Iceland: Horseback tours in saga land

by W. S. C. Russell

It was merely the act without any conversion from Scandinavian polytheism. Again we read,—

“Winterlid, the Scald, made a scurvy rime about him,” Thangbrand. And again we find,—

[10]“Thorvald, the Guileful, and Winterlid, the Scald, made a scurvy rime about Thangbrand, but he slew them both. Thangbrand abode three winters in Iceland, and was the bane of men or ever he departed thence.”

It is reported in Iceland that this Pool is the place where Thangbrand christened his converts. Since it is authentic that he passed the time in Iceland at the home of Hall, which was in the southeast of Iceland, it is not likely that this is the real pool, although it is true that christenings took place in this pool at very early times. The Vikings did not take very kindly to the christening and the following facts will be of interest to those who dispute over the correct method of baptism. When the priests found that the Icelanders were the most stubborn of all the pagans of their experience about the rite of christening, the priests changed their tactics and performed their christenings in the warm pools adjacent to the hot springs. Their method of baptism in the eleventh century in Iceland may be inferred.

The Saga references show that the Mývatn region was an important place in the early days of colonization and in subsequent centuries and we reluctantly close the old annals so full of interest to the antiquarian and the historian, and turn again to a more general view of the Mývatn of the present. The view from Skútustaðir is remarkable and of great variety. In the foreground, the quiet lake, alive with water fowl and fringed with prosperous farms, presents a picture of pastoral peace and beauty; in the distance across the lake rise clouds of steam and sulfurous gases from the sizzling solfataras of Námaskarð, Sulfur-Pass; to the left rises the innocent looking peaks of Krafla, Creeping, and Leirnúkr, Mud-Peak, two famous volcanoes; to the right, the prominent feature in the landscape is Hverfjall, Hot-Spring-Mountain. Hverfjall is a large circular crater of the explosion type. It stands 700 feet above the level of the plain and is 4875 feet in diameter across the top. It is four miles in circumference at the summit of the rim. The interior is a mass of fragments and crushed rubble. There is a large mound in the center composed of crumpled lava with angular edges. It is doubtful if lava ever flowed from this great crater, although there was said to have been an eruption in 1728. I found no evidence of such eruption, other than that of a violent upheaval of the crust due to internal explosions of a mighty character. A force beyond human comprehension or calculation thrust upwards this enormous mass and dropped the titanic fragments in the form of this circular wall 700 feet high here,—

“Wide ruin spread the elements around,

His havoc leagues on leagues you may descry.”

The farm at Skútustaðir is one to which my thoughts often revert. I spent some time there in 1910 and was so charmed with the place and delighted with the Dean and his family that I returned to it for a more extended visit in 1913. The Dean has since moved to Hólmar, Eskifjörðr. Skútustaðir is a scene unmatched in Iceland, the lake, the sloping uplands clothed with excellent grass and sprinkled with a wealth of Arctic flowers, the flocks and herds in the succulent pastures, the farm buildings, Thinghús and church grouped on an eminence between two bodies of water and the grand panorama of meadows, rivers and volcanoes, with their ascending columns and clouds of steam,—a panorama that is well worth a summer and ten thousand miles of travel. On each of my visits the haying was in full swing. The men rose early to cut the grass in the dew and paused at midday for a long rest and a plunge in the lake while the raking, bundling and stacking continued well into the night. Numerous cocks of hay rose from the closely pared turf, many wild ducks led their young from one sheet of water to the other, crossing the yard between the buildings or pausing around the haycocks to pick the numerous insects or venturing close to the doorways of the buildings for bits of food. Along the margin of the lake I found many of the swimming sandpipers, Lobipes hyperboreus, the Northern Phalarope. It is a beautiful bird and at Mývatn it is so tame that one may sit quietly on the bank and coax it up within a few feet of the shore where it will dart about picking up the insects thrown to it. I devoted an hour to studying this bird, feeding it in groups of several and in taking their photographs. What a shame it is that New England birds are not treated with the same thoughtfulness as the birds of Iceland! These birds were within a minute’s walk of the house.

We strolled around the east side of the lake to the north shore and for three days made our headquarters at Reykjahlið, Smoking-Pass, a remnant of a once prosperous farm which has been destroyed by the lava pouring from the vents of the foot hills that surround Leirhnúkr. English travellers of casual observation have stated that this great flood of lava came from the volcano itself but if they had taken the trouble to follow the streams of lava from the farm to their source, they would have found that a deep valley runs between these foothills and the real volcano of Leirhnúkr. This lava flowed during the years 1725, 1727, 1728 and 1729. Leirhnúkr was active at the same time, hence their error in attributing this sheet of lava to the volcano. The volcano has enough havoc to its discredit without charging it with the crime of ruining the fertile plains at the north end of the lake. In 1729 an extensive tract of grazing and mowing land of rare fertility was overflowed by molten rock. Some branches of the stream entered the lake and quenched their ardent fires, one branch flowed to the northeast corner of the church and was arrested in its flow within two feet of the building. Here the stream divided into two arms and flowed around the edifice reuniting about sixty feet from the opposite corner, leaving the church entirely unharmed in the midst of the terrific heat of its fiery glow. Says Henderson, who mused at length over the incident,—

“Who knows but the effectual earnest prayer of some pious individual, or some designs of mercy, may have been the cause fixed in the eternal purpose of Jehovah for the preservation of this edifice?”