The municipality of Grindum was established on 1 January 1902 when the old municipality of
Bjelland og Grindum was divided into two separate municipalities: Grindheim (population: 909) and
Bjelland (population: 907). During the 1960s, there were many municipal mergers across Norway due to the work of the
Schei Committee. On 1 January 1964, Grindheim (population: 701) was merged with the Ågedal and Midtbø areas (located just east of the lake
Ytre Øydnavatnet; population: 96) in
Bjelland and the neighboring municipality of
Konsmo (population: 712) to create the new municipality of
Audnedal.
Name The municipality (originally the
parish) is named after the old
Grindem farm () since the first
Grindheim Church was built there. The first element is which means "gate" or "fence". The last element is which means "home" or "abode". Historically, the name of the municipality was spelled
Grimdem. In 1889, the spelling was changed to
Grindum. On 3 November 1917, a
royal resolution changed the spelling of the name of the municipality to
Grindheim. ==Government==