Saga - 1999, Síða 218

216
JENNY JOCHENS
normally were considered to be darker. As evidence of Norwegian self-
consciousness the nickname ,the white' started to appear among
Norwegian Vikings whose blond features stood out in the Celtic world.
Settling in Iceland, they were joined by Celts some of whom came of their
free will whereas the majority had been taken as slaves on the
Norwegians' stopovers on the Westem Islands.
The number of Celtic settlers relative to the Norwegians is difficult to
determine. The problem can be studied in Landnámabók and in the sagas
but the texts do not lend themselves to statistical analysis, and estimates
range from 14% to more than 40%. Nonetheless, Celtic settlers can be
identified in these sources from a study of their names and place of ori-
gin, and in some cases by lack of ancestors or attribution of nicknames.
A few free Celts, some of high social status at home, retained their Celtic
names and even bestowed them on their Icelandic children. Others,
perhaps discovering that their Celtic names were too difficult to pro-
nounce, adopted regular Old Norse names. Of special interest is a group
of names starting with the prefix Is-, such as Isleifur, Isröður, and Isólfur.
Since such names were rare in Norway until later, it is suggested that
their bearers may have created new identities by which they linked their
affinity with the new land, Island. A larger group, mainly slaves, were
given identities by their masters with Norse words which eventually
became regular names. Chief among these are the names of Svartur and
Ljótur. Highlighting the features of darkness, that is, hair, eyes, eyebrows,
skin, with assumed objectivity, the former gave a fresh identity to men
forced to continue as slaves in new surroundings, whereas the latter,
conveying the connotation of ,ugly', revealed an underlying hostility
provoked by the obvious visibility of ,the other'. Regardless of narne,
many Celts can be identiffied by their place of origin as being, from the
West', from the Hebrides, and other islands. Most Norwegian settlers
carried long lists of forefathers in their mental baggage. One fourth of the
more than four hundred original settlers are nonetheless listed without
patronymics and only with their given name. Some of these are declared
to have come from Norway, but it is plausible that a large part of these
immigrants came from the Celtic world. A comparable number is titte
with nicknames instead of paternal identifiers. Since these often identify
unattractive features, it is likely they were attached to people of Celtic
origin.
Since Norwegians brought only few of their own women to Iceland m
the beginning, it follows that Celtic women were largely responsible for
funnelling Celtic genes into the Icelandic population either directly °r
indirectly. Although high-ranking women who were imported to Icelan
as wives gave birth to children the slaves were more numerous. Celtm