Landscape in the sagas of Icelanders: The concepts of land and landsleg

This article presents a study of the Icelandic landscape concept, and its meaning and embedded connotations. The present-day understanding of the concept provides the point of departure to some of the oldest preserved examples of the term. The analysis thus centres upon the sagas of Icelanders that were written in the Middle Ages. The paper reveals that in the 14th century the concept referred to morphological qualities of land, and was often associated with an aesthetic appreciation thereof. The meaning of landscape as natural scenery has been explained as the outcome of artistic articulations of social relations in the wake of the Renaissance and Romanticism. Such accounts, however, do not explain the aesthetic connotations associated with the Icelandic landscape concept in the Middle Ages, described in this article. The results of the study thus indicate that there may be more to the landscape concept within the cultural domain defined by the Germanic languages than hitherto revealed, particularly in terms of aesthetic experiences of the natural environment. Subsequently, this article emphasises the importance of identifying the culturally embedded meaning of landscape as a concept in the Icelandic context, for successful implementation of the concept in planning practices.