Bindal

Bindal is a municipality in the Helgeland region in the extreme southwest part of Nordland county, Norway. The administrative centre is the village of Terråk. Other villages include Bindalseidet, Holm, Vassås, Horsfjord and Åbygda.

General information

In 1838, the parish of Bindal was split into two municipalities (see formannskapsdistrikt) because the parish included land in both the counties of Nord-Trøndelag and Nordland. The new law required that municipalities be located only in one county, so the parish was divided into two municipalities: Nordbindalen and Sørbindalen. In 1852, the county border was moved south to its current position and the municipalities of Nordbindalen and Sørbindalen were merged back together to form the municipality of Bindal. On 1 January 1964, the Tosen-Lande area (population: 296) was transferred to Brønnøy.

Name

The Old Norse form of the name was Birnudalr. The first element is the genitive case of the river name Birna (now Åbjøra) and the last element is dalr which means "valley" or "dale". The river name is derived from the word birna which means "(female) bear".