ABSTRACT
The island-hopping of the Vikings during the ninth century was almost inevitable. The inner dynamic of the emigration movement, particularly the land hunger, drove these seamen-farmers further and further west. Once Shetland was settled and once Ireland had began to lose its attraction, the Vikings found other and uninhabited places to settle. Flat maps distort distances in the northern waters; in fact, the North Atlantic islands lie at regular, navigable distances from one another, not like a string of pearls, more like stepping stones of different sizes and shapes. The Faroe Islands are only 190 miles from Shetland; the Faroes, in turn, only 240 miles from Iceland; and Iceland only 190 miles from the nearest part of Greenland. Or, to look at it another way, facing from Norway to the west, the Faroes lie about 350 miles distant, Iceland 600 miles, and Greenland close to 1000 miles. Nothing in history, of course, is truly inevitable, but, given the sailing and navigational skills of the Vikings and their land hunger in the ninth and tenth centuries, it comes as no surprise that the settlement of Shetland was followed by settlements in Faroe, Iceland, Greenland, and even beyond Greenland till the lines were so long, the circumstances so disagreeable, that the westward expansion ended, short-lived, on the shores of North America. That theme belongs to the next chapter. For now, let us consider the Viking achievement in the islands of the North Atlantic, unique among Viking experiences, for here they settled uninhabited lands and their achievements reached a dazzling fulfilment in the great Icelandic age.
