The
parish of Finsland was established as a municipality on 1 January 1838 (see
formannskapsdistrikt law). During the 1960s, there were many municipal mergers across Norway due to the work of the
Schei Committee. On 1 January 1964, Finsland municipality was dissolved and its lands split between two municipalities. The small area of Finsland near Kleveland bru (population: 34) was transferred to the neighboring
Marnardal municipality and the rest of Finsland (population: 797) was merged with the municipality of
Greipstad (population: 2,061) and the Eikeland area of
Øvrebø (population: 39) to form the new municipality of
Songdalen. Prior to the merger, the population of Finsland was 831.
Name The municipality (originally the
parish) is named after the old
Finsland farm () since the first
Finsland Church was built there. The first element comes from the old name for the local river Finnså. The river name is likely a compound of the words and which means "
river". The word could be referring specifically to the plant
Nardus stricta or to "
moorland" or "
wilderness" in general. The farm is situated by the river Finnsåna, which flows into the river
Mandalselva. There are also farms nearby called Finsdal and Finsådal, so the first element is a common local name. The last element is which means "land" or "district". ==Government==