Viking Age Norwegian or Norse Vikings raided and settled in
Shetland,
Orkney, Ireland, Scotland, and northern England. In the United Kingdom, many names for places ending in -
kirk, -
ness, -
thorpe, -
toft and -
by are likely Norse in origin. In 947, a new wave of Norwegian Vikings appeared in England when
Erik Bloodaxe captured
York. In the 8th century and onwards, Norwegian and Danish Vikings also settled in
Normandy, most famously those led by
Rollo; some of their
Norman descendants would later expand to England,
Sicily, and other
Mediterranean islands. Apart from Britain and Ireland, Norwegian Vikings established settlements in largely uninhabited regions. The first known permanent Norwegian settler in Iceland was
Ingólfur Arnarson. In the year 874 he settled in
Reykjavík. After his expulsion from Iceland
Erik the Red discovered Greenland, a name he chose in hope of attracting Icelandic settlers. Viking settlements were established in the sheltered fjords of the southern and western coast. Erik's relative
Leif Eriksson later discovered North America.
Netherlands During the 17th and 18th centuries, many Norwegians emigrated to the Netherlands, particularly
Amsterdam. The Netherlands was the second-most popular destination for Norwegian emigrants after Denmark. Loosely estimated, some 10% of the population may have emigrated, in a period when the entire Norwegian population consisted of some 800,000 people. The Norwegians left with the Dutch trade ships that when in Norway traded for timber, hides, herring, and
stockfish (dried codfish). Young women took employment as maids in Amsterdam, while young men took employment as sailors. Large parts of the Dutch merchant fleet and navy came to consist of Norwegians and Danes. Most
took Dutch names, leaving no trace of Norwegian names in the later Dutch population. The emigration to the Netherlands was so devastating to the homelands that the Danish-Norwegian king issued penalties of death for emigration, but repeatedly had to issue amnesties for those willing to return, announced by posters in the streets of Amsterdam. Increasingly, Dutchmen who search their genealogical roots turn to Norway. Many Norwegians who emigrated to the Netherlands, and often were employed in the Dutch merchant fleet, emigrated further to the many Dutch colonies such as New Amsterdam (New York).
North America , with the percentage of
Canadians and
Americans of Norwegian descent in each province, territory and state in Canada and the U.S. in the United States
United States Many Norwegians emigrated to the US between the 1850s and the 1920s. The descendants of these people are known as Norwegian Americans. Many Norwegian settlers traveled to and through Canada and Canadian ports while immigrating to the United States. In 1850, the year after Great Britain repealed its restrictive
Navigation Acts in Canada, more emigrating Norwegians sailed the shorter route to the Ville de Québec (
Quebec City) in Canada, to make their way to US cities like
Chicago,
Milwaukee, and
Green Bay by
steamship. For example, in the 1850s, 28,640 arrived at Quebec, Canada, en route to the US, and 8,351 at New York directly. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, three million Americans consider Norwegian to be their sole or primary ancestry. It is estimated that as many as a further 1.5 million more are of partial Norwegian ancestry. Norwegian Americans represent 2–3% of the non-Hispanic
Euro-American population in the U.S. They mostly live in both the
Upper Midwest and
Pacific Northwest.
Canada '' (1893) by
Christian Krohg As early as 1814, a party of Norwegians was brought to
Canada to build a winter road from York Factory on Hudson Bay to the infant
Red River settlement at the site of present-day
Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Norway House is one of the oldest trading posts and Native-Canadian missions in the Canadian West. Willard Ferdinand Wentzel served the North West Company of Canada in the Athabasca and Mackenzie regions and accompanied Sir John Franklin on his overland expedition in 1819–20 to the Canadian Arctic. Norwegian immigration to Canada lasted from the mid-1880s until 1930, although Norwegians were already working in Canada as early as 1814. It can be divided into three periods of roughly fifteen years each. In the first, to about 1900, thousands of Norwegians homesteaded on the Canadian prairies. In the second, from 1900 to 1914, there was a further heavy influx of Norwegians immigrating to Canada from the United States because of poor economic conditions in the US, and 18,790 from Norway. In the third, from 1919 to 1930, 21,874 people came directly from Norway, with the peak year in 1927, when 5,103 Norwegians arrived, spurred by severe depression at home. They came with limited means, many leaving dole queues. in
Canada is of Norwegian ancestry. From 1825 to 1900 some 500,000 Norwegians landed at Ville du Quebec in Canada (and other Canadian ports) for travelling through Canada was the shortest corridor to the United States' central states. In spite of efforts by the Government of Canada to retain these immigrants for Canada, very few remained because of Canada's somewhat restrictive land policies at that time and negative stories being told about Canada from U.S. land agents deterring Norwegians from going to Canada. Not until the 1880s did Norwegians accept Canada as a land of opportunity. This was also true of the many Americans of Norwegian heritage who immigrated to Canada from the US with "Canada Fever" seeking homesteads and new economic opportunities. By 1921 one-third of all Norwegians in Canada had been born in the US. These new Canadians became British subjects in Canada, and part of the British Empire. Canadian citizenship, as a status distinct from that of a British subject, was created on 1 January 1947, with Canada being the first Commonwealth country to create their own citizenship. Prior to that date, Canadians were British subjects and Canada's nationality law closely mirrored that of the United Kingdom. On 1 January 1947, Canadian citizenship was conferred on most British subjects connected with Canada. Unlike the US, Canada was part of the British Empire and most Norwegians would have become Canadians and British subjects at the same time. According to the
2011 Census, 452,705 Canadians reported Norwegian ancestry (Norwegian-Canadians).
Australia As of 2011, there were 3,710 Norwegian-born Australians, and 23,037 Norwegians of Australian descent.
Russia In the 19th century a community known as the
Kola Norwegians settled in the environs of the Russian city of
Murmansk. They have suffered persecution under
Joseph Stalin and after 1992 were offered a chance to get back to Norway. There are very few of them left there today.
Other ==Genetics==