Fangst av grindehval i Norge – vs. Færøyene / Pilot whaling in Norway vs. the Faroe Islands

Abstract

Úrtak: Endamálið við hesi grein er, umframt at varpa ljós á ein lítið ansaðan tátt í norskari hvalaveiðisøgu, at vísa á, at grindadráp í Noreg var rættiliga ólíkt tí føroyska. Hugsanarstøði mítt er, at grind í Føroyum allarhelst má síggjast sum ein staðbundin innovatión. Eg havi tvær grundgevingar fyri  hesi  áskoðan: (1) Grindahvalur hevur verið sjáldsýndur við norsku strendurnar, og grinddráp kom ov sjáldan fyri til at kunna finna ein institutionaliseraðan form. Norðmenn høvdu hvørki kunnleika ella amboð til hóskandi rakstrar­ og drápshátt. (2) Meðan grind varð rikin á land í Føroyum, var vanligast í Noreg at brúka nót, hóast nógvar áheitanir um at læra av føroyingum. Munurin í rakstrar­ og drápshátti hevði týðandi sosialøkonomiskar avleiðingar. Hetta bendir á, at føroysk lóggáva og siðvenja hvat viðvíkur luttøku í drápi og býti av veiðini fyrst og fremst má síggjast í staðbundnum samteksti, og ikki sum komið uttaneftir til Føroyar. Grindadráp í Føroyum og Noreg eru grundleggjandi ymisk mentanarlig modell.

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is, beside to address a neglected chapter in the history of whaling in Norway, to demonstrate that pilot whaling in Norway was rather different from its Faroese counterpart. My hypothesis is that Faroese pilot whaling is most likely a local innovation. I argue along two lines. (1) Pilot whales have been relatively rare in Norwegian coastal waters, and catches were too infrequent to find an institutionalized form. Norwegian fishermen had neither knowledge nor equipment to hunt pilot whales efficiently, and each hunt had important idiosyncratic characteristics. (2) Whereas pilot whales and other small toothed whales in the Faroe Islands were driven ashore, they were in most places in Norway enclosed by seines. This difference had important socio-economic implications. Technology as well as regulations and practices pertaining to pilot whaling and distribution of the catch in the Faroe Islands must therefore be understood in its local context and nothing emigrants brought from Norway about a millennium ago. Whalers in the Faroe Islands and Norway were motivated by quite different cultural models.