Update June 29, 2014:
Subsequent to making this post I found that this house is not only the Oldest Wooden House in Europe, it is also the "The Oldest Still Inhabited Wooden House in the World". I have therefore made a fresh post about it by using text/images from this post and have also added more information/images in the new post.
Please therefore view the Latest Post and ignore this post.
Thanks.
While researching for my earlier post about the "Amazing Turf Houses of Iceland", I came across an old turf-roofed house in the small village of Kirkjubøur on the the island of Streymoy in Faroe Islands. As per several sources, it is one of the oldest still inhabited wooden houses of the world and reportedly the oldest inhabited wooden house in all of Europe. (Please see the note at the end of this post)
Subsequent to making this post I found that this house is not only the Oldest Wooden House in Europe, it is also the "The Oldest Still Inhabited Wooden House in the World". I have therefore made a fresh post about it by using text/images from this post and have also added more information/images in the new post.
Please therefore view the Latest Post and ignore this post.
Thanks.
While researching for my earlier post about the "Amazing Turf Houses of Iceland", I came across an old turf-roofed house in the small village of Kirkjubøur on the the island of Streymoy in Faroe Islands. As per several sources, it is one of the oldest still inhabited wooden houses of the world and reportedly the oldest inhabited wooden house in all of Europe. (Please see the note at the end of this post)
The house dates back to 11th century and was originally the
residence of the bishop of the Diocese of the Faroe Islands. As per local legend
the house was initially constructed in Norway, then disassembled, its logs
numbered and then floated to the Kirkjubøur where these were reassembled.
The house and the big farm around it are called
Kirkjubøargarður (King's Farm) and are now owned by Faroese government. Its main portion, called Roykstovan,
houses a museum, however a part of the house is still occupied by a
local family whose past several generations are the traditional tenant since
16th century.
It is interesting to note that although this house and
several other houses on the Island have turf roof yet these are a bit
different from the turf houses of Iceland. The walls of these houses are made of
wood, unlike the houses in Iceland where the walls are also covered with layers
of earth and then turfed.
Image from Wikimedia Commons is by Vincent van Zeijst
Image from Flickr is by Stig Nygaard
360o Panoramic View of inside;
Roykstovan in Kirkjubour in Faroe Islands
View location in Google Earth / Google Maps
Source of info: Wikipedia / Flickr Photo by foroyar22 (Charlie Kellogg)
Note: Several websites especially those of Swiss
origin claim that a wooden house known as Bethlehem House (Bethlehem-Haus)
in the small village of Schwyz Switzerland is the oldest in Europe. As per
swissinfo.ch and other related websites the Bethlehem House was built in
1287, while the Kirkjubøargarður in the Kirkjubøur dates back to 11th
century. The claim that the house in Switzerland is the oldest in Europe,
therefore doesn't appear to be correct.
It may also be worthwhile to note that the World's Oldest Wooden Building is a five-story pagoda in Ikaruga, Nara Prefecture, Japan, which dates back to early seventh century.
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