The story about "Strong Nils".

LeifR

My wife and I had a sunday's trip to day, and I got an idea about sharing an old story from our area.

In the middle of Telemark in Norway there was born a very special boy about 1720. He was given horse milk as a baby, and he grew up to be the strongest man we know about here. A lot of stories are known about his achievements, there is even written a book about him. The stories are of course not prooved to be true, but as far as we know, they may mainly be correct.

At the church in the little village Seljord there is a stone he is supposed to have lifted. The stone carries a weight of 570 kg.
Powerful people out there, come to Seljord and try to lift it!



Here is another one, 75 kg. It's called "klypelyftsteinen". Klype means to pinch, and Strong Nils pinched the head with one hand. His hands were extremely big. Some people have tried to lift the stone, but I am not sure if anyone has succeded. This stone is placed at the ground of the animals' show in Seljord, where his cabin has become rebuilt too.
At the annual animals' show, there is a lot of festivity around this cabin. Wedding, folklore music, and a lot more.


Nils was a kind and friendly man and did never use his strength in any bad way. He married Anne, she was a very kind woman too. Unfortunately she died. Another woman had sworn to marry him - in one way or other. Now she got her chance. She talked him around, and got at last what she wanted.
This marriage ended in misery. She was rather ill-tempered, and she managed to make quarrels everywhere. Nils who always had been friendly was dragged into hostilities both here and there.
According to the book about him, it ended up in a huge quarrel with his wife's family. During this, he was hit in his head with a wooden sledge runner and died a few days later. This was a few years after 1800, may be 1804.

Who will start exercising and prepare for a journey to Norway?


Leif.

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Therrin

I'm sure Newguy would try it! Even if he only gets it part of the way up and then drops it on his foot.

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HolmenTree

Yes Norse folklore revolves around heavy stone lifting. Inuit [eskimo] legend from the far northern Canadian artic has stories of strong yellow haired men lifting and piling large heavy stones along the seacoast. My grandparents came from Norway and they all had huge hands and stood over 6 feet tall. My grandfathers brother was said to have loaded by himself a large rain barrel full of water onto a wagon and not spilling a drop, weighing 600 pounds[273 KG].
I guess one Norwegian had to be tough to chase a thousand Swedes through the weeds.