History of Iceland
The recorded history of Iceland began with the settlement by Viking explorers, mostly Norwegian, and the people they enslaved from Western Europe, particularly the British Isles, in the late ninth century. Iceland was still uninhabited long after the rest of Western Europe had been settled. Recorded settlement has conventionally been dated back to 874, although place names and storytellings indicate Gaelic monks from Ireland, known as papar from sagas, may have settled Iceland earlier.
The land was settled quickly, mainly by Norwegians who may have been fleeing conflict or seeking new land to farm. By 930, the chieftains had established a form of governance, the Althing, making it one of the world's oldest parliaments. Towards the end of the tenth century, Christianity came to Iceland through the influence of the Norwegian king Olaf Tryggvason. During this time, Iceland remained independent, a period known as the Old Commonwealth, and Icelandic historians began to document the nation's history in books referred to as sagas of Icelanders. In the early thirteenth century, the internal conflict known as the age of the Sturlungs weakened Iceland, which eventually became subjugated to Norway over the 13th century. The Old Covenant, and the adoption of Jónsbók effectively ended the Icelandic Commonwealth. Norway, in turn, was united with Sweden and then Denmark. Eventually all of the Nordic states were united in one alliance, the Kalmar Union, but on its dissolution, Iceland fell under Danish rule. The subsequent strict Danish–Icelandic Trade Monopoly in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries was detrimental to the economy. Iceland's resultant poverty was aggravated by severe natural disasters like the Móðuharðindin or "Mist Hardships". During this time, the population declined.
Iceland remained part of Denmark, but in keeping with the rise of nationalism around Europe in the nineteenth century, an independence movement emerged. The Althing, which had been suspended in 1799, was restored in 1844, and Iceland gained sovereignty after World War I, becoming the Kingdom of Iceland on 1 December 1918. However, Iceland shared the Danish Monarchy until World War II. Iceland was neutral in the Second World War. Nazi Germany had begun Operation Weserübung and won the Norwegian campaign and declared itself a republic. Following the Second World War, Iceland was a founding member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and joined the United Nations one year after its establishment. Its economy grew rapidly, largely through fishing, although this was marred by disputes with other nations.
After the 1980 Icelandic presidential election, Vigdis Finnbogadottir assumed Iceland's presidency on August 1, 1980, the first elected female head of state in the world.
Following rapid financial growth, the 2008–2011 Icelandic financial crisis occurred. Iceland continues to remain outside the European Union.
Iceland is very remote, and so has been spared the ravages of European wars but has been affected by other external events, such as the Black Death and the Protestant Reformation imposed by Denmark. Iceland's history has also been marked by a number of natural disasters.
Iceland is a relatively young island in the geological sense, being formed about 20 million years ago by a series of volcanic eruptions in the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. It is still growing from fresh volcanic eruptions. The oldest stone specimens found in Iceland date back to million years ago.
Geological background
In geological terms, Iceland is a young island. It started to form in the Miocene era about 20 million years ago from a series of volcanic eruptions on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, where it lies between the North American Plate and Eurasian Plate. These plates spread at a rate of approximately 2.5 centimeters per year. This elevated portion of the ridge is known as the Reykjanes Ridge. The volcanic activity is attributed to a hotspot, the Iceland hotspot, which in turn lies over a mantle plume, a column of anomalously hot rock in the Earth's mantle which is likely to be partly responsible for the island's creation and continued existence. For comparison, it is estimated that other volcanic islands, such as the Faroe Islands have existed for about 55 million years,the Azores about 8 million years, and Hawaii less than a million years. The younger rock strata in the southwest of Iceland and the central highlands are only about 700,000 years old. The Geological history of the Earth is divided into ice ages, based on temperature and climate. The last glacial period, commonly referred to as The Ice Age is thought to have begun about 110,000 years ago and ended about 10,000 years ago. While covered in ice, Iceland's icefalls, fjords and valleys were formed.
Early history
Iceland remained, for a long time, one of the world's last uninhabited larger islands. It has been suggested that the land called Thule by the Greek geographer Pytheas was actually Iceland, although it seems highly unlikely considering Pytheas' description of it as an agricultural country with plenty of milk, honey, and fruit; the name is more likely to have referred to Norway, or possibly the Faroe Islands or Shetland. Many of the early settlers were Thelir, fleeing the recent union of Norway under Harald Fairhair and came from Telemark. A similar argument explains the name of Greenland from Grenland, neighbouring Telemark and also populated by Thelir. The exact date that humans first reached the island is uncertain. Roman currency dating to the third century has been found in Iceland, but it is unknown whether they were brought there at that time or came later with Vikings after circulating for centuries.Irish monks
There is some literary evidence that monks from a Hiberno-Scottish mission may have settled in Iceland before the arrival of the Norsemen. The Landnámabók, written in the 1100s, mentions the presence of Irish monks, called the Papar, prior to Norse settlement and states that the monks left behind Irish books, bells, and crosiers, among other things. According to the same account, the Irish monks abandoned the country when the Norse arrived or had left prior to their arrival. The twelfth-century scholar Ari Þorgilsson's Íslendingabók reasserts that items including bells corresponding to those used by Irish monks were found by the settlers. No such artifacts have been discovered by archaeologists, however. Some Icelanders claimed descent from Cerball mac Dúnlainge, King of Osraige in southeastern Ireland, at the time of the Landnámabóks creation.An archaeological excavation has revealed the ruins of a cabin in Hafnir on the Reykjanes peninsula. Carbon dating reveals that the cabin was abandoned somewhere between 770 and 880, suggesting that Iceland was populated well before 874. This archaeological find may also indicate that the monks left Iceland before the Norse arrived.
Norse discovery
According to the Landnámabók, Iceland was discovered by Naddodd, one of the first settlers in the Faroe Islands, who was sailing from Norway to the Faroes but lost his way and drifted to the east coast of Iceland. Naddodd called the country Snæland "Snowland". Swedish sailor Garðar Svavarsson also accidentally drifted to the coast of Iceland. He discovered that the country was an island and called it Garðarshólmi "Garðar's Islet" and stayed for the winter at Húsavík.The first Norseman who deliberately sailed to Iceland was Hrafna-Flóki Vilgerðarson. Flóki settled for one winter at Barðaströnd. After the cold winter passed, the summer came and the whole island became green, which stunned Flóki. Realizing that this place was in fact habitable, despite the horribly cold winter, and full of useful resources, Flóki restocked his boat. He then returned east to Norway with resources and knowledge.
Settlement (874–930)
The first permanent settler in Iceland is usually considered to have been a Norwegian chieftain named Ingólfur Arnarson and his wife, Hallveig Fróðadóttir. According to the Landnámabók, he threw two carved pillars overboard as he neared land, vowing to settle wherever they landed. He then sailed along the coast until the pillars were found in the southwestern peninsula, now known as Reykjanesskagi. There he settled with his family around 874, in a place he named Reykjavík "Smoke Cove", probably from the geothermal steam rising from the earth. This place eventually became the capital and the largest city of modern Iceland. It is recognized, however, that Ingólfur Arnarson may not have been the first one to settle permanently in Iceland—that may have been Náttfari, one of Garðar Svavarsson's men who stayed behind when Garðar returned to Scandinavia.Much of the information on Ingólfur comes from the Landnámabók, written some three centuries after the settlement. Archeological findings in Reykjavík are consistent with the date given there: there was a settlement in Reykjavík around 870.
File:Flateyjarbok Haraldr Halfdan.jpg|thumb|250px|Harald Fairhair receives the kingdom of Norway from his father, Halfdan the Black.|alt=Harald Fairhair of Norway receiving the kingdom of Norway from his father, Halfdan the Black.
According to Landnámabók, Ingólfur was followed by many more Norse chieftains, their families and slaves who settled all the habitable areas of the island in the next decades. Archeological evidence strongly suggests that the timing is roughly accurate; "that the whole country was occupied within a couple of decades towards the end of the 9th century." These people were primarily of Norwegian, Irish, and Scottish origin. Some of the Irish and Scots were slaves and servants of the Norse chiefs, according to the sagas of Icelanders, the Landnámabók, and other documents. Some settlers coming from the British Isles were "Hiberno-Norse," with cultural and family connections both to the coastal and island areas of Ireland and/or Scotland and to Norway.
The traditional explanation for the exodus from Norway is that people were fleeing the harsh rule of the Norwegian king Harald Fairhair, whom medieval literary sources credit with the unification of some parts of modern Norway during this period. Viking incursions into Britain were also expelled thoroughly during this time, potentially leading to a need for peaceful settlement in other lands. It is also believed that the western fjords of Norway were simply overcrowded in this period.
The settlement of Iceland is thoroughly recorded in the aforementioned Landnámabók, although the book was compiled in the early 12th century when at least 200 years had passed from the age of settlement. Ari Þorgilsson's Íslendingabók is generally considered more reliable as a source and is probably somewhat older, but it is far less thorough. It does say that Iceland was fully settled within 60 years, which likely means that all arable land had been claimed by various settlers.
In 2016, archaeologists uncovered a longhouse in Stöðvarfjörður that has been dated to as early as 800. Other, similar finds in Iceland have been dated to a similar time, preceding the traditional settlement date significantly.