Erik Rosenkrantz inherited an estate at Stranden through his relationship with the Losne clan. After a fire in 1561 he built a “dwelling with a foundation wall” right across Strandgaten, and he collected building material from the adjacent Munkeliv monastery. “De Rosenkrantzers Mur” and “Rosenkrantz Alminding”, both today known as Muren and Muralmenning.
In the beginning of the 1600s Hanseatic control of the foreign trade was in decline. Many of the Office’s trading agents at Bryggen broke away, took citizenship and started their own businesses. New immigrants did the same. This is how a new trading bourgeoisie developed. Today the old Stranden (seafront) and Nordnes are gone, with their boathouses and trading houses – the town quarters of Ludvig Holberg and Edvard Grieg. The only places left are some small enclaves.
