Kråkstad

The parish of Kraakstad was established as a municipality January 1, 1838 (see formannskapsdistrikt). Ski was separated from Kråkstad July 1, 1931 - and the rest of Kråkstad was merged with Ski January 1, 1964.

The village has 839 inhabitants (2006), and a train station on Indre Østfoldbanen. The Norwegian footballer Martin Andresen grew up in this village.

Members of the black metal band Mayhem lived in a house near the village in the early 1990s, and became infamous when vocalist Dead committed suicide inside the house on 8 April 1991 by slitting his wrists and neck and then shooting himself in the forehead with a shotgun. Guitarist Euronymous then took photographs Dead's corpse, one of which became the cover of their Dawn of the Black Hearts album. Dead's suicide was said to cause "a change in mentality" in the black metal scene and was the first in a string of infamous events carried out by its members.

There are some remains of an old hillfort in the forest above Vientjern (a small lake), a few kilometers outside Kråkstad.

J. H. Jørgensen organ (1943)

Kråkstad Church (Kråkstad Kirke) is a parish church with origins in the mid-1100s and has 200 seats. The medieval church has a roughly square nave and narrow, short chorus. The structure is of fracture stones of uniform size and good cleavage. After a lightning strike and fire in 1801 only the walls were left badly damaged. The church was rebuilt with internal walls of smooth plastered. The timbered west tower was also built in 1882 with two bells which were recast after the fire of 1801. Apart from parts of the altarpiece, most of the interior decor is from 1882. The church organ is from J. H. Jørgensen and dated to 1943. [1][2]

The municipality (originally the parish) was named after the old farm Kråkstad (Norse Krákustaðir), since the first church was built there. The first element is probably an old rivername (*Kráka), the last element is staðir 'homestead, farm'. The meaning of the (hypothetical) rivername is 'crow-river' (the river sounding like a crow'?). Until 1921 the name was written Kraakstad.

• Media related to Kråkstad at Wikimedia Commons