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42-597: Guðmundr appears in the following legendary sagas : He also appears in Saxo Grammaticus ' Gesta Danorum (Book VIII) and in Samsons saga fagra , one of the chivalric sagas . Guðmundr shared the same name with his father; Úlfhéðinn was added to the son's name to differentiate father from son. According to some sources, Guðmundr Úlfhéðinn's son was Heiðrekr Úlfhamr. However, in Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks Guðmundr's son

84-463: A drift ice in the fjord he decided to name it "Ísland" (Iceland). Despite difficulties in finding food, he and his men stayed another year, this time in Borgarfjörður , but they headed back to Norway the following summer. Flóki would return much later and settle in what is now known as Flókadalur . It is said with accuracy that a Norwegian called Ingólfr travelled from there [Norway] to Iceland for

126-439: A full circle, circumnavigating the island and establishing that the landmass in question was indeed an island. He departed the following summer, never to return but not before giving the island a new name – Garðarshólmur (literally, Garðar's Island). One of his men, Náttfari , decided to stay behind with two slaves. Náttfari settled in what is now known as Náttfaravík, close to Skjálfandi . Landnámabók maintains that Náttfari

168-526: A hunting and fishing outpost only inhabited part of the year, but it is not known whether it was built by people from Scandinavia, Ireland or Scotland. Two longhouses built consecutively on the same site in Stöð near the village of Stöðvarfjörður in eastern Iceland have been excavated since 2015. The older of these is one of the largest longhouses ever found in Iceland and may date to as early as 800. Bjarni F. Einarsson,

210-639: A name that the Norsemen used for the Irish. Ingólfr was said to have settled a large part of southwestern Iceland, although after his settlement nothing more was known of him. His son, Þorsteinn Ingólfsson, was a major chieftain and was said to have founded the Kjalarnesþing  [ is ] , the first thing , or parliament, in Iceland. It was a forerunner of the Althingi . As winter approached, Ingólfur's slaves found

252-478: A short period of time, but gave the country a name: Snæland (Land of Snow). He was followed by the viking explorer Garðar Svavarsson , who was the first to stay over winter. At some time around 860, a storm pushed his ship far to the north until he reached the eastern coast of Iceland. Garðar approached the island from the east, sailed westward along the coast and then up north, building a house in Húsavík . He completed

294-521: A sixth-to-seventh-century settlement should be rejected. Other archaeological sites have been found which predate the traditionally accepted date of 874 for the earliest settlement of the island. Some dwellings were excavated in Reykjavík in 1971–73 which were found below the 'Settlement Layer' and thus must date to before 870. A cabin in Hafnir was abandoned between 770 and 880 CE. It is thought to have been

336-431: A smaller proportion of the modern population. Though the notion that population pressure drove migration to Iceland remains unsupported in the academic literature, a number of reasons have been offered for the settlement of Iceland: Written sources say some settlers took land freely, others bought lands from earlier settlers, some were gifted land by earlier settlers, and that some settlers took lands from others through

378-702: Is generally believed to have begun in the second half of the ninth century, when Norse settlers migrated across the North Atlantic . The reasons for the migration are uncertain: later in the Middle Ages Icelanders themselves tended to cite civil strife brought about by the ambitions of the Norwegian king Harald I of Norway , but modern historians focus on deeper factors, such as a shortage of arable land in Scandinavia . Unlike Great Britain and Ireland, Iceland

420-415: Is thus the second-to-last major land mass to be permanently settled by humans ( Madagascar and New Zealand being colonized in the mid-first millennium and thirteenth century, respectively). According to one hypothesis, which is based on radiocarbon dating evidence from Vestmannaeyjar off the southern coast of Iceland, the island was first settled by Norsemen as early as the end of the sixth century or in

462-563: The Oskorei . Otto Höfler , drawing on earlier theories of Nils Lid, argued that it was actually a word found in modern Norwegian dialect as both fax and faxe and referring to a kind of grass, and that it referred to the fertility symbol of the sheaf in Norwegian Yule celebrations. According to Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks , the Norwegians came to see Guðmundr as a god; Höfler argued that in both

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504-581: The Great Lacuna ). Other sagas deal with heroes such as Ragnar Lodbrok , Hrólf Kraki and Orvar-Odd . In these respects, then, the fornaldarsögur overlap in genre and occasionally content with the Kings' sagas . The Fornaldarsagas have great value for legend research, since they contain motifs and complexes of motifs from many types of legend of which there is otherwise no documentation in Scandinavia prior to

546-507: The Icelandic Commonwealth period is considered to begin. Archeological evidence shows, however, "that immigrants continued to arrive in Iceland throughout the 10th century". The authors of one study speculate that "continued immigration may have been needed to sustain the population". Landnámabók claims that the first Norseman to rest his feet on Icelandic soil was a viking by the name of Naddoddr . Naddoddr stayed for only

588-652: The fornaldarsögur that verse is almost invariably in the metre of Eddaic verse (unlike the skaldic verse found in most other saga genres). The setting is primarily Scandinavia in the time prior to the settlement of Iceland and the conversion of Scandinavia, but occasionally it moves temporarily to more distant and exotic locations or has its characters encounter Christian cultures (one example of both being Örvar-Odds saga ). There are also very often mythological elements, such as dwarves , elves , giants and magic . In centuries past, they were considered to be reliable historic sources by Scandinavian scholars, but since

630-417: The 19th century, they have been considered to contain very little historic material. The present consensus is that, although some of the sagas contain a small core which is not fiction, or are based on historical characters, the primary function of the legendary sagas was entertainment, and the aim of the sagas has not been to present a historically accurate tale. Recently, however, it has been emphasized that

672-457: The Lombards with mares with white bands around their legs symbolising fetters (they did in fact bind their legs with white bands). Since Óðinn is patron of the Lombards, this is another Odinic connection. Einar Ólafur Sveinsson thought Guðmundr was Irish in origin while Geirröðr was native Scandinavian. Legendary saga A legendary saga or fornaldarsaga (literally, "story/history of

714-516: The Norsemen, from a Hiberno-Scottish mission when they arrived in Iceland. There is some archaeological evidence for a monastic settlement from Ireland at Kverkarhellir cave, on the Seljaland farm in southern Iceland. Sediment deposits indicate people lived there around 800, and crosses consistent with the Hiberno-Scottish style were carved in the wall of a nearby cave. Ari Thorgilsson writes that

756-603: The Swede Esaias Tegnér , who wrote Frithiof's saga , based on the Friðþjófs saga ins frœkna . One such saga was even forged in the early modern period: Hjalmars och Hramers saga . For a comprehensive list of the medieval fornaldarsögur , with information about manuscripts, bibliography, etc., see Stories for all time: The Icelandic fornaldarsögur . Settlement of Iceland The settlement of Iceland ( Icelandic : landnámsöld [ˈlantˌnaumsˌœlt] )

798-554: The air and then returned to the ship. However, the third flew in front of the ship and they followed its direction to Iceland. He landed in Vatnsfjörður in the Westfjords after passing what is now Reykjavík . One of his men, Faxi, remarked that they seemed to have found great land—the bay facing Reykjavík is therefore known as Faxaflói . A harsh winter caused all of Flóki's cattle to die—he cursed this cold country, and when he spotted

840-656: The ancient era") is a Norse saga that, unlike the Icelanders' sagas , takes place before the settlement of Iceland . There are some exceptions, such as Yngvars saga víðförla , which takes place in the 11th century. The sagas were probably all written in Iceland, from about the middle of the 13th century to about 1400, although it is possible that some may be of a later date, such as Hrólfs saga kraka . In terms of form, fornaldarsögur are similar to various other saga-genres, but tend towards fairly linear, episodic narratives. Like sagas in other genres, many quote verse, but in

882-545: The case of Hervarar saga , it conveys names of historical places in present Ukraine during the period c. 150-450, and the last part of the saga is used as a historic source for Swedish history. Indeed, they often contain very old Germanic matter, such as the Hervarar saga and the Völsunga saga which contains poetry about Sigurd that did not find its way into the Poetic Edda and which would otherwise have been lost (see

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924-437: The country had been "fully settled" by 930. Correspondingly, Landnámabók suggests that within about sixty years, all the usable land had been taken; it mentions 1,500 farm and place names, and more than 3,500 people, arranged in a geographical fashion. In the periodisation of Icelandic history, therefore, the age of settlement is considered to have ended in the year 930 with the establishment of Alþingi ; at this point

966-456: The details they provide about the settlement, and recent research focuses more heavily on archaeological and genetic evidence. Traditionally, the Icelandic Age of Settlement is considered to have lasted from 874 to 930, at which point most of the island had been claimed and Alþingi (Althingi), the assembly of the Icelandic Commonwealth , was founded at Þingvellir (Thingvellir). Iceland

1008-550: The first time when Haraldr the Fine-Haired was sixteen years old, and a second time a few years later; he settled in the south in Reykjarvík. Another Norseman, by the name of Ingólfur Arnarson , had instigated a blood feud in his homeland, Norway. He and his foster-brother Hjörleifr Hróðmarsson went on an exploratory expedition to Iceland, and stayed over winter in what is now Álftafjörður . A few years later they returned to settle

1050-469: The head of the archaeological team which excavated the site, believes that the older longhouse was used as a summer outpost by Scandinavians. In archaeologist Orri Vésteinsson's view, there was probably a period of seasonal settlement of the island before permanent settlements were established. The Íslendingabók of Ari Thorgilsson claims that the Norse settlers encountered Gaelic monks, called papar by

1092-545: The island of Thule . They said that darkness reigned during winter but that the summers were bright enough to pick lice from one's clothing, but the veracity of this source may be questioned. Additionally, Iceland is only about 450 kilometres from the Faroes , which had been visited by Irish monks in the sixth century, and settled by the Norse around 650. Written sources consider the age of settlement in Iceland to have begun with settlement by Ingólfr Arnarson around 874, for he

1134-520: The land with their men. When they approached the island, Ingólfur cast his high seat pillars overboard and swore that he would settle where they drifted to shore. He then sent his slaves Vífill and Karli to search for the pillars. In the meantime, Hjörleifr had been murdered by his Irish slaves. Ingólfr hunted them down and killed them in the Westman Islands . The islands got their name from that event, with westmen (Old Norse: vestmenn ) being

1176-570: The legendary sagas in less esteem, in terms of their literary value, than the Icelanders' sagas. The content is often less realistic, the characters more two-dimensional, and the sagas often borrow themes from each other, and from folk tales. In these aspects of style and reception, the fornaldarsögur tend to overlap with the Chivalric sagas , particularly those composed in medieval Iceland. The legendary sagas have influenced later writers, for instance

1218-475: The mid-19th century. They are also of great value for scholars studying medieval Scandinavian ballads, particularly the Faroese kvæði , which are often based on the same matters. Moreover, they are also very important for the study of Scandinavian and Germanic heroic legends together with Saxo Grammaticus ' Gesta Danorum which was based on the same heroic poetry and traditions. Philologists have generally held

1260-400: The monks left upon the arrival of the Norsemen since they did not want to live with non-Christians. The oldest known source which mentions the name "Iceland" is an eleventh-century rune carving from Gotland . There is a possible early mention of Iceland in the book De mensura orbis terrae by the Irish monk Dicuil , dating to 825. Dicuil claimed to have met some monks who had lived on

1302-496: The number of initial settlers ranging between 311 and 436. While the written sources emphasise settlement from Norway, genetic evidence shows that the founder population of Iceland came from Ireland, Scotland, and Scandinavia: studies of mitochondrial DNA and Y-chromosomes indicate that 62% of Icelanders' matrilineal ancestry derives from Scotland and Ireland (with most of the rest being from Scandinavia), while 75% of their patrilineal ancestry derives from Scandinavia (with most of

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1344-522: The pillars by Arnarhvoll . When summer came, he built a farmstead in Reykjavík and claimed all the land west of the rivers of Ölfusá , Öxará and Brynjudalsá . His slave Karli did not care for the location, and said to Ingólfur: "How ill that we should pass good land, to settle in this remote peninsula." Prior to the deforestation of Iceland in the Middle Ages , some 40% of the land was forested. Today,

1386-536: The rest being from the Irish and British Isles). Archaeogenetic evidence suggests that the actual founding population included a higher proportion again of settlers from the Irish and British Isles: one study found that the mean Norse ancestry among Iceland's settlers was 56%, whereas in the current population the figure was 70%. It is thought likely that most of the settlers from Ireland and Scotland came as slaves, and therefore reproduced less successfully than higher-status settlers from Scandinavia, making them ancestors of

1428-462: The sagas are useful sources for the culture of 13th and 14th century Iceland, "in terms of the light that they can shed on the culture in which they were composed" i.e. Iceland in the later Middle Ages. In the words of Margaret Clunies Ross, Some of the sagas are based on distant historic characters, and this is evident in cases where there are corroborating sources, such as Ragnars saga loðbrókar , Yngvars saga víðförla and Völsunga saga . In

1470-412: The seventh century. The dated material was found under a layer of tephra (volcanic fragments), called the 'Settlement Layer', left by an eruption dated through ice core analysis to about 871. However, doubts have been raised about the accuracy of this dating because of the possible effect of volcanic carbon dioxide on the dating process. According to Magnús Stefánsson, the attribution of this material to

1512-548: The use of force or threat of force. Lands were likely not rented during the Age of settlement. Medievalist Hans Kuhn argued that lands were given away or taken freely because earlier settlers had no need for such extensive lands. Historian Gunnar Karlsson notes that it could be rational for earlier settlers to encourage new settlers to settle lands nearby so as to ease maintenance of cattle and slaves, and as insurance in times of crisis. Ari Thorgilsson claims in Íslendingabók that

1554-575: The wolf-form suggested by Úlfhéðinn and the horse-form suggested by faxi , Guðmundr was a death-demon and his death-horse the prototype of the death-horse Sleipnir portrayed on the Gotland picture stones . Ingemar Nordgren regards the first Guðmundr as "a cult-god" and his son, the Guðmundr of the sagas, as portraying him in theriomorphic form, and suggests that he is either an earlier fertility god who came to be identified with Óðinn and that Glæsisvellir

1596-463: Was Höfund , who married Hervor , and their sons were Angantýr and Heiðrekr . Saxo Grammaticus , in Gesta Danorum (VIII) , referred to Guðmundr Ulfheðinn as Guthmundus , calling him a giant and the brother of Geruthus ( Geirröðr ). He is sometimes given the epithet faxi , 'the one with a mane', i.e., a horse. This suggests a connection with the army of the dead who roam Norway at Yule ,

1638-572: Was influenced by Valhalla , or that he is a local variant of a precursor of Óðinn. Guðmundr and the Lombards are said to have battled Helgi and Sinfjötli ; it is Guðmundr who engages in the flyting with Sinfjötli from shore in Helgakviða Hundingsbana I . The latter are called the Ylfings , the 'wolf clan'. As Höfler noted, both armies are spoken of as animals, and Paulus Diaconus identifies

1680-572: Was not a permanent settler. The next Norseman to arrive in Iceland was named Flóki Vilgerðarson , but the year of his arrival is not clear. According to the story told in Landnámabók , he took three ravens to help him find his way. Thus, he was nicknamed Raven-Flóki (Icelandic: Hrafna-Flóki ). Flóki set his ravens free near the Faroe Islands. The first raven flew back to the Faroes. The second flew up in

1722-424: Was the first to sail to Iceland with the purpose of settling the land. Archaeological evidence shows that extensive human settlement of the island indeed began at this time, and "that the whole country was occupied within a couple of decades towards the end of the ninth century." Estimates of the number of people who migrated to the country during the Age of Settlement range between 4,300 and 24,000, with estimates of

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1764-418: Was unsettled land and could be claimed without conflict with existing inhabitants. On the basis of Íslendingabók by Ari Þorgilsson , and Landnámabók , histories dating from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries and providing a wealth of detail about the settlement, the years 870 and 874 have traditionally been considered the first years of settlement. However, these sources are largely unreliable in

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