Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2002, Page 63

árni Einarsson, Oddgeir Hansson & Orri Vésteinsson
AN EXTENSIVE SYSTEM OF MEDIEVAL
EARTHWORKS IN NORTHEAST ICELAND
A complex system of interconnected earthworks, preserved primarily in moorland
pastures, was recorded in the county of Suður-Þingeyjarsýsla, NE-Iceland.
Indications are that these earthworks date from the Middie Ages and that they
were a common feature of the landscape all over Iceland, but have survived rela-
tively well in this region. Studies of aerial photographs revealed about 150 km of
earthworks. They form a pattem which suggests a role as boundaries between
adjacent farms and fencing off their homelands from the commons. Gaps in the
pattern suggest that other 50-100 km may have disappeared due to soil erosion or
solifluction.
An ongoing project aims to fully map these earthworks, date them, establish
their function and to analyse their implications for the socio-economic and envi-
ronmental history of the first centuries of settlement in Iceland.
Arni Einarsson, Mývatn Research Station, 660 Mývatn, ICELAND, arnie@hi.is
Oddgeir Hansson & Orri Vésteinsson, Fornleifastofnun Islands. Bárugötu 3,
101 Reykjavík, ICELAND, oddgeir@instarch.is, orri@instarch.is
Keywords: earthworks, boundaries, pasture management.
Introduction
Over the past two centuries ancient earth-
works on the hillsides and moorlands
above the present settlement in northeast-
ern Iceland have been recorded by a vari-
ety of authors, including farmers, parish-
priests, natural-historians and antiquari-
ans.
Although these earthworks have not
been the subject of systematic studies,
two different functions have been
ascribed to them: on the one hand they
are supposed to have fenced off pastures
and on the other they are supposed to
have been made as tracks, for both peo-
ple and livestock. In accordance with
this they are variously called "vörslu-
garðar" and "vamargarðar" (lit. dykes for
keeping or obstructing), "merkjagarðar"
(lit. boundary dykes), "göngugarðar" (lit.
dykes for walking), "reiðgarðar" (lit.
dykes for riding), or "rekstrargarðar" (lit.
dykes for herding) and even "granna-
garðar" (lit. neighbours' dykes) and "eng-
jagarðar" (lit. meadow dykes).1
In the 19th century some of the more
monumental earthworks had become the
stuff of folklore, their making attributed
either to famous historical personages or
supematural beings. As a rule 19th cen-
' Early occurrences of most of these terms are in SSÞ, 183.
2 ÞJÁ II, 95, 137-38; IV, 141; SSÞ, 183.
Archaeologia Islandica 2 (2002) 61-73