited to a patrol craft, and three British aircraft were destroyed or damaged beyond repair by Kaafjord's defenders. A group of German
submarines attempted to intercept the carrier force as it returned to base, without success. Two U-boats were sunk near the carriers by British patrol aircraft and several others were damaged. (
Full article...)
Image 5The
black-throated loon (
Gavia arctica), also known as the
Arctic loon and the
black-throated diver, is a
migratory aquatic bird found in the
northern hemisphere, primarily breeding in
freshwater lakes in
northern Europe and
Asia. It winters along sheltered, ice-free coasts of the north-east
Atlantic Ocean and the eastern and western
Pacific Ocean. This loon was first described by
Carl Linnaeus in 1758 and has two subspecies. It was previously considered to be the same species as the
Pacific loon, of which it is traditionally considered to be a
sister species, although this is debated. In a study that used
mitochondrial and
nuclear intron DNA, the black-throated loon was found to be sister to a
clade consisting of the Pacific loon and two sister species, the
common loon and the
yellow-billed loon.
The black-throated loon measures about 70
cm (28
in) in length and can weigh anywhere from 1.3 to 3.4 kilograms (2.9 to 7.5
lb). In breeding
plumage, the adult of the nominate subspecies has mostly black upperparts, with the exception of some of the
mantle and
scapulars, which have white squares. The head and hindneck are grey, and the sides white and striped black. Most of the throat is also black, giving this bird the name "black-throated loon". The colour of the throat patch can be used to distinguish the two subspecies; the throat patch of the other subspecies,
G. a. viridigularis, is green. The underparts are mostly white, including the bottom of the throat. The flanks are also white, a feature which can be used to separate this bird from the Pacific loon. When the bird is not breeding, the black patch on the throat is absent, replaced with white; most of the black lines on the throat are also missing, except those on the bottom sides, and the upperparts are unpatterned with the exception of a few white spots on the
upperwing. The juvenile is similar to the non-breeding adult, except more brown overall. (
Full article...)
Image 6The
1952 Winter Olympics, officially known as the
VI Olympic Winter Games (
Norwegian:
De 6. olympiske vinterleker;
Nynorsk:
Dei 6. olympiske vinterleikane) and commonly known as
Oslo 1952, were a winter
multi-sport event held from 14 to 25
February 1952 in
Oslo, the capital of Norway.
Discussions about Oslo hosting the
Winter Olympic Games began as early as 1935; the city was keen to host the
1948 Winter Olympics, but that was made impossible by
World War II. Instead, Oslo won the right to host the 1952 Games in a contest that included
Cortina d'Ampezzo in Italy and
Lake Placid in the United States. All of the Olympic venues were in Oslo's metropolitan area, except for the
alpine skiing events, which were held at
Norefjell, 113
km (70
mi) from the capital. A new hotel was built for the press and dignitaries, along with three dormitories to house athletes and coaches, creating the first modern
athlete's village. Oslo bore the financial burden of hosting the Games in return for the revenue they generated. The 1952 Winter Olympics was the first of the two consecutive Olympics to be held in Northern Europe, preceding the
1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki, Finland. (
Full article...)
Image 7In September 1967, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands brought the
Greek case to the
European Commission of Human Rights, alleging violations of the
European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) by the
Greek junta, which had taken power earlier that year. In 1969, the Commission found serious violations, including
torture; the junta reacted by withdrawing from the
Council of Europe. The case received significant press coverage and was "one of the most famous cases in the Convention's history", according to legal scholar
Ed Bates.
On 21
April 1967, right-wing army officers
staged a military coup that ousted the Greek government and used mass arrests, purges and censorship to suppress their opposition. These tactics soon became the target of criticism in the
Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, but Greece claimed they were necessary as a response to alleged Communist subversion and justified under
Article 15 of the ECHR. In September 1967, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and the Netherlands filed identical cases against Greece alleging violations of most of the articles in the ECHR that protect individual rights. The case was declared admissible in January 1968; a second case filed by Denmark, Norway and Sweden for additional violations, especially of
Article 3 forbidding torture, was declared admissible in May of that year. (
Full article...)
Image 9Nansen's Fram expedition of 1893–1896 was an attempt by the
Norwegian explorer
Fridtjof Nansen to reach the geographical
North Pole by harnessing the natural east–west current of the
Arctic Ocean. In the face of much discouragement from other polar explorers, Nansen took his ship
Fram to the
New Siberian Islands in the eastern Arctic Ocean, froze her into the
pack ice, and waited for the drift to carry her towards the pole. Impatient with the slow speed and erratic character of the drift, after 18 months Nansen and a chosen companion,
Hjalmar Johansen, left the ship with a team of
Samoyed dogs and sledges and made for the pole. They did not reach it, but they achieved a record
Farthest North latitude of 86°13.6′N before a long retreat over ice and water to reach safety in
Franz Josef Land. Meanwhile,
Fram continued to drift westward, finally emerging in the North Atlantic Ocean.
The idea for the expedition had arisen after items from the American vessel
Jeannette, which had sunk off the north coast of
Siberia in 1881, were discovered three years later off the south-west coast of
Greenland. The wreckage had obviously been carried across the polar ocean, perhaps across the pole itself. Based on this and other debris recovered from the Greenland coast, the meteorologist
Henrik Mohn developed a theory of
transpolar drift, which led Nansen to believe that a specially designed ship could be frozen in the pack ice and follow the same track as
Jeannette wreckage, thus reaching the vicinity of the pole. (
Full article...)
Image 10Operation Tungsten was a Second World War
Royal Navy air raid that targeted the
German battleship Tirpitz. The operation sought to damage or destroy
Tirpitz at her base in
Kaafjord in the far north of Norway before she could become fully operational again following a period of repairs.
The British decision to strike Kaafjord was motivated by fears that the battleship, upon re-entering service, would attack strategically important
convoys carrying supplies to the Soviet Union. Removing the threat posed by
Tirpitz would also allow the Allies to redeploy the
capital ships which had to be held in the North Sea to counter her. After four months of training and preparations, the British
Home Fleet sailed on 30 March 1944 and aircraft launched from five
aircraft carriers struck Kaafjord on 3 April. The raid achieved surprise, and the British aircraft met little opposition. Fifteen bombs hit the battleship, and strafing by
fighter aircraft inflicted heavy casualties on her gun crews. Four British aircraft and nine airmen were lost during the operation. (
Full article...)
Image 11
Z33 under attack by Allied aircraft on 9 February 1945
On 9
February 1945, near the end of the
Second World War, a force of Allied
Bristol Beaufighter aircraft suffered many losses during an attack on the German destroyer
Z33 and its escorting vessels; the operation was called
Black Friday by the survivors. The German ships were sheltering in a strong defensive position in
Førde Fjord,
Norway, forcing the Allied aircraft to attack through massed
anti-aircraft fire (
FlaK).
The Beaufighters and their escort of
Mustang Mk III fighters from 65 Squadron RAF were intercepted by twelve
Focke-Wulf Fw 190s of
Jagdgeschwader 5 (Fighter Wing 5) of the
Luftwaffe. The Allies damaged at least two of the German ships for the loss of seven Beaufighters shot down by FlaK. Two Beaufighters and a Mustang were shot down by the Fw 190s and four or five of the German aircraft were shot down by the Allied aircraft, including that of the ace
Rudi Linz. (
Full article...)
Image 14Operation Goodwood was a series of
British carrier air raids conducted against the
German battleship Tirpitz at her anchorage in
Kaafjord in
occupied Norway during late August 1944. It was the last of
several attacks made by the
Home Fleet during 1944 which sought to damage or sink
Tirpitz and thereby eliminate the threat it posed to
Allied shipping. Previous raids on Kaafjord conducted by
Fleet Air Arm aircraft had involved only one air attack; in Operation Goodwood several attacks were made in a single week. The
Royal Navy hoped that these raids would wear down the formidable German defences.
The British fleet departed its base on 18 August and launched the first raid against Kaafjord on the morning of 22 August. The attack failed, and a small raid that evening inflicted little damage. Attacks were conducted on 24 and 29 August and were also failures.
Tirpitz had been hit by two bombs during the raid on 24 August, but neither caused significant damage. British losses during Operation Goodwood were 17 aircraft to all causes, a
frigate sunk by a submarine, and an
escort carrier badly damaged. German forces suffered the loss of 12 aircraft and damage to 7 ships. (
Full article...)
Image 16
A British Lancaster bomber over Kaafjord during Operation Paravane
was a British air raid of
World War II that inflicted heavy damage on the
German battleship Tirpitz, at anchor in
Kaafjord in the far north of
German-occupied Norway. The attack was conducted on 15 September 1944 by 21
Royal Air Force heavy bombers, which flew from an airfield in the north of the
Soviet Union. The battleship was struck by one bomb, and further damaged by several near misses. This damage rendered
Tirpitz unfit for combat, and she could not be repaired as it was no longer possible for the Germans to sail her to a major port.
The attack on 15 September followed a series of raids conducted against
Tirpitz with limited success by
Royal Navy carrier aircraft between April and August 1944, seeking to sink or disable the battleship at her anchorage, so that she no longer posed a threat to Allied convoys travelling to and from the Soviet Union. The
first of these raids was successful, but the other attacks failed due to shortcomings with the
Fleet Air Arm's strike aircraft and the formidable German defences. As a result, the task of attacking the battleship was transferred to the RAF's
Bomber Command.
Avro Lancaster bombers from the Command's two elite squadrons flew to their staging airfield in the Soviet Union on the night of 11/12 September, and attacked on 15 September using heavy bombs and air-dropped mines. All of the British aircraft returned to base, though one of the Lancasters later crashed during its flight back to the United Kingdom. (
Full article...)
Image 18
Female near
Kaktovik, Barter Island, Alaska, United States
The
polar bear (
Ursus maritimus) is a large
bear native to the
Arctic and nearby areas. It is closely related to the
brown bear, and the two species can
interbreed. The polar bear is the largest extant species of bear and land
carnivore, with adult males weighing 300–800
kg (660–1,760
lb). The species is
sexually dimorphic, as adult females are much smaller. The polar bear is white- or yellowish-furred with black skin and a thick layer of fat. It is more slender than the brown bear, with a narrower skull, longer neck and lower shoulder hump. Its teeth are sharper and more adapted to cutting meat. The paws are large and allow the bear to walk on ice and paddle in the water.
Polar bears are both terrestrial and
pagophilic (ice-living) and are considered
marine mammals because of their dependence on
marine ecosystems. They prefer the annual
sea ice but live on land when the ice melts in the summer. They are mostly carnivorous and specialized for preying on
seals, particularly
ringed seals. Such prey is typically taken by ambush; the bear may stalk its prey on the ice or in the water, but also will stay at a breathing hole or ice edge to wait for prey to swim by. The bear primarily feeds on the seal's energy-rich
blubber. Other prey include
walruses,
beluga whales and some terrestrial animals. Polar bears are usually solitary but can be found in groups when on land. During the breeding season, male bears guard females and defend them from rivals. Mothers give birth to cubs in
maternity dens during the winter. Young stay with their mother for up to two and a half years. (
Full article...)
Image 20
Hull at
RAF Wick in Scotland in early 1940
,
DFC (26 February 1914
– 7 September 1940) was a
Royal Air Force (RAF)
flying ace during the Second World War, noted especially for his part in the
fighting for Narvik during the
Norwegian Campaign in 1940, and for being one of "
The Few"—the Allied pilots of the
Battle of Britain, in which he was shot down and killed. From a farming family, Hull's early years were spent in
Southern Rhodesia,
South Africa and
Swaziland. He boxed for South Africa at the
1934 Empire Games. After being turned down by the
South African Air Force because he did not speak
Afrikaans, he joined the RAF and, on becoming a
pilot officer in August 1936, mustered into
No. 43 Squadron at
RAF Tangmere in
Sussex.
A skilful pilot, Hull dedicated much of his pre-war service to
aerobatics, flying
Hawker Audaxes,
Furies and
Hurricanes. He reacted to the outbreak of war with enthusiasm and achieved No. 43 Squadron's first victory of the conflict in late January 1940. Reassigned to Norway in May 1940 to command a
flight of
Gloster Gladiator biplanes belonging to
No. 263 Squadron, he downed four German aircraft in an hour over the
Bodø area south-west of Narvik on 26 May, a feat that earned him the
Distinguished Flying Cross. He was shot down the next day, and invalided back to England. Hull returned to action at the end of August, when he was made commander of No. 43 Squadron with the rank of
squadron leader. A week later, he died in a
dogfight over south London. (
Full article...)
Image 21The
orca (
Orcinus orca), or
killer whale, is a
toothed whale and the largest member of the
oceanic dolphin family. The only
extant species in the genus
Orcinus, it is recognizable by its
black-and-white-patterned body. A
cosmopolitan species, it inhabits a wide range of marine environments, from
Arctic to
Antarctic regions to tropical seas.
Orcas are
apex predators with a diverse diet. Individual populations often specialize in particular types of prey, including
fish,
sharks,
rays, and
marine mammals such as
seals,
dolphins, and whales. They are highly
social, with some populations forming stable
matrilineal family groups (pods). Their sophisticated hunting techniques and vocal behaviors, often unique to specific groups and passed down from generation to generation, are considered to be manifestations of
animal culture. (
Full article...)
{{/box-footer|
The Battle of Svolder, by Otto Sinding
The naval
Battle of Svolder (
Svold,
Swold) was fought in September 999 or 1000 somewhere in the western
Baltic between King
Olaf Tryggvason of Norway and an alliance of his enemies. The backdrop of the battle is the unification of Norway into a single state, long-standing Danish efforts to gain control of the country, and the
spread of Christianity in Scandinavia. King Olaf was sailing home after an expedition to Wendland (
Pomerania), when he was ambushed by an alliance of
Svein Forkbeard, King of Denmark,
Olaf Eiríksson, King of Sweden, and
Eirik Hákonarson,
Jarl of Lade. Olaf had only 11 warships in the battle against a fleet of at least 70. His ships were cleared one by one, last of all the
Long Serpent, which Jarl Eirik captured as Olaf threw himself into the sea. After the battle, Norway was ruled by the Jarls of Lade as a fief of Denmark and Sweden. The most detailed sources on the battle, the
kings' sagas, were written approximately two centuries after it took place. Historically unreliable, they offer an extended literary account describing the battle and the events leading up to it in vivid detail. The sagas ascribe the causes of the battle to Olaf Tryggvason's ill-fated marriage proposal to
Sigrid the Haughty and his problematic marriage to Thyri, sister of Svein Forkbeard. As the battle starts Olaf is shown dismissing the Danish and Swedish fleets with ethnic insults and bravado while admitting that Eirik Hákonarson and his men are dangerous because "they are Norwegians like us". The best known episode in the battle is the breaking of
Einarr Þambarskelfir's bow, which heralds Olaf's defeat. In later centuries, the saga descriptions of the battle, especially that in
Snorri Sturluson's
Heimskringla, have inspired a number of ballads and other works of literature. (
Full article...)
Credit: Unknown author, source
The following are images from various Norway-related articles on Wikipedia.
Image 2Map of Sweden–Norway (from
History of Norway)
Image 3Røros, a major copper mining town, in 1869 (from
History of Norway)
Image 4Statfjord oil platform (from
History of Norway)
Image 5The Constituent Assembly which approved the
Constitution of Norway (from
History of Norway)
Image 8Traditional Norwegian St. Hansbål (midsummer) bonfire in
Laksevåg,
Bergen Municipality (from
Culture of Norway)
Image 12Norwegian Prime Minister
Kjell Magne Bondevik met with U.S. President
George W. Bush at the
Oval Office in
White House, on 27 May 2003. (from
History of Norway)
Image 13Map of Denmark–Norway (from
History of Norway)
Image 15Edvard Munch's The Scream (1893) (from
Culture of Norway)
Image 16Homann's map of the
Scandinavian Peninsula and
Fennoscandia with their surrounding territories: northern
Germany, northern
Poland, the
Baltic region,
Livonia,
Belarus, and parts of
Northwest Russia.
Johann Baptist Homann (1664–1724) was a German geographer and cartographer; map dated around 1730. (from
History of Norway)
Image 18Industry along
Akerselva in Oslo in 1912 (from
History of Norway)
Image 19The
Kingdom of Norway about 1265, at its greatest extent (from
History of Norway)
Image 20The Kalmar Union,
c. 1400 (from
History of Norway)
Image 21Historical quarter of
Bryggen in
Bergen (from
Culture of Norway)
Image 22Scenes from the
Norwegian Campaign in 1940 (from
History of Norway)
Image 23Reconstruction of a
longhouse at
Lofoten (from
History of Norway)
Image 24Battle of Alvøen between the frigate
HMS Tartar and Norwegian gunboats near
Bergen in 1808 (from
History of Norway)
Image 25Smørbrød, Norwegian open sandwiches (from
Culture of Norway)
Image 26Bryggen in
Bergen, once the centre of trade in Norway under the
Hanseatic League trade network, now preserved as a
World Heritage Site (from
History of Norway)
Image 28Harvesting
oats at Fossum in
Jølster during the 1880s (from
History of Norway)
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