Archaeologia Islandica - 01.01.2005, Page 16

Torfi Tulinius
Europe. The analysis of fish-bones found
in middens corroborates this evidence.
Fish was always important but in the
period when stockfish exports were at
their highest levels, cod bones are domi-
nant in those collected in the fishing set-
tlements. All this goes to prove the key
role of fishing and other maritime
resources in the economy of the
Westfjords. Invoking an earlier article by
himself,12 Edvardsson argues convincing-
ly that in the assessment of land value in
the region, fishing, driftwood and other
resources involving the sea accounted for
more than half of the price of property,
which is a clear indicator of something
never stated openly in the sources, i.e. the
importance of the sea in the local econo-
my.
All this raises compelling ques-
tions concerning the evolution of
Icelandic society and culture. If fishing
was a specialised line of work aimed at
creating exportable goods, if the popula-
tion was engaged in diverse activities, if
indeed the accumulation of wealth in the
late Middle Ages allowed for an increase
in the population of the area, one can ask
whether the society of the Westfjords was
not more complex and dynamic than in
other parts of the country. A sign of this
is a vibrant lay culture that seems to have
thrived in the area at least ífom the thir-
teenth century into the seventeenth. It
was lay because the Westljords are far
away from any centre of ecclesiastical
power. There are neither bishop’s sees
nor monasteries in the region.
The evidence for the dynamism
of the culture of the Westfjords is varied
and convincing. The existence of sagas
such as Hrafns saga or Gísla saga, proba-
bly composed in the Westfjords near the
middle of the thirteenth century, is proof
of literacy among - or at least around -
the dominant laymen. It also shows the
existence of a lively oral tradition con-
ceming the past as well as a taste for and
knowledge of poetry, especially the
ancient "dróttkvætt" or skaldic verse.
This is corroborated by diverse accounts
in the contemporary sagas which show,
among other things, that entertainment
with poetry and story-telling was prac-
ticed in feasts in the homes of local mag-
nates. Also these magnates seem to have
had poets in their household. There is
quite a lot of evidence that these cultural
practices - or at least some of them - con-
tinued well into the seventeenth century.
For example the late medieval magnate,
Bjöm Einarsson (1350-1415) of Vatns-
fjörður is thought to have had poets in his
entourage and Jón Arason (1606-1673),
another denizen of Vatnsljörður, com-
posed a long skaldic poem, Eggerts-
diktur, in honour of his great-grandfather
Eggert Hannesson (1516-1583), who was
the representative of the Danish king in
the area during his lifetime.13 Anumber of
sagas, especially late medieval romances,
and saga manuscripts are believed to
come from the Westfjord area, either
because they were written there or had
been preserved there. The earliest exam-
ples of the late medieval genre of
"rímur", metrical romances, are thought
to have been composed in the region.14
12 Ragnar Edvardsson, "Statistical Analysis of the 1703-1712 Land Register: Four Districts in the North West of Iceland",
Proceedings of the Conference ofNordic Archaeologists in Akureyri 2001, Reykjavík.
13 Þórunn Sigurðardóttir, "Vestfirskur aðall", p. 206.
14 Sverrir Tómasson, "Rímur og aðrar vestfirskar bókmenntir á síðmiðöldum", Arsrit Sögufélags Isfirðinga 43 (2003), p. 147-
170.
14