Roots and routes / Regional reference
Telemark
Telemark fylke
Inland valleys and steep smallholdings between the Hardangervidda plateau and the coast, and one of the districts that sent the highest share of its people west.
Why people left
Telemark was among the earliest and heaviest emigration districts, and Tinn in the upper valley was the first parish in eastern Norway to send people in numbers. The core area was upper Telemark together with neighbouring Numedal, and the flow west began in earnest in the 1840s, a generation before the national peak. Hjartdal and its annexe parish Sauland ran at roughly the same rate as Tinn in those first years. Many Telemark emigrants sailed by way of Le Havre, because the timber trade out of Skien made a passage there cheap, and most of them settled in Wisconsin.
The bygdelag for this district
A bygdelag is a North American association of descendants from one Norwegian district. They hold annual gatherings called stevne, keep genealogists who know the local records, and are almost always the fastest route to someone who has already traced a farm near your own.
Telelaget of America
Founded 16 January 1907 in Fargo, North Dakota
Stevne partner: Seven+Lag / NSI
Publishes Telesoga twice a year and TeleNews, holds its annual stevne in mid-July with six other southern-Norway lags, and is one of the very few lags that organises its own tours of the home district.
The umbrella body for all the lags is the Norwegian-American Bygdelagenes Fellesraad, founded in 1916. If you are not sure which district your family came from, the Fellesraad site is organised by Norwegian region and is the right place to start.
Getting there
- From Oslo, the train to Bø or Notodden puts you inside the district in around two hours, and both are reasonable bases for a car.
- A car is not optional once you leave the valley floors. The farms are up the side valleys, and that is the point of the trip.
- The Telemarkskanal locks between Skien and Dalen are a slow and genuinely pleasant way to arrive from the coast if you have the day to spare.
When to go
Late May to mid-September for the farms and the mountain roads. Note the archive trap: Norwegian kommune libraries, where the bygdebøker live, run reduced hours through July, which is exactly when most American visitors arrive. If a library day matters, aim for June or late August and write ahead.
Where the records are
- Regional archive in Kongsberg, covering the former Telemark, Vestfold and Buskerud counties.
- Digitalarkivet holds scanned parish registers for the whole district, free and searchable from home before you fly.
- Bygdebøker exist for most Telemark kommuner and are held by the local library; several will scan the relevant farm chapter and email it if you write ahead.
- The national archive was renamed Nasjonalarkivet on 1 January 2026; older guides call it Arkivverket or Riksarkivet, and the regional repositories are still signposted as statsarkiv.
Worth knowing
- Telemark rosemaling is from here, and the folk museums in the upper valleys are serious ones rather than gift shops. The Hardanger fiddle is played superbly in Telemark but was developed in Hardanger, which is a distinction local musicians will make for you.
- The dialect is famously conservative. Older relatives may be easier for you to follow than standard Oslo Norwegian, if you grew up hearing the language at home.
- Heddal stave church is the largest in Norway and sits directly on the route between Oslo and the upper valleys.
Common questions
- Which bygdelag covers Telemark?
- Telelaget of America, founded in Fargo in 1907. It publishes Telesoga twice a year, holds its stevne in mid-July with six other southern-Norway lags, and runs its own tours of Telemark.
- Where are the records for a Telemark farm?
- Three layers. Parish registers are scanned free on Digitalarkivet and can be worked from home. Civil and property records sit at the regional archive in Kongsberg. The bygdebok, a printed farm-by-farm history, is held by the kommune library.
- When did people emigrate from Telemark?
- Earlier than most of Norway. Tinn was the first eastern parish to send people in numbers, and the flow began in the 1840s, a generation before the national peak in the 1880s. If your family left before 1860, upper Telemark is one of the likelier origins.
- Do I need a car in Telemark?
- Yes, once you leave the valley floor. The train reaches Bø and Notodden in about two hours from Oslo, but the farms are up the side valleys and no bus goes there.
- When is the best time to visit Telemark for family research?
- June or late August. The farms and mountain roads are open from late May to mid-September, but kommune libraries run reduced hours through July, which is when most American visitors arrive.
Read next
The longer pieces behind this page. The playbook is where to start if you have not yet pinned the farm your family left.
- Trace Your Norwegian Roots: A Curator's Playbook for Your Trip
In the spring of 1882 a 22-year-old farmhand named Knut Olsen Bjørge left a small farm in Hjartdal in upper Telemark, took the wagon road down to the Skien rail line, the train to Bergen, and the steamer Angelo to Hull and on to Quebec. Six weeks later he stepped off a Mississippi River train at Red Wing, Minnesota, and walked the last hour to his uncle's farm near Vang Lutheran in Holden Township, Goodhue County. He never went back. He is one of about 800,000 Norwegians who left for North America between 1825 and 1925, and he is the reason about 4.5 million Americans today carry a Norwegian surname or a Norwegian grandmother in the family Bible. The farm he left, registered as gnr 47 bnr 3 in the Hjartdal property book, still has the original storehouse standing. The parish church where he was confirmed in 1876 still holds a service every other Sunday. Knut's descendants have known the family came from "somewhere near Heddal" for four generations. The work of this article is the work of turning that sentence into an address, and then into a trip.
- Norwegian Heritage by Region: Telemark, Hardanger, Sogn and the Other Four
Once the bygdebok work is done and the kommune is pinned, the next question is what your ancestral region actually looks and travels like in 2026. About seven Norwegian regions sent roughly 70% of the 800,000 emigrants who left for North America between 1825 and 1925: Sogn, Hardanger, Telemark, Nordfjord, Voss, Trøndelag and Sørlandet. The remaining 30% came from everywhere else, but if your great-grandfather appears in a Digitalarkivet emigration record, the odds are about two in three that the village you are trying to visit is in one of those seven. This article is the regional companion to <a href="/field-guide/trace-your-norwegian-roots-curators-playbook/">the curator's playbook for tracing Norwegian roots</a>. The playbook tells you how to find your bygd. This one tells you what to do when you get there, region by region.
- Roots and Routes: A 10-Day Norway Heritage Trip Itinerary for American Descendants
A meaningful Norway heritage trip is a four-phase journey: prep at home, archive days in Norway, the homestead visit itself, and regional immersion that turns the pilgrimage into a real week away. Ten days covers one region well; fourteen covers two. The difference between a chore and a trip is the walking, cycling, and fjord time you build between the genealogy stops.
Terms worth knowing before you write to a Norwegian archive or kommune: Bygdebok, Emigrasjon, Vesterheim, Seter.
If you want help planning the trip
We build individual itineraries for people visiting the district their family came from, and for people who simply want to see Norway properly. The advice is free and commits you to nothing. We charge no planning fee and earn a referral commission from the Norwegian operators we book, which is the same structure the inbound market has run on for thirty years.