Vardøhus Fortress

Vardøhus Fortress (Norwegian: Vardøhus festning), called "Wardhouse" in English historical navigations, is located in Vardø Municipality in Finnmark county, Norway. It is located in the town of Vardø on the island of Vardøya on the Barents Sea near the mouth of the Varangerfjord in northeastern Norway near the Russian border.

In 1251, an embassy from the Republic of Novgorod to King Haakon IV Haakonson of Norway complained of clashes between the Norwegians and the Karelians in northern Finnmark. A Norwegian embassy was dispatched to Novgorod where a treaty (the original of which is now lost) was signed to conclude a peace between the two countries, including the Novgorod tributary land of Karelia.

The Finnmark coast was originally important as a source of furs from the trade with the Karelians, but this trade dropped off as the Hanseatic League increased the fur trade through their Novgorod centre. Finnmark remained important as a fishery; the fish was shipped as stockfish to Bergen and traded there with the Hansa merchants.

The first fortification was erected by Haakon V Magnusson in 1306 and was called Varghøya. It is not known how long this fort was manned, but in 1307 the Archbishop of Trondhjem went to Vardøhus to consecrate the new Vardø Church. The earliest record still extant which defines the border between Norway and Russia is from 1326. In 1340, records show the Archbishop made further efforts to improve conditions there.

The second fortification to be built was in Østervågen (the "East Bay") which was erected between 1450 and 1500. This fortification was rectangular with two corner bastions. It appears on various maps from the 14th and 15th century.

The Captain of Vardøhus owned a share of the fishery. While visiting the fort in 1511, Erik Valkendorf wrote: "the country would not be habitable for Christians were it not that the catch of fish is so plentiful as to attract people to settle down there. And this dried fish, which they call 'stockfish', is so valuable and excellent that it is exported to nearly every Christian country."

In 1583, the Norwegian rights to the Arctic Sea were formally recognized by England; the agreement stipulated that each vessel which passed into the White Sea was to stop at Vardøhus to pay duty.

Text adapted from “Vardøhus Fortress” on Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.

Vardøhus Fortress ranks #1,503 of 7,738 worldwide in the atlas's castle fame ranking, and #6 of the 20 mapped in Norway. Founded 1300, it is older than 63% of the atlas's dated landmarks — one of 825 atlas entries founded in the 13th century. Its Wikipedia articles were opened 5,023 times in the last 60 days, more than 84% of the atlas. See how Norway compares in the castle statistics.

View on the interactive castle map →

Read the full history on Wikipedia ↗