a mad, mad woman

Similarly, in All Is Found #1: Anna of Arendelle and the Silver Skates, Anna has a lot of coins in her pocket when she sneaks out of the castle to attend the ice skating competition. She then uses the coins to pay the entry fee for the competition.

While banknotes appear in the Dark Horse comic Breaking Boundaries.

However, money is not the only way people trade. The books also shows examples of bartering and payment in kind, suggesting that traditional exchange methods still exist alongside the use of currency.

Bartering

We can see this in Conceal, Don't Feel, where Anna regularly trades goods with the grocer Goran while living in Harmon.

Another example appears in The Fixer Upper. Since Bulda and Cliff are trolls and do not use money, Kristoff usually trades fresh mushrooms for his clothes.

Payment in Kind

Sometimes payment is also made in kind. For example in the Dark Horse comic Breaking Boundaries, Anna and Princess Mari help Oaken run his shop, and instead of receiving money, they are given food.

Currency Units

Although we can confirm that Arendelle uses coins and banknotes, the franchise never officially reveals the name of its currency or the exact denominations used in the kingdom.

One of the few clues comes from Once Upon a Snowman, where Wandering Oaken Trading Post sells Anna's coronation outfit for 55,-. The way the price is written resembles Scandinavian currency notation, where a number followed by ",-" is commonly used to indicate a whole currency amount.

Other than that, the franchise only occasionally mentions numbers without specifying the currency. For example, in Frozen, we hear:

"That'll be forty." "Forty? No, ten."

Various books also refer to "coins" or "money", but never identify the actual currency units used in Arendelle.

As for the currency itself, modern Norway uses kroner (krone) and øre (1 krone = 100 øre). Since the price tag in Once Upon a Snowman is written as 55,-, it appears Disney intended it to represent 55 kroner, as the ",-" notation is commonly used with the Norwegian krone.

Notably, the song "Hygge" in Frozen: The Musical also mentions the word "kroner."

If we all die… keep this stuff as a loaner If we survive… you owe ten thousand kroner

We also have concept art of Arendelle's coins.

However, based on Norwegian history, the currency used around 1843 would not have been kroner and øre. At that time, Norway's official currency was speciedaler and skilling. The krone and øre were only introduced later, in 1875, when Norway adopted the Scandinavian Monetary Union.

Also based on the concept art above, we can see what appears to be a 20-unit coin. However, according to historical currency records, there was no 20 skilling or speciedaler coin, while a 20 kroner coin did exist (and is still in use today).

Hence, we came up with a fan theory: Arendelle has its own currency that is only used within Arendelle. If we want to match it with real-world history, I would say Disney probably assumed it was kroner (like in modern-day Norway), but that doesn't fit the actual historical timeline.

Everyday Economy

The franchise shows that citizens in Arendelle participate in various forms of economic activity, including earning income, acquiring goods and services, managing ownership, and supporting local businesses.

Rental and Ownership

Citizens in Arendelle can access goods and property through different financial arrangements, including renting, purchasing, and paying over time.

In Dangerous Secrets, Iduna rents a cottage after earning money by providing technical advice and blueprints to farmers. This shows that housing can be a regular expense and that citizens are responsible for managing their own living costs.

Additionally, the Dark Horse comic Breaking Boundaries mentions that sleds can also be rented.

The franchise also shows that citizens in Arendelle can own personal goods through different payment arrangements. Kristoff's sled is one example of this. In Frozen and A Frozen Heart, he mentions that he has "just paid it off", suggesting that larger purchases could be paid through instalments rather than being paid for all at once.

Meanwhile, in Frozen: The Junior Novelization, Kristoff mentions that he has "just got it", further indicating that the sled was a recent purchase.

Income and Work

The franchise provides many examples of how citizens earn a living and operate businesses. Beyond simply selling goods and services, merchants also use different methods to manage, promote, and grow their businesses.

In the films, Oaken runs the Trading Post, earning income by selling goods and services, while Kristoff works as an ice harvester, supplying ice as his livelihood.

More examples can be found in the books. In Dangerous Secrets, Iduna earns money by providing technical advice and blueprints to farmers, allowing her to live independently and pay for her own expenses.

These are just a few examples. Many other occupations and businesses appear throughout the Frozen franchise, all of which have been compiled in the "Citizens of Arendelle"-book, compiled by our Archivist @bigfrozenfan.

While occupations show how citizens earn a living, the franchise also provides interesting details about how businesses in Arendelle operate, promote themselves, and compete with one another.

As seen in Frozen 2, Oaken's market stall in the town square of Arendelle uses a cash register, showing an organized method of handling sales and payments. However, neither Oaken's shop (Frozen) nor Oaken's Cloakens and Sauna (Frozen Fever) appears to have a cash register.

We can also see examples of how citizens promote their businesses. In The Fixer Upper, Oaken sponsors a sled for the Polar Nights Ice Harvesting Race, demonstrating that sponsorship can be used to promote a business and increase its visibility within the community.

The same novel also features an example of business competition through a bake-off between two bakeries, suggesting that local businesses in Arendelle compete to attract customers and gain recognition.

More examples can be found in the comics Incredible Display, Let's Help Oaken, and Little Inventors, where Anna and Elsa help Oaken and some children promote their inventions and support their businesses.

Retirement

Beyond working and running businesses, the franchise also provides a small glimpse into retirement as part of citizens' economic lives.

In Breaking Boundaries, a clock maker is preparing to retire from his profession, indicating that retirement is a recognized stage of life within Arendelle's society.

Royal Economic Influence

The previous sections show how ordinary citizens participate in Arendelle's economy. However, as a monarchy, the royal family also plays an important role in supporting businesses, providing resources, and creating economic opportunities for its citizens.

Royal Recognition and Opportunities

The royal family can also influence citizens' careers through official recognition. Elsa awarding Kristoff the title of official Arendelle Ice Master and Deliverer (a title that was seemingly made up just for him) gives formal recognition to his occupation and strengthens his role within Arendelle's economy.

Royal Financial Support

The royal family also appears to have the ability to financially support citizens' economic activities. In Dangerous Secrets, Agnarr offers to provide financial assistance to Iduna for her windmill business.

Royal Services and Resources

Elsa's magical abilities also provide unique resources that can benefit the citizens of Arendelle. In Anna & Elsa #1: All Hail the Queen, she uses her ice magic to create useful items, such as ice boxes and piles of fluffy snow to help preserve crops.

Conclusion

Although the Frozen franchise does not provide a complete explanation of Arendelle's economy, the details found throughout the films, books, and comics reveal a kingdom with its own system of currency, trade, work, and business activities. These small details help create a more complete picture of Arendelle as a living society beyond what is shown on screen.

Big thanks to the Archivists here @virtual-winter (special thanks for your incredible help!) @frozenheart46 @bigfrozenfan @theartoffrozen & @dgzy117 for their help and for sharing valuable information that contributed to this article!

Why are there different shields on the front of Arendelle's castle?

Anyone ever take notice of the coats of arms on the castle walls in OFA? In May 2020, I (@bigfrozenfan) took up the topic (first link above), researched it further and prepared it for publication on my Tumblr blog. This promptly sparked a wider discussion among many Frozen fans on Tumblr and led to further facts: LINK As it turned out, many if not all of the 18 shields had counterparts among real-life coats of arms of Norwegian municipalities and were clearly inspired by Norwegian heraldic symbols:

👆Graphics created by @azaffranist

Note that there are (almost) no repetitions when it comes to what county (Norwegian: fylke) the municipalities are located in. All of Norway's counties are equally represented (except for Oslo and Bergen).

To cut a long story short, it was actually just a simple question, but one that revealed the very complex nature of the possible answers and led to many new questions that (like with so many other Frozen-topics) will likely never be fully answered.

As you can see, your original question has been largely answered (these are indeed the coats of arms of the provinces of Arendelle), but we have of course continued our research and now also included Frozen II and currently available map-material on the Frozenverse from books and previous research by Arendelle Archives, in particular the maps collected by @virtual-winter (all of the posts are published here on our blog, in particular his 2021 project Frozen Geography as well as the 2025 and 2026 entries to the Frozen Map Bonanza.

Here's an updated version of the castle wall view, taken from a Youtube-video featuring gameplay from the Disney mobile game Frozen Adventures from around 2021 (upscaled by @snowflaketale12):

In the Disney comic collection Storied Places from 2019, only 16 coats of arms are present on the castle walls and four of them are unique to this book and do not appear in the movies.

Why these four are different is unknown, but they also have close counterparts in Norway:

@virtual-winter did some additional research and identified seven additional matches among Norwegian municipalities' coats of arms. So, here's the updated final picture, together with @azaffranist's original graphics:

As you all know, Disney did a lot of research in advance for the production of Frozen, especially in Norway. Unfortunately, we don't know the full scope of their research or the full level of Norwegian culture, history and geography they had at hand when designing Arendelle. So far, the official map material provided (even in the more detailed books) has been missing out on a lot of details and there are still many unanswered questions about the kingdom of Arendelle (size, history, previous rulers, etc.).

To be honest, it is now questionable whether we will ever get answers to all the burning questions from Disney (I will spare you the extremely long list at this point). With the sequels Frozen III and IV coming out soon, some of us fans are willing to bet that this time, just like before, many questions will be raised but remain unanswered again.

This makes it all the more likely that we will continue to rely on our own research and conclusions, and the (ever-growing) Discord team at Arendelle Archives has dedicated itself to this task. Incidentally, we call ourselves ‘Royal Archivists’ for a reason, and they certainly don't always have it easy. Sometimes, it turns into a full-time job for some of our projects and would be impossible to manage without the help of many people. Whenever a particularly important discussion is brought up, we might deploy either of these labels to show we mean business:

But we are die-hard Frozen fans and we won't give up on finding out the facts about the Frozen films and sharing them with other Frozen fans.

We would also like to send a big thank you to all those who send us questions here on our Tumblr blog!

Some of them are so interesting that even we experienced archivists haven't come across them yet and are really amazed that we haven't thought of them ourselves.

But let's stick with the coats of arms of Arendelle for now. I found what I was looking for on Reddit again and would like to add the following information and a few of my own speculations to my 2020 post. There are currently over 500 coats of arms in Norway, and who knows how many of them have been added, changed or even completely disappeared since 1840, the time in which Frozen is set. Who knows whether Disney has researched this in documents that are not publicly or easily accessible.

Quote from the following website Heraldry-Wiki/Norway:

“Norway is divided into 19 administrative regions, known as counties (fylker, singular: fylke), and 429 municipalities. The capital, Oslo, is considered both a county and a municipality. All counties and municipalities use arms.”

So two things become apparent here:

The complexity of the Kingdom of Arendelle cannot be denied, and

azaffranist said at the end of the addition to my post: ‘Arendelle is much bigger than we all thought…’, but given the new information, Arendelle may not be as big as we thought, even though a family in OFA baked a cake in the shape of Norway, leading some of us to believe that Arendelle is a kingdom as big as the entire country. But more likely is, quote by @virtual-winter: “Going by the dimensions on the Frozen II map, Arendelle is still a small kingdom, many times smaller than Norway. Around 10 000 sq km (3 800 sq mi), about the same size as Lebanon or Kosovo. Yet still much bigger than just the town + castle. My theory is that the coats of arms represent 18 provinces, possibly with the 'capital' being a 19th area represented by the crocus shield. 'Provinces' are actually mentioned on a warning poster for the Duke of Weselton (found at EPCOT) as well as in the story Cold secrets deep down from the novel All is found and would be the equivalent of Norway's fylken (counties), i.e. a higher administrative level than municipalities or cities.”

It can be assumed that just like Norway, all the settlements within the Kingdom of Arendelle have their own coat of arms, with Arendelle as the capital in the middle, and we only saw 18+1 coats of arms on the castle wall in the films. Only 19 of possibly hundreds outside the borders of this kingdom.

Disney itself always describes Arendelle as a “town” or “village”, but not as a “city” or even a “capital”, as befits a kingdom. Elsa is even sometimes referred to as "Queen of the village" in the Anna & Elsa chapter books. So how small did they really imagine Arendelle to be, or had they planned it to be?

And the next fact to illustrate the scale is the distance to the Northuldra territory. According to research by @virtual-winter, the monoliths near the dam are only about a day's journey from Arendelle away (110 km, to be precise, as he found out) and can therefore also be reached on foot in a relatively short time (which is also consistent with what we see in Frozen II).

Why the former King Runeard had the dam built there — for whatever reason — also remains one of the many mysteries that intrigue Frozen fans, because the dam would be too far away to supply Arendelle with water (on the maps we have seen, there is no direct waterway from the dam to the agricultural areas around Arendelle), and electricity, or a reason to generate it, does not yet exist in the Frozenverse. See our own speculations on this question here: LINK. The Alta Dam in Troms og Finnmark county in northern Norway was certainly the model for the dam in Frozen II, and unlike the construction and subsequent effects in Frozen II, the generation of electricity was the main reason for building this dam. So is the reason solely Runeard's expansion of power into the north? Who knows…

As a closing act, I wanted to see how close together the different counties were in real-life Norway:

I was curious to see how near to Arendelle the provinces are, aka their pendent in Norway, and made a little (2 hrs) map test where in Norway all the coat-of-arms are located. It seems most of them are concentrated in southern Norway, in the area of Oslo (Østfold, Aust-Agder, Vest-Agder and Telemark), a few are near of it (Hordaland, Buskerud, Rogaland and Sogn og Fjordane). I think some can be excluded because they are far to the north in Troms, Nordland and Nord- and Sør-Trøndelag and also 2 in Møre og Romsdal. This map with roughly placed arms is the result: