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Kattegat

  (kăt'ĭ-găt') pronunciation

A strait of the North Sea between southwest Sweden and eastern Jutland, Denmark. It connects with the North Sea through the Skagerrak.

 

 
 

Arm of the North Sea, between Sweden and Jutland, Denmark. Its maximum width is 88 mi (142 km). It is connected with both the North and Baltic seas. Chief ports on its shores are Göteborg and Halmstad in Sweden and Århus in Denmark. It is an important commercial navigation passage and a popular summer vacation area.

For more information on Kattegat, visit Britannica.com.

 
(kăt'ĭgăt') , strait, c.140 mi (230 km) long and from 40 to 100 mi (60–160 km) wide, between Sweden and Denmark. It is connected with the North Sea through the Skagerrak, which begins at the northern tip of Jutland, and with the Baltic Sea by way of the Øresund, Store Bælt, and Lille Bælt. Göteborg (Sweden) and Århus (Denmark) are the chief ports.


 
Wikipedia: Kattegat
Kattegat and Skagerrak.
Enlarge
Kattegat and Skagerrak.

The Kattegat (Danish), or Kattegatt (Swedish) is a sea area bounded by Jutland (Denmark) and Sweden. The Baltic Sea drains into the Kattegat through the Oresund and the Danish Straits. The Kattegat is a continuation of the Skagerrak and may be seen as either a bay of the Baltic Sea, a bay of the North Sea, or, in traditional Scandinavian usage, none of these.

Geography

Waterways that drain into the Kattegat are the rivers of Göta älv at Gothenburg, together with the Lagan, Nissan, Ätran and Viskan from the province of Halland on the Swedish side, and the river of Gudenå from Jutland, in Denmark.

The main islands of the Kattegat are Samsø, Læsø and Anholt, where the latter two, due to their dry summer climate, are referred to as the Danish desert belt.

A number of noteworthy coastal areas abut the Kattegat, including the Kullaberg Nature Reserve in Sweden, which contains a number of rare species and a scenic rocky shore, the town of Mölle, which has a picturesque harbour and views into the Kullaberg, and Skagen at the northern tip of Denmark.

Etymology

According to Den Store Danske Encyklopædi and Nudansk Ordbog, the name derives from the Dutch words Kat (cat) and Gat (hole). It refers to late medieval navigation, where captains compared this region to a hole so narrow that even a cat would have difficulty creeping through due to the many reefs and shallow waters.[1][2] At one point, the passable waters were a mere 3.84 kilometers (2.38 miles) wide.

An older name for both the Skagerrak and Kattegat was the Norwegian Sea or Jutland Sea (Knýtlinga saga mentions the name Jótlandshaf). The name of the Copenhagen street Kattesundet is derived from same root.[2]

References

In-line:
  1. ^ Den Store Danske Encyklopædi (2004), CD-rom edition, Copenhagen: Gyldendal, entry Kattegat.
  2. ^ a b Nudansk Ordbog (1993), 15th edition, 2nd reprint, Copenhagen: Politikens Forlag, entry Kattegat.

Coordinates: 56°55′42″N, 11°25′41″E


 
 

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Copyrights:

Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2007. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved.  Read more
Columbia Encyclopedia. The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Copyright © 2003, Columbia University Press. Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/  Read more
Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Kattegat" Read more

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