Note 104 — Chapter XXXIV

When we visited the Rjukan fos some years since we were certainly under the impression that the name applied to a rock on the face of the precipice above the fall, where the lover slipped at the first meeting after a long absence, and was lost in the abyss below. The name may probably be derived from the footpath, which at that time was very similar to a ladder, and Williams, in his work “Through Norway with a Knapsack,” calls it “Marie Stige,” saying in a note, “stige” is the Dansk and Norsk for ladder; and placing the article “en” at the end of the word, as is usual, it becomes stigen, the ladder, hence the local name, “Marie Stigen,” the Mary’s Ladder, which most English writers have misunderstood or Germanized into “Marie Stein,” or Mary’s Rock; others spell it “Marie Stegen,” which, translated, signifies Mary’s fry, Mary’s roast meat. In Murray it is called Mari Stien. The legend has associated a romantic interest with the Rjukan fos.