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“The Wall” from 1561
“The Wall” from 1561 as it came to appear after the fire in 1702. Xylography from around 1860. (xylografi: Haakon Adelsten Lunde).
During the 1300s Strandsiden changed from a rural area with a monastery to a pulsating trading centre with boathouses, storehouses and embankment.

Erik Rosenkrantz inherited an estate at Stranden through his relationship with the Losne clan. After a fire in 1561 he built a “dwelling with a foundation wall” right across Strandgaten, and he collected building material from the adjacent Munkeliv monastery. “De Rosenkrantzers Mur” and “Rosenkrantz Alminding”, both today known as Muren and Muralmenning.

In the beginning of the 1600s Hanseatic control of the foreign trade was in decline. Many of the Office’s trading agents at Bryggen broke away, took citizenship and started their own businesses. New immigrants did the same. This is how a new trading bourgeoisie developed. Today the old Stranden (seafront) and Nordnes are gone, with their boathouses and trading houses – the town quarters of Ludvig Holberg and Edvard Grieg. The only places left are some small enclaves.

  • Town prospectus from the 1740s

Byprospektet fra 1740-årene

On this section of the town prospectus (1740s) we see the Nykirke tower as it was before the fire in 1756. The first Nykirke was erected on the ruins of the archbishop’s estate. The church again burnt down in 1800, and again in 1944. After the last time it was rebuilt in accordance with the plans from 1756. Fredriksberg is marked with the figure 3. The fortification works at the Nordnes point are from the end of 1600.