78 DWELLINGS OF THE SAG A- TIME LN 



left was about 13 meters 'from the door of the house, on the 

 steep mountain side. It was 4 meters square, built of turf only, 

 and partially underground. There was a large square platform 

 of stones in one corner which had served for a fire-place. 



Narrow platforms of earth faced along the outer edge with 

 upright stones, on which the inhabitants both sat and slept, ex- 

 tended along one or both sides of the hall. In the large halls 

 these platforms were about 23 centimeters high and 11 meters 

 broad. Sometimes there was also a broader platform at one end 

 of the hall. Samsstadir is one of the farmsteads in the Thor's 

 River valley which was buried during an eruption of Mount 

 Hecla in the fourteenth century. This valley is called the 

 Pompeii of Iceland. The farm was probably abandoned about 

 1300. It shows the first change in the evolution toward thicker 

 walls. 



With the exception of some spinning-stones, which were found 

 in the sitting-room of a house not shown here, no relics were 

 found during these researches. It is also an interesting fact that 

 no runic inscription belonging to the Saga-time or for two cen- 

 turies later has yet been found in Iceland. 



The evolution which has taken place in house-building since 

 the Saga-time has been in the steady increase in the thickness 

 of the walls until their breadth is nearly doubled, a slight in- 

 crease in height, not admitting a second story under the roof, 

 and the addition of many apartments, so that from a distance 

 the many roofs of a farmstead look almost like a little village. 



GREENLAND 



Greenland was discovered and colonized by Erik Thorvaldsson 

 toward the end of the tenth century, and from that time two 

 Norse colonies, called respectively the eastern and the western 

 settlements, prospered for about three hundred years. The 

 ruins of these two settlements have been studied with more or 

 less care by the Danish government. In the eastern settlement 

 a hundred and fifty farms, with all their outbuildings, have 

 been surveyed and measured. A few dwelling-houses have been 

 thorough^ dug out and examined.* 



*Beskrivelse af Ruiner i Julianehaabs Distrikt i Aaret 1880, af G. P. Holm. Meddel- 

 elser om Gronland, udgivne af Commissioner! for Ledelsen af de geologiske og geo- 

 graphiske UndersSgelser i Gronland. Copenhagen, 1883, vol. vi. 



Undersogelse af Gronlands Vestkyst fra 64° til 67° N. B. af J. A. D. Jensen, 1884 og 

 1885. Meddelelser om Gronland. Copenhagen, 1889, vol. viii. 



Arkseologiske Underso^lsiT i Julianehaabs Distrikt af Daniel Brtinn, 1895. Meddel- 

 elser om Gronland. Copenhagen, 1890, vol. xvi. 



