Sacralisation of Land and Seascapes on the West Coast of Norway – A Reality or Misconceptions on Renaissance Maps?

The paper discusses the geographical sacralisation that seems to be present in sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century maps of the land and seascapes around Bergen on the Norwegian west coast. The hagiotoponyms may represent foreign mapmakers’ misconceptions when faced with unfamiliar and incomprehensible local place-names. That is, the toponyms’ original meaning may have been secular and the origin Norse. Alternatively, the maps may correctly reproduce and preserve medieval sacral place names, of which meaning subsequently has been lost. The toponyms that are discussed are Sotra, Krossfjord and Lyse, which may be linked, respectively, to the prominent medieval religious institutions of the region, the Benedictine Munkeliv Abbey, the Cross Church of Fana and the Cistercian Lyse Abbey.