Viking Age Iceland Paperback – September 1, 2001

We encountered Jesse Byock's work while researching the history of Iceland prior to our visit in October. His papers on the archaeology at Mosfell and its connection with the Sagas were truly inspiring. This book is destined to become another treasure on our bookshelf.

This study seems to have been written as a follow-up to Medieval Iceland: Society, Sagas, and Power and covers much of the same territory. However, this is a somewhat different work as well. While "Medieval Iceland" focuses much more heavily on the legal sources, this book attempts to use the sagas to reconstruct social structures in the earlier centuries of republican Iceland. This book, along with the author's other works, should be in the library of anyone who seriously wants to learn more about the Viking-Age Norse cultures.

This book covers a wide range of topics, from the effects of human settlement on Iceland ecologically to the legal mechanisms that allowed blood feuds to play a stabilizing role on society. Along the way, he covers questions of how Icelandic society was stratified, the role of the chieftains/godhar, and the economics of the island. In an appendix he discusses the construction of turf buildings.

In terms of questions of the uses of the Sagas as sources for history, Byock discusses the problems of doing so and the changing debate among historians, covering a large number of viewpoints here. This section in particular is very helpful for those who may be trying to make up their minds as to whether the family sagas can be useful in the study of history.

The book is very detailed in what it covers and provides a compelling picture of early Iceland. Highly recommended.

Byock's study of Iceland during the Viking Age and the generations immediately following it, is not an exciting page turner, but is filled with information not easily available elsewahere. Nordic Iceland developed under extremely unusual circumstances. Unlike the subsequent discoveries of Greenland and North America, Iceland was uninhabitated. Usable land was scarce and was quickly filled with settlers. During the first centuries, civilization developed entirely without the presence of 'civis' [cities] and there weren't even any towns. The liveable parts of the island were subdivided entirely into farms.

Nevertheless there was was a society and that society was highly litigious--an alternative to lethal 'solutions'. This was also necessary because Scandinavians of the time were inclined to violence at the drop of a hat. Rules to direct these aggressive impulses into survivable channels were simply mandatory. It was also necessary because available land filled up quickly so there came to be an eternal jocking for land and postion in limited territories.

Although legalistic to a fault, Icelandic law had little--and much--in common with present law. Might pretty much made Right and there was a continual scamble for allies--interested allies, to be certain--to 'back' your position at the local Thing or Althing. You won if you could back your opponent and his supporters down, although this sometimes involved bloodshed and killing. Still, this 'decision' didn't always stick. If you reckoned that you had more to gain by a killing than peaceful acquiesence...well...you killed and hoped you judged the consequences properly. If not, you stood to be 'Outlawed' which meant ANYONE could kill you on sight. Police and military weren't necessary. Most individuals were evidently happy to participate in a free kill.

Although not included in this book, there is an instructive tale in one of the Vinland Sagas--Sagas primarily about Icelanders. Our Scandinavians are sailing down the coast or a river in North America and chance on some 'skraelings' sleeping under an overturned canoe supported by timbers. Our Europeans quietly land on the bank and kill the native-americans because they were obviously 'Outlaws' A free kill. A kill to be taken advantage of.

As rough as Icelandic Law was by our standards, it worked. If you think about it, present legal systems are very much designed to shortcut the more direct satisfaction of a killing duel. Amazingly, when religious push-came-to-shove in 1000 A.D.--and despite the fact that most Icelanders were Pagan--they abided by a decision that ALL would convert to Christianity, in the interest of order. To be certain, many people must have 'converted' entirely tongue-in-cheek but they converted nonetheless and Iceland became a more-or-less Christian nation. I say 'more-or-less' because Pagan prists became Catholic Priests and our primary knowledge of ancient Scandinavian religion was written down--quite proudly--by Icelandic Catholic priests about 200 years following this mass conversion.

I also enjoyed discussions about the legal status of women and children. They were IMMUNE from killing violence and protected from family violence. Although women couldn't personally prosecute legal cases [probably to protect them], their status was similar to their fathers, brothers and husbands. There was something like sexual equality which was not unlike that followed over much of the northern world, although obviously not in the rest of the world. Our present laws fixing female equality must therefore derive from northern law and tradition.

More a survey of the saga literature than a real history, but Iceland is an endlessly fascinating place. The actual historical people seemed to get lost in the saga legends. I really wanted to know how the people lived their lives, but was disappointed on that score.

The title says it all - this book is about Iceland in the Viking Age. if you are looking for detailed information how the Icelandic Vikings dressed or what they ate, look elsewhere. This book is about more broad topics relating to Iceland and Viking social structure and politics.

Written from a field investigation perspective, rather than an academic one, the Byock work is stimulating and intriguing....I think I found my Icelandic ancestors (Eymundson) in those pages, and also found, as a building scientist and registered architect, the detailed descriptions of Viking period structures fascinating. As the Viking age closed, so did the warm arctic period become the "little ice age" which lasted for about four hundred years, affecting social order, politics as well as the economic reality causing increased trade and increased reliance on oceanic resources. I want to learn more about the era that superseded the Viking Age!

Very good.

I read this book prior to my trip to Iceland, and it really served to give me a good sense of the country, how it was settled, who settled it, and how the population grew over time. It also explained the desolation of the countryside --- when you travel from the airport to Reykjavik, the land is like much like on the moon --- treeless crags abound. The book explains how this came to be. In addition, the book gives a good background to the sagas and other adventures of the people of Iceland, and those who came to its shores.

Of course, this book will not explain Iceland's rise to financial success and despair in the early 21st century, but that is a tale for another time.

(review by Kendall Giles)