Tinganes

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Tinganes is a Waterfront in Tórshavn, Faroe Islands

Tinganes is the historic heart of Tórshavn, a rocky promontory jutting into the harbour of the Faroese capital. Its name means the parliament point, and the name is well earned. The Faroese assembly, the Løgting, has met here since around the year 900, making it one of the oldest parliamentary sites in the world. To this day the promontory houses the offices of the Faroese government, not in grand halls but in a cluster of small timber buildings painted the traditional deep red, many roofed with living turf. Narrow lanes wind between them, past old warehouses and merchants’ houses dating back to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, down to the water’s edge. It is a quiet, atmospheric place to wander, and at the very tip a memorial stone marks the meeting ground. Few capitals keep their seat of government in something so modest and so old.