Øvre Rendal

Øvre Rendal Municipality Øvre Rendal herred
Former municipality
Øvre Rendalen herred (historic name)
View of Øvre Rendal (1924)
Hedmark within Norway
Øvre Rendal within Hedmark
Coordinates: 61°53′29″N 11°04′44″E
Country	Norway
County	Hedmark
District	Østerdalen
Established	1 Jan 1880
• Preceded by	Rendal Municipality
Disestablished	1 Jan 1965
• Succeeded by	Rendalen Municipality
Administrative centre	Bergset
Area (upon dissolution)
• Total	1,829 km² (706 sq mi)
Population (1965)
• Total	1,629
• Density	0.89/km² (2.3/sq mi)
Demonym	Rendøl^[1]
Official language ^[2]
• Norwegian form	Bokmål^[3]
Time zone	UTC+01:00 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+02:00 (CEST)
ISO 3166 code	NO-0433^[4]
Data from Statistics Norway

On 1 January 1838, the large municipality of Rendal was established. This municipality spanned 4,201 square kilometres (1,622 sq mi) from the Østerdalen valley to the border with Sweden. During the 1870s, discussions began on dividing the large municipality. On 1 January 1880, the municipality of Rendal was split in two to create the municipalities of Øvre Rendal (population: 1,868) and Ytre Rendal (population: 1,661). The new municipality of Øvre Rendal had an area of 2,521 square kilometres (973 sq mi). On 1 January 1911, the new municipality of Engerdal was established to the east of Øvre Rendal. This new municipality was created by taking 692 square kilometres (267 sq mi) of eastern Øvre Rendal, plus area from the neighboring municipalities of Ytre Rendal, Tolga, and Trysil. This portion of Øvre Rendal that became part of Engerdal had 381 residents. During the 1960s, there were many municipal mergers across Norway due to the work of the Schei Committee. On 1 January 1965, the new municipality of Rendalen was created by merging Øvre Rendal (population: 1,629) and Ytre Rendal (population: 1,913).^[6]

Name

The municipality (originally the parish) is named after the Rendalen valley (Old Norse: Reindalr). In 1880, the large municipality of Rendal was divided to create two new municipalities. Both municipalities were named after the old municipality and to distinguish between the two, an additional word was added to the name. The word øvre was added to this name and the word ytre was added to the other municipality. The word øvre means "upper" (while ytre means "outer"). The first element of Rendal is rein which means "reindeer". The last element is dalr which means "valley" or "dale". The river Rena runs through the valley and it is not known if the valley was named after the river or if the river was named after the valley. A nearby mountain Renafjellet also has a similar name.^[7] Historically, the name of the municipality was spelled Øvre Rendalen. On 3 November 1917, a royal resolution changed the spelling of the name of the municipality to Øvre Rendal, removing the definite form ending -en.^[8]

While it existed, this municipality was responsible for primary education (through 10th grade), outpatient health services, senior citizen services, unemployment, social services, zoning, economic development, and municipal roads. During its existence, this municipality was governed by a municipal council of directly elected representatives. The mayor was indirectly elected by a vote of the municipal council.^[9]

Municipal council

The municipal council (Herredsstyre) of Øvre Rendal was made up of 17 representatives that were elected to four year terms. The party breakdown of the final municipal council was as follows: