In English & På norsk

The fishing villages of Hammerfest and Vardø were granted market town rights sometime in the past, more precisely, as far back as 1789. In the county of Finnmark, only these two places were granted the rights, duties and privileges that came with operating in various industries, above all, in trade.

The market town rights came as a regulation imposed by the king in Copenhagen. In this way, it became possible to control the import and export of goods and services.

At the time the picture was taken, Honningsvåg was the largest fishing village in West Finnmark. There were two fishmeal and herring oil factories there, they were closed down, and the factories were removed. There were many fish farms there. All were closed down, and have been removed. After a couple of years after all the fishing industry facilities had disappeared, there had been eight, a new one, a small one, came where the largest, the Finotro complex, had been.

The granted market town rights gradually fell out of use during the 19th century, when the privileges had fallen away. It gradually became common to refer to places that had had town rights as towns. Other areas that were not directly rural also gradually became common to call towns, i.e. places with slightly more concentrated settlements.

The meaning of having the granted market town rights  has, as a result of general social development, for example the strong growth outside the administrative centers, gained less and less practical and formal significance, and has now completely fallen away.

Quite recently, the municipal laws have been changed, and all laws about towns and country have been removed. «In the very latest version of the Municipal Law, the question of town status is not mentioned at all,» reads the Store norske lexikon. — We can perhaps say, fortunately.

You can call Honningsvåg today whatever you want, it is at least a place, the municipal center in the North Cape. There is no longer any Norwegian law on city rights.

Updated Monday 24 August 2026 – 09:34 with sources

1. Hansen, Tore (2025) «Kjøpstad», in Store norske lexikon, 25 May 2021
2. The fishing industry in post-war Honningsvåg

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