Kodal is a village in

Sandefjord Municipality Sandefjord () is a List of municipalities of Norway, municipality in Vestfold county, Norway. It is located in the Traditional districts of Norway, traditional district of Vestfold. The administrative centre of the municipality is the Sandefjord ...

Vestfold Vestfold () is a county and a current electoral district in Norway. Located on the western shore of the Oslofjord, it borders Buskerud and Telemark counties. The county administration is located in Tønsberg, Norway's oldest city, and the larg ...

county,

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

. The village is located about to the north of the city of Sandefjord and about to the south of the village of Andebu. The village has a population (2022) of 1,059 and a

population density Population density (in agriculture: Standing stock (disambiguation), standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geog ...

of .

Kodal has one gas station, an elementary school, a kindergarten, grocery store, and sports center. There are several

burial mounds A tumulus (: tumuli) is a mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves. Tumuli are also known as barrows, burial mounds, mounds, howes, or in Siberia and Central Asia as ''kurgans'', and may be found throughout much of the world. ...

dating back to the

Viking Age The Viking Age (about ) was the period during the Middle Ages when Norsemen known as Vikings undertook large-scale raiding, colonising, conquest, and trading throughout Europe and reached North America. The Viking Age applies not only to their ...

that have been found in the area.

Kodal Church Kodal Church () is a parish church of the Church of Norway in Sandefjord Municipality in Vestfold county, Norway. It is located in the village of Kodal. It is the church for the Kodal parish which is part of the Sandefjord prosti (deanery) in t ...

is located at Prestbøen, about north of the village centre. Agriculture is an important industry in Kodal, but large amounts of

iron Iron is a chemical element; it has symbol Fe () and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, forming much of Earth's o ...

and

phosphorus Phosphorus is a chemical element; it has Chemical symbol, symbol P and atomic number 15. All elemental forms of phosphorus are highly Reactivity (chemistry), reactive and are therefore never found in nature. They can nevertheless be prepared ar ...

are also found. The amount of

granite Granite ( ) is a coarse-grained (phanerite, phaneritic) intrusive rock, intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly coo ...

is estimated to be .

Etymology

The village is named after the site of the historic

. The

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...

form of the name or . The first element is the old name for the local river Ivjua which was formerly known as or . The meaning of the old river name is uncertain. It may have been derived from the word which means "shallow waters". Another option is that it may have been derived from the word which means "resin", referring to the vast

Norway spruce ''Picea abies'', the Norway spruce or European spruce, is a species of spruce native to Northern, Central and Eastern Europe. It has branchlets that typically hang downwards, and the largest cones of any spruce, 9–17 cm long. It is very clo ...

forests in the area. The last element is which means "

valley A valley is an elongated low area often running between hills or mountains and typically containing a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams over ...

" or "dale". The spelling of the name has changed over time. Some written forms of the name were Kvodal (from 1376), Kuadal (1390), Quadal (1414), and Quodal (1558). Its current spelling ''Kodal'' is kept from the 17th century.

Recreation

An ancient

hill fort A hillfort is a type of fortification, fortified refuge or defended settlement located to exploit a rise in elevation for defensive advantage. They are typical of the late Bronze Age Europe, European Bronze Age and Iron Age Europe, Iron Age. So ...

can be seen about from the village centre of Kodal, connected by a hiking trail from the village centre. A closer parking lot can be found at Kodalveien 414. The trail is marked by blue paint on trees and rocks, and a variety of interpretive signs describing the fauna and flora can be found on the trail to ''Bygdeborgen''. The local lake Gallisvannet sits at the north end of the village at an elevation of above sea level. The lake

Goksjø Goksjø is a lake on the border of Larvik Municipality and Sandefjord Municipality in Vestfold county, Norway. The lake is located about to the northwest of the Sandefjord (town), town of Sandefjord and about to the south of the village of Kod ...

is located about to the south of the village.

References

{{use dmy dates, date=December 2023 Andebu Sandefjord Villages in Vestfold