Monday, 10 November 2008

Panorama shots Drammen city

Panorama shots Drammen city
History

Rock carvings at Åskollen and Skogerveien are 6000 to 7000 years old, and are the first signs of human activity in the area. The largest rock carving at Åskollen depicts a moose.

Drammen originally consisted of three small seaports: Bragernes on the northern side of the Drammenselva river and Strømsø and Tangen on the southern side. For trade purposes, small seaports were placed under market towns. Despite their geographical proximity, Bragernes was placed under Christiania and Strømsø under Tønsberg. For this reason, cooperation between the adjacent seaport towns was almost impossible. In 1662 a merger was proposed to unite Strømsø and Bragernes to form a market town with the name Frederiksstrøm. The proposal was rejected by Frederick III of Denmark. Bragernes received limited market town rights in 1715, and merged with Strømsø to gain status as a single city on 19 June 1811.

Its unique geographical location made the city a centre for seafaring, ship building, log driving, timber trade and - from the 19th century - paper and pulp industries. During the 1960s most of the pulp and paper factories along the Drammenselva were closed down.

Large parts of the city were ruined in the great fire of 12-13 July 1866, which led to the reconstruction of the city centre, including the characteristic town square and Bragernes church.

In 1909, Drammen got the first trolleybus system in Scandinavia, the Drammen trolleybus. The lines ran until 1967. For many years the centre of Drammen suffered from heavy traffic, but in 1999 the opening of the Bragernes tunnel diverted much of the traffic away from the centre of the city. In recent years, the city centre has seen significant regeneration, with the introduction of new housing, shopping facilities, restaurants, cafes and bars, as well as a public pathway along the Drammenselva river.

The Norse form of the city's name was Drafn, and this was originally the name of the inner part of Drammensfjord. The fjord is, however, probably named after the river Dramselva (Norse Dröfn), and this again is derived from the old word dröfn, which meant 'wave'.

The coat-of-arms is from 1960 - but it is based upon the old seal for Bragernes from 1723. The motto for Bragernes (in Latin) was IN FIDE ET JUSTITIA FORTITUDO ('in faith and justice is strength'), and the items in the seal are referring to this: key = faith, sword = justice, column on rocks = strength.


31 comments:

  1. Fantastic photos, and a very interesting history! Thanks for sharing!

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  2. Interesting. The sky is almost white and still has clouds.

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  3. What a beautiful world you live in. Great photos.

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  4. You live in such beautiful city and you capture it nicely too in your photos!

    Posted mine, HERE. Have a great day! And nice to view your world today!

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  5. Hi John,
    What wonderful info on your part of the world.
    The vistas you photographed are wonderful. I love the second one and how you captured the sun and its rays.

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  6. The city looks so beautiful in the evening. Trolleybus-system sounds really cool but it´s not a really modern way. There is a system like that in Tallinn, Estonia even today. In Helsinki, Finland we have trams that are quite modern.

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  7. Great piccies, did you use a fisheye in the bottom one or is that curve real!

    Interestin post

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  8. Excellent overviews. You can really take it all in.

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  9. Du frister meg sååå utrolig med dine bilder fra Drammen. No er det rett før jeg flytter nedover. Hi hi hi. Nydelige bilder, John:)

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  10. Igjen...herlig reklame for byen vår!
    Flotte bilder!
    Kan nesten se huset vårt her også;)
    Ha en fin tirsdag!

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  11. Tank you for the history of your home town and the great panorama shots.
    What I would dearly love to see is the cave paintin of the moose to compare to the cave paintings of Altamira and Lascaux. Any possibility?

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  12. Awesome shots, John! Those could be paintings, especially the second one. Top notch!

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  13. this panoramic are gorgeous...

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  14. Flotte bilder du tar. Likte det siste veldig godt. Takk for invitasjon til Norsk Nettfoto. Jeg må tenke meg litt om!Jeg er aktiv på vg-bloggen også med to blogger. Naturglede og Kattens skrivehjørne, pluss som "Norge i bilder" fotograf på VGB, så jeg er redd det kan bli litt mye og følge opp.Ønsker dere lykke til, og jeg er stadig innom og ser og ser.Kanskje jeg blir med etterhvert likevel :)))))

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  15. Informative post with a couple of beautiful pictures John...Thomas

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  16. Så lærte jeg noe idag og - takk skal du ha for det!

    Panorama begge to, eller bare det nederste?

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  17. John,
    What a beautiful and fantastic panoramic view. Interesting history as well

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  18. Hi hi hi, ja no kan du lure. Jeg har ikke noe rekord fra selve banen, men jeg har en rekord fra selve Arctic Circle. Den er fra min ville ungdomstid, så jeg er ikke så stolt over den. Men tiden kan en gang få over en kaffekopp;)
    Kansje vi skal ta oss et race på banen en gang du er her oppe?

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  19. Hvordan får jeg til det da John?
    Jeg har jo ikke vidvinkelobjektiv...

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  20. Panorama kan du John. Flott. Og en informativ tekst. Du har virkelig jobba. :-)

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  21. Excellent photos, and very interesting commentary. Well done post.

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  22. Thnak you for excellent photos and telling me about where you live. Looks a very nice place indeed.

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  23. Very beautiful photos and scenery. Your part of the world is so amazing. Nice information too.

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  24. amazing photos and facinating history... quite a beautiful place

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  25. These are very nice panorama shots. Well done!

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  26. Interesting history lesson and wonderful photos! Bye and greetings from Croatia.

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  27. Wow, I took wrong user name "upstairs" - fantastic photos and fantastic story. Greetings from Croatia.

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  28. Fatter ikke at du får det til,men dette var kjempeflotte bilder.Det ser så fint ut i Drammen,så vi må vel stoppe og utforske byen litt neste gang vi er nedover,i stedet for å kjøre rett gjennom...

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  29. John

    I was curious about the theme of the work cave.
    You can tell me that size figure of the moose?
    Confirm that this is by chance, which I found?

    Thank you very much

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Thanks for dropping by and i hope you enjoy the pictures.