Country Norway District Solør Area rank 100 in Norway Area 1,041 km² Local time Sunday 1:39 AM Official language form Bokmål | County Hedmark Administrative centre Flisa Demonym(s) Åsnessokning Population 7,581 (2004) Administrative center Flisa | |
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Weather 4°C, Wind S at 6 km/h, 98% Humidity | ||
Åsnes is a municipality in Hedmark county, Norway. It is part of the traditional region of Solør. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Flisa, which is also the largest town in the municipality with around 2,100 people.
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Map of %C3%85snes, Norway
Name
The municipality (originally the parish) is named after the old Åsnes farm (Old Norse: Ásnes), since the first church was built here. The first element is áss which means "mountain ridge" and the last element is nes which means "headland". (The headland is made by the river Glomma, and the farm is lying beneath a hill.)
Coat-of-arms
The coat-of-arms is from modern times. They were granted on 9 December 2001. The arms show three black hooks for log driving on a gold background. This was chosen to represent the importance of logging and forestry to the municipality throughout history.
History
Åsnes was originally part of the larger district Hof. It was first split into two: Hof and Åsnes og Våler in 1849. The split left Hof with 2,913 innhabitants and Åsnes og Våler with 7,087. Åsnes og Våler was again divided in 1854 into the two current municipalities of Våler and Åsnes. At that time, Åsnes had 3,644 innhabitants while Våler had 3,410. In 1963, Hof was incorporated back into Åsnes. The population of Åsnes grew fast between 1854 and 1963 and today its population is roughly equal to that of Hof and Våler combined. There has been talk of further municipality merging but the neighboring municipalities Grue and Våler have rejected Åsnes in favor of bigger municipalities.
Geography
The municipality is located in the southern part of Hedmark county. It is bordered on the north by the municipality of Våler, in the south by Grue, and in the west by Nord-Odal and Stange, and to the east it borders Torsby Municipality in Sweden.
Finnskogen or the forest of the Finns is a belt about 32 kilometres (20 mi) wide which runs continuously northwards along the border between Norway and Sweden through six Norwegian municipalities, including Åsnes.
Sister cities
The following cities are twinned with Åsnes: