Hvalba (Settlement)

© Styrelsen for Dataforsyning og Infrastruktur

The old agricultural village of Hvalba or Hvalbøur, mentioned in Hundabrævið, is the Faroe Islands’ largest markatal settlement of 98 merkur and 13 gyllin. 41 mercury, 5 gyllin and 2 skinn are copyhold land divided between 28 copyhold tenants, and 57 merkur, 7 gyllin and 18 skinn are freehold land. The village has 599 inhabitants. Today, agriculture consists predominantly of hobby sheep farming, and neither Hvalba nor the other villages on Suðuroy have dairy cows. The sheep herd consists of 2,941 animals.

With its 202 inhabitants, Hvalba was the second largest village in 1801, surpassed only by Tórshavn. Together with the outlying village Sandvík, it became its own municipality in 1878.

The village is located on a narrow strip of land (eiði), from which there is access to the sea from both the east and west sides. It is surrounded by four mountains: Grímsfjall at 327 m to the west, Skálafjall at 374 m to the north, Prestfjall at 471 m to the southwest and the 514 m high Hvalbiarfjall to the southeast.

There was no road connection to Hvalba or Sandvík before 1963, when the Faroe Islands’ first tunnel was built between Tvøroyri and Hvalba and another between Hvalba and Sandvík in 1970. A new and contemporary tunnel between Hvalba and Tvøroyri was inaugurated in 2021.

Fishing has long been the main industry, and Hvalba got its first trawler in 1947. In the 1980s, another two trawlers arrived, Niels Pauli (1983) and Steintór (1985). Around the same period, a fish filleting factory was also established, which created many jobs, but the crisis of the 1990s hit hard and unemployment rose significantly. However, the situation gradually stabilised and the factory started up again.

During World War I, a small port facility was built in the district of Nes, undir Rananum. In the 1920s, two more port facilities, referred to as the small quay and the large quay respectively, were established at Bíargarður and Hamranes. The port was expanded and modernised in the 1980s in connection with the establishment of a fish factory.

The vicar of Suðuroy parish has lived in Hvalba for centuries. The current vicarage in Leirum was built in 1880 by the Icelandic master builder Guðbrandur Sigurðsson. The church was built in 1935 by master builder Jens Mortensen from Tvøroyri.

The village got its first school in 1882 and a new one in 1973, which was expanded in the 1980s. The school currently has some 100 pupils.

Hvalba, 2021. The village is believed to have been inhabited since the Viking Age and is for many Faroese synonymous with the coal industry. It reached its peak during and just after World War II, when ships from all over the country came to the village to buy coal. At that time, unemployment in Hvalba was almost non-existent but from the 1960s onwards, the coal industry began to lose its importance and the inhabitants therefore had to look for other jobs.
BASED ON UMHVØRVISSTOVAN

Further reading

Read more about The islands, towns and settlements

  • Jens Hákun Leo

    (b. 1987) MA in International Politics with a minor in history from the University of the Faroe Islands. Primary school teacher in Oyrarbakki, Faroe Islands.