The Bentsjord Estate also known as the Moursundian Estate (Norwegian: Det moursundske gods), was an estate in Troms

Troms

or Romsa is a county in North Norway, bordering Finnmark to the northeast and Nordland in the southwest. To the south is Norrbotten Län in Sweden and further southeast is a shorter border with Lapland Province in Finland. To the west is the Norwegian Sea...

, Norway

Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

.

Owners

From 1783, the southern part of the Tromsø Estate

Tromsø Estate

The Tromsø Estate was a Norwegian estate, originally the in Troms located part of the Irgens Estate. The estate seat was Karnes Farm.-History:...

 belonged to the family Moursund, whose seat was Bentsjord Farm. Through the marriage to Elisabeth Wasmuth, who was the heiress to a part of the Tromsø Estate, Hans Andreas Moursund († 1802) became the owner of this land. His son was Andreas Røst Moursund († 1850), whose only son was Hans Andreas Moursund (1818–80). Hans Andreas Moursund the younger started the sale of the estate.

Sale of farms and forest

The estate consisted in 1860 of approximately 300 farm parts in Tromsøysund, Balsfjord, Malangen, and Hillesøy, and of approximately 50,000 daa forest. Many farm parts were in and from 1862 sold to their respective tenant farmers. In 1892, the state bought the forest, which subsequently was sold to the tenant farmers. Bentsjord Farm was in 1890 sold on auction. By 1900, the Bentsjord Estate was in praxis dissolved.

Literature and sources

• Wikipedia, Norwegian Bokmål & Riksmål: [//no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bentsjordgodset Bentsjordgodset] (Per 06.06.2011.)
• Store norske leksikon: Moursund
• Store norske leksikon: Moursundske gods