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the Kuvlunger aud Hskjegger were defeated by Sverre at the naval battle
of Florvaag (near the Askø). Ten years later, during the (so-called ‘Bergen
summer’, the rival parties of the Birkebeiner and the Bagler fought against
each other in the town and neighbourhood. In 1223 a national diet was
held at Bergen, at which Haakon Haakonsan’s title to the crown was
recognised (a scene dramatised in Ibsen’s Kongsemnerne, Act. i.). During
his reign Bergen was the largest and busiest town in Norway, and boasted
of no fewer than thirty churches and monasteries, and of many handsome
buildings, of which but few traces now remain. For its subsequent
commercial prosperity the town was indebted to the Hanseatic League, which
established a factory here about the middle of the 15th century. From
the Comptoir of the factory the German merchants were known as
Kon-torske, and the nickname of Garper (probably from garpa, ‘to talk loudly),
was also applied to them. These settlers, having obtained various
privileges from the Danish government, gradually succeded in monopolising the
whole trade of northern and western Norway, and in excluding the
English, Scottish, and Dutch traders, and even the Norwegians themselves,
from all participation in their traffic. These foreign monopolists,
however, after having wielded their authority with great oppressiveness for
upwards of a century, were succesfully opposed by Christopher
Valken-dorf in 1559, after which their power gradually declined. Their
‘Comptoir’ continued to exist for two centuries more, but at length in 1763 the
last ‘»5lave’ (p. 75) was sold to a native of Norway.
Down to the beginning of the 17th cent. Bergen was a much more
important commercial place than Copenhagen, and even at the beginning
of the 19th cent, it wras more populous than Christiania. (At the present
day Christiania carries on 32 per cent of the whole trade of Norway,
while Bergen’s proportion is 16 per cent only.)
Among the natives of Bergen who have attained celebrity may be
mentioned Ludwig Holberg, the traveller, social reformer, and poet (d. 1754),
Johan Welhaven, the poet (d. 1873), J. C. Dahl, the painter (d. 1857), and
Ole Bull (d. I860), the musician.
Fish has always been the staple commodity of Bergen, which
is the greatest fish-mart in Norway. The Hanseatic merchants
compelled all the northern fishermen and traders to send their fish
to Bergen, and down to the present day the trade still flows mainly
through its old channels. In May and June occurs the first
Nord-far-Stcrvne (‘arrival ot’ northern seafarers’), when the fishermen of
the N. coasts arrive here with their deeply laden Jagter, the lines
of which recall the shape of the ancient dragon-ships of the
Vikings. Their cargoes consist chiefly of train-oil (manufactured
from the liver of the cod or the torsk, and either ‘blank’, i. e.
colourless, ‘brun-blank’. or ‘brun’) and roe (liogn); and in July and
August they bring supplies of ‘Klipfisk’ and ‘Rundfisk’ (comp,
p. 245). Bergen also possesses a considerable mercantile fleet,
consisting of about 110 steamers of 40,000 tons burden and 260
sailing-vessels of 52.000 tons. The exports, chiefly consisting of
fish, are valued at about 20,000,000 kr. annually, the imports at
30,000,000 kr. The Bergen ship-building yards are the largest in
Norway (as that of Georgernes Verft on the Puddefjord; Laksevaag
Dampskibsbyggeri, and Bergens Mechaniike Varksted at
Solheims-viken).
Public Buildings. The most interesting are the Kongshall
and *Valkendorfs Taarn near Bergenhus. (Permission to be
obtained from the commandant; fee to the soldier who acts as
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