The Meridian Column at Hammerfest, Norway. The Meridianstotta, surrounded by iron railings, is on the Fuglenes peninsula to the north of the harbour. It is a marble column commemorating the first survey (1816–52) by Russian scientist Friedrich Georg Wilhelm Struve to determine the arc of the global meridian and thereby calculate the size and shape of the earth. A woman and seven children are by the railings. This is one of the few structures in Finnmark that was inexpicably not destroyed by the Germans in 1944-1945.