VOLCANIC EEUPTIONS AND EARTHQUAKES IN ICELAND 



WITHIN HISTORIC TIMES.* 



Translated by George H. Boehmer. 



Very little account is taken in the Icelandic sagas of nature and its 

 phenomena, yet already at an early day the volcanoes of Iceland have 

 been mentioned. The "speculum regale," written in Norway in 1230- 

 1250, dwells on volcanoes and hot springs in Iceland, and advances some 

 sui)erstitious ideas as to their origin. " The Icelandic Annals " quote 

 volcanic eruptions and violent earthquakes, but without entering into 

 details; and a large amount of information on this subject exists only 

 in manuscript. 



The first mention by foreign authors of the volcanoes of Iceland are 

 found in the "Topographia Hibernise," by Giraldus Cambrensis (1187), 

 and in " Chronicon de Lanercost" (1275), while the earliest descriptions 

 of the island were given in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. In 

 these the most absurd ideas regarding Iceland and other northern coun- 

 tries are advanced, and unlimited fancies and superstitions are disi)layed 

 as regards the Hecla. At about the middle of the sixteenth century 

 the brothers Johannes Magnus and Clans Magnus wrote about Iceland, 

 and at about the year 1600 Oeorg Peersonand BlefJcenius published some 

 volumes on the same island, in which they distinguish themselves by 

 their ridiculous accounts and illusions. They were reported by the 

 Icelandic scientist, Arngrlmr Jonsson (1568-1648), who, in several works, 

 endeavored to give the foreigners a correct idea of the country. But 

 it is only since the middle of the eighteenth century, and only by the 

 efforts of Thormodhr Torfason ( + 1719) and Ami Magnusson (+1730) 

 that the north has commenced to take an interest in the language and 

 the history of Iceland. Ole Worm was the first, in Denmark, to write 

 something on the remarkable nature of that country. Nevertheless the 

 knowledge of it was but very imperfect until the middle of the eighteenth 

 century. In 1746, Johan Anderson, burgomaster of Hamburg, published 

 a volume on Iceland, in which he corrected many inaccurate ideas, and 

 which was followed by the publication, in 1752, of Niels Horrebow's ex- 

 cellent work "Tilforladelige Efterretninger om Island." But no work 

 has ever served a better purpose than the " Reise igjennem Island," 

 Soro, 1772, by Eggert Olafsson and Bijarni Pdlsson; it has been trans- 



* Translalion of the rdsumd of '"Oversigt ov'er de islaiidske Viilkauers Historio af 

 Tli. Tlioroddscu, Laeror ved liealskoleii paa Modhnivellir, Island." 



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