Norrland (Swedish: [ˈnɔ̌rːland] , lit. 'Northland', originally Norrlanden, meaning 'the Northlands') is the northernmost, largest and least populated of the three traditional lands of Sweden, consisting of nine provinces. Although Norrland does not serve any administrative purposes, it continues to exist as a historical, cultural, and geographic region; it is often referred to in everyday language, e.g., in weather forecasts. Several related Norrland dialects form a distinct subset of dialects of the Swedish language separate from those to its south.
Norrland consists of the majority of the Swedish landmass at about 60% of the land area, but only has about 12% of the country's population. Its largest city is Umeå, while the other four county seats are Gävle, Härnösand, Östersund and Luleå. The largest non-capitals are Sundsvall, Skellefteå and Örnsköldsvik while Kiruna is the largest town of the vast Lapland province in the far north. Sweden's highest mountain Kebnekaise and deepest lake of Hornavan are in Norrland. Plenty of long rivers originating in the mountains run through the Norrland forests, with major coastal towns frequently being on their estuaries. Their extensive drops in elevation also make Norrland a major producer of hydroelectricity from some of those rivers.
