The Outer Harbor of Balstad, Lofoten, in the Fishing Season 
The Lofoten Fisheries 
By Oscar Sund 
Fishing is an ancient industry in Norway. There is reason to 
think that the annually recurring presence of the spawning cod was 
known to our forefathers in very early times and that the discovery 
was first made at the Lofoten Islands where even now the most impor¬ 
tant winter fisheries take place. We read of it first in Eigil s Saga, 
where it is related that Thorolf Kveldulf sen, a prominent man living on 
the island of Alfsten, where the Seven Sisters’ range is situated, “was 
engaged in every kind of fishing at that time known in Haalogaland, 
that he had some men fishing the fat-herring and others the “skrei,” as 
the Norwegians call the spawning cod. This Thorolf lived in the ninth 
century, and it seems that the skrei-fishing was even then an established 
institution, for it is further related that he sent his trusted men to Eng¬ 
land with a ship loaded with skrei and pelts to bring back wheat, honey, 
wine, and clothing in exchange. 
During the centuries that followed, the skrei seems to have played 
an important role in the economic life of northern Norway. It was 
dried or, in later times, dried and salted, and exported in ever increas- 
