Steinkjer is a municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. It is part of the Innherad region. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Steinkjer which is located on the inner part of the Trondheimsfjord. The town is also the administrative centre for Trøndelag county. Other populated areas in Steinkjer include the villages of Ogndal, Hyllbrua, Gaulstad, Beitstad, Bartnes, Vellamelen, Stod, Binde, Sunnan, Byafossen, Følling, Kvam, Lerkehaug, Mære, Sparbu, Vassaunet, Vekre, Malm, Follafoss, Sela, and Verrastranda.
The municipality is the 31st largest by area out of the 356 municipalities in Norway. Steinkjer is the 53rd most populous municipality in Norway with a population of 24,004. The municipality's population density is and its population has decreased by 0.02% over the previous 10-year period.
General information
The village of Steinkjer in the municipality of Stod was declared a kjøpstad (town) in 1857, and then on 23 January 1858 it was separated from Stod to form a municipality of its own. The initial population of Steinkjer was 1,150.
Over time, as the town grew, land was annexed from the neighboring municipalities. It started on 1 January 1902 when an unpopulated area from the neighboring Ogndal municipality was taken for future growth of Steinkjer. Then in 1941, an area (population: 57) was taken from Ogndal to be added to Steinkjer. Again, in 1948, an area (population: 78) was transferred from Ogndal and another area (population: 70) was transferred from Egge municipality.
During the 1960s, there were many municipal mergers across Norway due to the work of the Schei Committee. On 1 January 1964, a large merger took place: the neighboring municipalities of Beitstad (population: 2,563), Egge (population: 3,476), Kvam (population: 1,245), Ogndal (population: 2,678), Sparbu (population: 4,027), and Stod (population: 1,268) were all merged with the town of Steinkjer (population: 4,325) to form the new municipality of Steinkjer.
On 1 January 2018, the municipality joined the rest of the old Nord-Trøndelag county to the newly formed Trøndelag county.
On 1 January 2020, the municipality of Steinkjer and the neighboring municipality of Verran merged to form a new, larger municipality of Steinkjer.
Toponymy
The municipality (originally the town) is named after the old Steinkjer farm () since the town was built on the site of the old farm. The first element is (m) which means "stone" or "rock". The last element is (n) which means a "barrier made for catching fish".
Coat of arms
The current coat of arms was approved in October 2018 for use starting on 1 January 2020 after the merger of Steinkjer and Verran municipalities (these arms were previously the arms for Verran from 1987 until 2019). The official blazon is "Azure, a boat with raised square sail and topsail argent" (). This means the arms have a blue field (background) and the charge is a Veranjekt (boat) with a raised square sail and topsail. The boat has a tincture of argent which means it is commonly colored white, but if it is made out of metal, then silver is used. The design was chosen to symbolize the historical importance of boating and boat-building for the area. The (literally translated as "a yacht from Verran") is a type of boat has been built in Verran for centuries. The arms were designed by Rolf Tidemann. The municipal flag has the same design as the coat of arms.
The previous coat of arms was originally granted on 8 March 1957 to the town of Steinkjer. Then on 14 March 1964, they were re-granted to the newly enlarged Steinkjer Municipality. They were in use until 1 January 2020 when the municipality was enlarged again and a new coat of arms was put into use. The official blazon was "Azure, a mullet of six argent" (). This means the arms had a blue field (background) and the charge was a six-pointed star. The star had a tincture of argent which meant it was commonly colored white, but if it was made out of metal, then silver was used. The original meaning of the star was that six main roads crossed in the town of Steinkjer. After the municipal reorganization in 1964, the arms were re-granted, but the meaning was slightly changed. The town of Steinkjer now formed the centre of the municipality and the points were directed to the six other districts (former municipalities) in the new, large Steinkjer Municipality. The six districts were Beitstad, Egge, Kvam, Ogndal, Sparbu, and Stod. The arms were designed by Hallvard Trætteberg. The municipal flag had the same design as the coat of arms.