Stumped in the Sagas: Woodland and Wooden Tools in the Íslendingasögur

• Main Author: Conway, Rebecca Taylor, 1992-
• Other Authors: Háskóli Íslands
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: 2015
• Subjects: Íslensk miðaldafræði; Íslensk fornbókmenntasaga; Fornleifafræði; Skógar; Svæði; Wyatt; Iceland
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1946/22708

Recent archaeological and paleoenvironmental studies have questioned the degree and uniformity of woodland decline during Iceland’s settlement years (Dugmore et al., 2006; Lawson et al., 2007; Smith, 1995). Not only does deforestation seem to be a more temporally and geographically nuanced process than previously believed but archaeological and legal studies point towards active woodland management systems during the settlement and Commonwealth periods in Iceland (Church et al., 2007; Dugmore et al., 2007; Lawson et al., 2007; Simpson et al., 2001; Vickers et al., 2011). The complexity of this evidence is generally ignored in the literary realm, where literary scholars (if they look at woodland at all) identify descriptions of native Icelandic woodland in the Íslendingasögur as a ‘Golden Age’ trope or literary device (Abram, 2015; Clunies Ross, 1994; Wyatt 2001). With phenomenological theory as a framework for landscape, culture, and body interactions, this dissertation explores the use of wood and the presentation of woodland in two Íslendingasögur, Grettis saga and Eyrbyggja saga. The type of wood to which the various characters have access, as well as the uses to which they put this resource, carry heavy implications for the corporeal, social, and geographic identities of these characters. Contrary to the idea of forest (or lack of it) as static backdrop, the roles of wood and woodland in the selected Íslendingasögur illustrate continuing, albeit controlled, political and personal relationships with an important raw material. Undanfarnar fornleifarannsóknir og rannsóknir á fornum umhverfisbreytingum hafa lagt í vafa stærðargráðu og einsleitni skógareyðingar á landnámsárum Íslands (Dugmore et al., 2006; Lawson et al., 2007; Smith, 1995). Svo virðist vera að skógareyðing hafi ekki eingöngu verið ójöfn hvað varðar tímabil og svæði, heldur hafa fornleifa- og lagarannsóknir sýnt að virkt umsjónarkerfi með skógum hafi verið til staðar á landnámsöld (Church et al., 2007; Dugmore et al., 2007; Lawson et al., 2007; ...