48 Fun Facts About Iceland

Which Icelandic town is nicknamed the 'Capital of the North'?

Akureyri carries the grand nickname with only about 20,000 people, in a country where roughly two in three people live around the capital.

Iceland's capital holds what distinction among the capitals of sovereign states?

Northernmost of all sovereign-state capitals, Reykjavík sits at about 64°08′ N on Faxaflói bay; Nuuk lies farther north but is not the capital of a sovereign state.

The name Reykjavík translates roughly as what?

Reykjavík means 'Smoky bay', from Old Norse reykr, 'smoke', and vík, 'bay'; by tradition the smoke was steam rising from the area's hot springs.

According to the Landnámabók, who became Iceland's first permanent settler in 874?

Ingólfr Arnarson is named in the Landnámabók as the first permanent settler; he reportedly cast his high-seat pillars overboard and settled where they came ashore, at Reykjavík, in 874.

Which Norseman gave Iceland its name after climbing a mountain and seeing an ice-filled fjord?

Flóki Vilgerðarson found the island by releasing three ravens at sea and following the one that flew ahead and never returned, which earned him the nickname Hrafna-Flóki, or Raven-Flóki.

Iceland's Althing, founded around 930, originally met in what setting?

Outdoors on a plain it met, for about two weeks each summer, while those attending camped in booths of turf and stone; it counts among the world's oldest parliaments.

Which drink remained banned in Iceland until 1 March 1989?

Beer stayed illegal for 74 years: wine came back within a decade of the 1915 ban and spirits in the 1930s, but campaigners argued cheap beer would do more harm, and its return is still toasted as Beer Day.

Iceland became a republic in 1944 by ending its union with which country?

Denmark had shared its king with Iceland under a 1918 act of union; Icelanders voted to end it while Denmark was under German occupation, and King Christian X still sent his congratulations.

Iceland's 'Cod Wars' of the 1950s-70s were fishing disputes with which country?

The Cod Wars pitted Iceland against the United Kingdom, whose Royal Navy escorted its trawlers; Iceland still won each round, helped by threats to quit NATO and deny it vital North Atlantic bases.

What new weapon did Iceland's coast guard turn on foreign trawlers in the Cod Wars?

Net cutters, towed behind a patrol ship, severed a trawler's nets and sent gear and catch to the seabed; Iceland used them as its fishing limit jumped to 50 and then 200 miles.

Which two leaders held a 1986 summit at Höfði House in Reykjavík that helped end the Cold War?

Reagan and Gorbachev met at Höfði House in October 1986; the talks broke down over SDI testing, yet the ground they covered led to the 1987 INF Treaty.

Reykjavík hosted the 1972 'Match of the Century' in which game?

Chess was the game: Bobby Fischer beat Boris Spassky 12½–8½ in Reykjavík in 1972, ending 24 years of Soviet hold on the world title.

In 1980, Vigdís Finnbogadóttir of Iceland became the world's first woman to do what?

Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, a theatre director and divorced single mother, was the first woman to win a national presidential election, edging out three men with about a third of the vote; she served until 1996.

Iceland is the only NATO member with no what?

Iceland alone among NATO members keeps no standing army; its Coast Guard handles defence, and the US-run Iceland Defense Force left Keflavík in 2006.

Iceland straddles the boundary between which two tectonic plates?

Eurasian and North American plates pull apart beneath Iceland along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, which widens by roughly 2 cm a year and surfaces above sea level at Þingvellir.

What does the Icelandic verb 'geysa', root of 'geyser', mean?

'To gush or rush forward' is the sense of geysa, the verb behind Geysir, a single hot spring in Haukadalur whose name foreign writers borrowed as the word for every spouting spring.

Which volcano's 2010 eruption grounded air travel across northern and western Europe for a week?

Eyjafjallajökull erupted in April 2010; meltwater from its ice cap entering the vent made the eruption explosive, and the fine ash carried into the jet stream closed much of Europe's airspace for about a week.

The 1783 eruption of which volcano triggered a famine that killed about a fifth of Icelanders?

Laki's fissure erupted for eight months from June 1783; its poisonous haze drifted over Europe, and about eight in ten of Iceland's sheep died in what Icelanders call the 'Mist Hardships'.

Surtsey, an island that rose from the sea off Iceland's south coast in 1963, is named after what?

A Norse fire giant, Surtr, gives Surtsey its name; the island broke the surface in November 1963, and only scientists studying how life colonises new land may set foot on it.

What gives the Blue Lagoon spa's geothermal water its milky-blue colour?

Silica particles suspended in the water scatter light and give the Blue Lagoon its milky-blue colour; the man-made lagoon is fed by runoff from the Svartsengi geothermal power plant.

Which source generates about 70% of Iceland's electricity?

Hydropower from glacial rivers makes about 70% of Iceland's electricity; the famous geothermal steam supplies most of the rest, and its hot water heats the great majority of homes.

Which is Europe's largest island, ahead of second-placed Iceland?

Great Britain is roughly twice the size of Iceland yet holds well over a hundred times as many people, more than 60 million against about 400,000.

The Arctic Circle does not cross mainland Iceland, but it does pass through which small Icelandic island?

Grímsey, about 40 km off the north coast, straddles the Arctic Circle, marked there by an eight-tonne stone sphere that has to be rolled to a new spot as the line creeps north off the island.

How do most Icelanders get their last name?

From a parent's first name: Jón's son is Jónsson and his daughter Jónsdóttir, so a married couple and their two children can carry four different last names.

Iceland's Naming Committee has the power to reject what?

A baby's given name must be on the approved register or clear the Icelandic Naming Committee, which refused Blær as a masculine noun; she was 'Girl' on official papers until a court overruled it in 2013.

Icelandic is the only living language whose alphabet keeps which runic letter?

Þ, called thorn, began as a rune and spells the 'th' of 'thing'; English dropped it when early printers' imported type lacked the letter and used 'y' instead, which is how 'the' became 'ye olde'.

What is the closest living relative of the Icelandic language?

Faroese, spoken in the Faroe Islands, is Icelandic's closest living relative; both descend from Old West Norse, and written Faroese is largely readable to Icelanders though the spoken languages differ.

What do Icelandic children leave on the windowsill for the 13 Yule Lads to fill?

A shoe goes on the windowsill for each of the 13 nights before Christmas; well-behaved children wake to a small treat in it, and those who misbehaved find a rotting potato.

In Icelandic folklore, the Yule Cat eats people who have failed to do what before the holiday?

Those who fail to receive new clothes before Christmas are prey for the Jólakötturinn, the giant Yule Cat of the ogress Grýla; the threat spurred households to finish the autumn wool work before Yule.

'Jólabókaflóð', literally 'book flood', names what Icelandic habit?

Buying most of the year's books before Christmas is the Jólabókaflóð: Icelandic publishers release the bulk of new titles in autumn, a catalogue (Bókatíðindi) goes to every home, and books are the classic Christmas Eve gift.

Which Icelander won the 1955 Nobel Prize in Literature?

Halldór Laxness won the 1955 Nobel Prize in Literature for novels such as Independent People; the Swedish Academy praised his 'vivid epic power which has renewed the great narrative art of Iceland'.

Which saga, generally rated the finest of the Icelanders' sagas, sees a wise peacemaker burned to death at home?

Njáls saga, also known as the saga of 'Burnt Njáll', follows blood feuds that spiral until the wise, peace-loving Njáll and his family are burned to death in their home, a fate he accepts without a fight.

Hákarl, Iceland's notorious fermented national dish, is made from which animal?

Greenland shark flesh is toxic when fresh, so for hákarl it is buried and fermented for weeks, then hung to dry for four to five months until it reeks of ammonia.

What grim nickname do Icelanders give their caraway-flavoured spirit, brennivín?

Black Death, 'svarti dauði', comes from the stark black label the spirit was given in 1935 to look unappealing and limit demand; it did the opposite, and the bottle became a national symbol.

Skyr, eaten across Iceland, is technically what kind of food?

A soft cheese by classification, skyr is skimmed milk soured with live cultures and strained of its whey, though Icelanders eat it like a thick yogurt.

Iceland's first Olympic medal in a team sport, a silver in 2008, came in which sport?

Handball delivered it: a nation of under 320,000 people reached the Beijing 2008 final, losing the gold-medal match to France.

Iceland knocked which team out of Euro 2016 in the round of 16?

England lost 2-1 in Nice after scoring first, and manager Roy Hodgson resigned that same night.

Iceland's Hafþór Björnsson, World's Strongest Man 2018, played which Game of Thrones character?

The Mountain, Ser Gregor Clegane, was his role; he only took up strongman after an ankle injury ended his basketball career.

Which animal is barred by law from ever returning to Iceland once it has left the country?

Horses that leave are gone for good: the Icelandic breed is unvaccinated and has no immunity to foreign diseases, so none that is sold or sent abroad may ever come home.

Björk first found international fame as lead singer of which Icelandic band?

The Sugarcubes won acclaim in Britain with Björk as lead vocalist, a decade after she recorded her first solo album as an 11-year-old music student.

Which ice cap, Iceland's largest by far, covers about 8% of the country?

Vatnajökull covers roughly 8% of Iceland and hides active volcanoes such as Grímsvötn, whose eruptions melt the ice into sudden floods called jökulhlaups; Iceland's highest peak rises on its southern rim.

Who carried out the 1627 raids on Iceland remembered as the 'Turkish Abductions'?

Barbary pirates from Algiers and Salé carried off hundreds of Icelanders, most of whom never came home; 'Turkish' was then a catch-all word for any Muslim from the Mediterranean.

Iceland's 19th-century emigrants founded 'New Iceland' around Gimli, in what is now which Canadian province?

Manitoba took in 'New Iceland' only in 1881; when Icelanders founded the colony on Lake Winnipeg in 1875 it lay outside the province, and for years they made their own laws and ran their own schools.

Kvennalistinn sat in Iceland's parliament from 1983 to 1999 as what kind of party?

A party formed and run entirely by women, the Women's List (Kvennalistinn) won three seats in 1983 and six in 1987, then split in 1999 between the new Social Democratic Alliance and the Left-Green Movement.

In its first World Cup match, in 2018, Iceland held which giant to a 1-1 draw?

Argentina were held 1-1 in Moscow in June 2018 in Iceland's first World Cup match; goalkeeper Hannes Halldórsson, a film director by trade, saved Lionel Messi's penalty.

Which Icelandic children's show created by Magnús Scheving was sold to over 100 countries?

LazyTown starred Scheving himself as the athletic hero Sportacus, a part backed by his two European aerobics titles; launched in 2004, the show went on to air in well over 100 countries.

Which animal is the only land mammal native to Iceland?

The Arctic fox walked in over sea ice during the last ice age and was stranded when it melted; reindeer and mink were brought by people, and polar bears are only rare strays from Greenland.

Iceland was essentially free of which common insect until October 2025?

Mosquitoes were first recorded in Iceland in October 2025, when an insect enthusiast found three Culiseta annulata on a red-wine ribbon he had set out for moths in Kjós, just north of Reykjavík.