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Permalink Reply by RaiB's GhosT on February 25, 2016 at 8:33pm

Very cool. Thanks for sharing Sister..... :-)

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Permalink Reply by Trolldear on February 29, 2016 at 1:55am

Erm as a Norwegian myself I find it inaccurate to deem my cultural heritage as "fairytale" architecture. Back in the days when we did not have that many fanciful machines we had to build alongside nature. Now the cottages and bulidings with moss on the roof is old mountain farm buildings. Also called a Seter, were mostly milk maids would spend their entire summer to tend to the herd, make some cheese out of the milk and prepare milk to be delivered down to the farm.And that could take a few days between deliveries, each Seter had their own speciality. *Which was mainly used during the summer season for a larger farms stock of cattle, sheep, goats etc. You know why norwegian farmers used what they had around themselves to build? Oh they had to contractor or even a fanciful architect with the newest designs.They needed something functional and that served a purpose, stone enclosures or fences were made when they cleared the fields fit for farming, branches and wood in general came from the forest. As for the stave churches why they are so decorated? Why is there dragons in stave churches? The 1200's was a humble golden age for Norway as a kingdom, mainly christianity had taken its hold even for the common farmers but they still had a newly attached fear toward the "demons" in nature of the hidden people, that had not many centuries prior held a large significance for the wealth of your community. Just like the sea faring vikings, we used some ideas from our ships. And certain decorations such as ravens, wolves and dragons were used in the stave churches. As a scare tactic for uninvited guests such as demons or the hidden folk. So in a sense one can consider the dragon carvings as a kind of gargoyle.

And if you ever decide to visit one of these mountain farms...make sure you have a tour guide. Make sure you have enough money, good clothes meant to walk along old and overgrown paths. We are an expensive country and we do have our own share of not so kind weather. And it can change to 4 seasons within a day in some areas...

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