Bergen: Hub of the Hansa

Scandinavian Review, Summer 2001 by Zaunders, Bo

The Hansa

Ever since the Vikings ventured down the fjords in their longships a thousand years ago, this city on Norway's west coast has been an important trading center. For a while in the 13th century Bergen was also the country's capital, and by the year 1600 it had become the largest city in Scandinavia, with a population of around 15,000. Much of its history is linked with what is known as the Hanseatic League.

The League was, in effect, Europe's first common market and was formed in the 12th century by a group of German merchants with interests throughout most of northern Europe. By the mid-14th century it had evolved into a confederation of German towns with trading posts throughout the Baltic and North Sea regions. The most mportant of these were in London, Bruges, Novgorod, and Bergen. Russian fur and candle wax were shipped from Novgorod, wool and linen from London, pottery from Bruges, and dried fish from Bergen.

When the German merchants came to Bergen in 1360 they settled on the east side of the harbor in an area called Bryggen (the Wharf). For centuries this was the thriving Hanseatic hub, to which huge quantities of fish were brought from the north, traded, and stockpiled into broad-beamed ships to be sent around the world. The merchants of the Hansa had their houses along one side of the harbor: an elaborate network of tall dark buildings, with pointed gables, narrow alleys and cobbled courtyards leading to workshops behind them. A row of steeply gabled warehouses with wood-floored courtyards recalls the medieval character of Bryggen, which is now a major tourist attraction and, since 1979, a UNESCO World Heritage site. The collection of old wood buildings that constitutes Bryggen is preserved as a living museum of medieval settlement and Norwegian architecture.

Disastrous fires swept Bryggen on several occasions but reconstruction always followed the original pattern, preserving the timbered style of the German merchants. These old warehouses have been converted into shops, artists' studios and restaurants. One of them houses the Hanseatic Museum, and offers glimpses of a lifestyle that seems unusually harsh, even by medieval standards.

In the museum one learns, for instance, that these enterprising Germans lived in a compound of unheated tenements patrolled by dogs, and that the apprentices were given a particularly raw deal. They slept two by two, sitting facing each other on seaweed mattresses in cramped bunks; their workday, starting at four in the morning, lasted fifteen hours and often consisted of emptying and refilling barrels of smelly cod liver oil. Arriving in Bergen, these 14 or 15-year old recruits had to endure initiation rites that included getting repeatedly dunked naked into the frigid harbor, flogged with birch switches, and hung in the smoke of a fire stoked with various pungent debris. The colony was strictly a male community. Only unmarried men were granted residency, and celibacy was part of the regulations. This gave rise to a lucrative business in one of the city's main streets, Ovregate, which for centuries was known as the red-light district.

A few years ago Bergen was chosen as one of Europe's tidiest cities and, as one wanders through the streets, it is easy to see why. From the streamlined commercial center to the surrounding hills with small

wooden houses and cobblestone walkways, there is an air of immaculate cleanliness that reflects clearly how the Bergensers feel about their hometown. It may in part also reflect the rainstorms that frequently blow in from the Atlantic and sweep the city clean. These downpours are usually of short duration, however, and are followed by magic bursts of sunshine. Still, taking along an umbrella is a prudent policy in a city with an average precipitation of 95 inches.

Old Bergen

The people of Bergen pride themselves on their modem, international outlook, but are also fascinated with things past. An example is Old Bergen, an open-air museum with more than 35 wooden houses carefully refurbished to show what life in the city used to be like. One 18th century country house, for example, looks exactly as it did at a social gathering held on June 20, 1808. Other interiors include a photographer's studio, a bakery, and a barber shop.

Two dentists offices, one from the 1880s and the other from the 1920s, offer striking differences. The older is set in a sumptuous Victorian-style living room with fabrics and furnishings in rich soft browns. Even the dentist's chair facing the window - to capture the much-needed light - is an elaborate affair with velvety padding. The dentist would receive his patients deferentially dressed in a dark suit, as if straight out of an Ibsen play. Back then, dental care was strictly for the well-to-do. The 1920s office, by contrast, was for the general public since, by then, national health care had been established. Technologically, it is much advanced, but looks frightening in its stark, totally utilitarian design.

From the ceiling of the barber shop hangs a now-empty bird cage. Like the canaries used in English mines to signal lack of oxygen, a canary was once used in this establishment for the same purpose. As the small room filled with pipe-smoking burghers gathering for their morning shave, the bird would sometimes drop off its perch, indicating that it was time to open the window. Along with moustache curlers and other such items is a collection of lathering cups on which the names of regular customers have been engraved. At first the names are not surprising - Sigurd Monsen, Ragnar Siwertsen, John Blytt - then, Helen Nilsen! It seems that Bergen had its own bearded lady.