Vikøy is mentioned as vicarage in the 1300s, but Vikøy is older than this both as church centre and vicarage. Vikøy is one of the few official estates with its old collection of buildings, built like one of the farms in Kvam, without a dominating main building of the type for “state employees” as was common in the 1700s. The dwelling house is in reality three houses joined together, originally with a smokehouse from 1612 in the middle of the group. In the yard there is also a storehouse on stilts from the middle of the 1700s, the so-called Selmerhuset – an older smokehouse fitted out as a rough kitchen, and reconstructed around 1870 – and Borgstova – a smokehouse from 1815. This is the type of house Tidemand used as model for his painting “Haugianerne” (The followers of Hans Nielsen Hauge – a lay preacher).
Tidemand was on a courting trip to the vicar’s sister, Claudia Jæger, in 1843. After their wedding, he visited Vikøy every summer for many years. Today the hamlet is protected.
