Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1991, Page 26

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PROBLEMS CONCERNING THE EARLIEST SETTLEMENT .
of a change at about 950, reflected in a
shift from the cultivation of oats to the
cultivation of barley. To him this fact
might indicate a shift from Norse-Irish to
Norwegian settlement, even if this change
may have taken place over a time.47
In my opinion, this theory is not quite
satisfactory to explain the »gap« between
a supposed early Irish and a later Norse
settlement — at least only if we accept an
idea of two Norse »Landnáms«, one from
the south at about 800 and one direct from
Norway at about 900, possibly connected
with king Harald Hairfair’s seizure of po-
wer, sustained bu the Icelandic tradition
and Faroese archaeological research. The
»Dicuilian« Norsemen should then have
carried on the already existing cultivation
of oats, while barley was introduced by
their Norwegian kinsmen 100 or 150 years
later.48 But the question arises: Were two
Norse Landnáms possible in this small
country? Could there have been space for
a massive new colonization more than one
hundred years after the first one? Hadn’t
the first settlers already divided the land
among themselves over this span of three
or four generations when the effect of in-
heritance must have been an active social
force in the Faroese community?
So, temporarily leaving out of account
the possibilities of a Stone Age settlement,
it still remains to connect or to disconnect
there hypothetical phases of Landnám in
the Faroe Islands: one »Irish anchorite«
phase, one »Dicuilian« phase and one
period of change to permanent Norse sett-
lement.
At least natural science has provoked
much interesting and inspiring disturbance
in the study of Faroese history.
Philology and Philologists
I have deliberately chosen to put subject
and scholars under the same item, finding
it necessary not to leave out this field of
science, but at the same time stressing that
it has not very much to say about the ques-
tion dealt with here: the dating of the first
settlement. But, as a matter of fact, the
philologists were the first to touch upon
early Irish-Faroese relations.
In his studies Dr Jakob Jakobsen poin-
ted out that several placenames in the
Faroe Islands were of Gaelic origin.49 Pro-
fessor Christian Matras continued his
Work, widening the spectrum also to lang-
uage elements other than place-names. On
the islands of Mykines he maintained to
have found an interesting place-name,
»Korkadalur«, meaning the »oats vall-
ey«, thus linking together Sverri Dahl’s ass-
umption concerning the fields and Dr Jo-
hansen’s pollen analyses. (The Gaelic ori-
gin of the word »korki« and the meaning
of the word had already been observed by
Dr Jakobsen, but not in Matras’ interpre-
tation.50) Christian Matras also pointed
out that the first part of two place-names,
»Papurshálsur« and »Paparøkur« might re-
late to an early Irish settlement.51 But that
such locations shuld have been the remote
abodes of distressed Irish hermits has been
questioned by Símun V. Arge.52 And from
pure logic it can hardly be possible that in-
vading Norsemen should have adopted
place-names from the enemies they had
either killed or driven away. Gaelic cultur-
al, also linguistic, influence after the perm-
anent Norse settlement has been proven
by irrefutable evidence.