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As Iceland itself is small and isolated, the individualistic “us against them” mentality didn’t last long, and gave way to less violent forms of vendetta. [19] This is a major shift in contrast to the raiding and pillaging going on in the rest of the Viking World and sets Viking-age Iceland apart from other Norse settlements.
The recorded history of Iceland began with the settlement by Viking explorers and the people they enslaved from Western Europe, particularly in modern-day Norway and the British Isles, in the late ninth century. Iceland was still uninhabited long after the rest of Western Europe had been settled.
Hjalmarsson, Jon R. (1993) History of Iceland - From Settlement to the Present Day (Reykjavík: Iceland Review ) ISBN 978-9979510710 Jones, Gwyn (1986) The Norse Atlantic Saga: Being the Norse Voyages of Discovery and Settlement to Iceland, Greenland, and North America (Oxford University Press) ISBN 978-0192851604
A page from a vellum manuscript of Landnáma in the Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies in Reykjavík, Iceland. Landnámabók (Icelandic pronunciation: [ˈlantˌnauːmaˌpouːk], "Book of Settlements"), often shortened to Landnáma, is a medieval Icelandic written work which describes in considerable detail the settlement (landnám) of Iceland by the Norse in the 9th and 10th ...
However, archaeological finds in Iceland suggest settlement may have started somewhat earlier. The medieval chronicler Ari Þorgilsson said Ingólfur was the first Nordic settler in Iceland, but mentioned that Irish monks had been in the country before the Norsemen.
Landnámabók, a medieval Icelandic manuscript, describes in considerable detail the settlement of Iceland (Icelandic: landnám) by the Norse in the 9th and 10th centuries. According to the Landnámabók , Iceland was discovered by Naddodd, who was sailing from Norway to the Faroe Islands, but got lost and drifted to the east coast of Iceland.
The settlement of Iceland and the Faroe Islands by the Norse included many Norse–Gael settlers as well as slaves and servants. They were called Vestmen (Western men), and the name is retained in Vestmanna in the Faroes and the Vestmannaeyjar off the Icelandic mainland.
Erik Thorvaldsson [a] (c. 950 – c. 1003), known as Erik the Red, was a Norse explorer, described in medieval and Icelandic saga sources as having founded the first European settlement in Greenland. Erik most likely earned the epithet "the Red" due to the color of his hair and beard.