Volume 3 — SECTIO SECUNDA.

[Sidenote: Munsterus, Olaus magnus & reliqui.] In hac, æstiuo solstitio, sole signum Cancri transeunte, nox nulla, brumali Solstitio proinde nullus dies. Item, Vadianus. In ea autem Insula quæ longe Supra Arcticum circulum in amplissimo Oceano sita est, Islandia hodie dicta, & terris congelati maris proxima, quas Entgronlandt vocant, menses sunt plures sine noctibus.

Nullum esse hyemali solstitio diem, id est, tempus quo sol supra horizontem conspicitur in illo tantum Islandiæ angulo, si modò quis est, fatemur, vbi polus ad integros 67. gradus attollitur. Holis autem, quæ est sedes Episcopalis Borealis Islandiæ, sita etiam in angustissima & profundissima conualle, latitudo est circiter grad. 65. 44. min. vt à Domino Gudbrando eiusdem loci Episcopo accepimus, & illic diem breuissimum habemus ad minimum duarum horarum, in meridionali autem Islandia longiorem, vt ex artificum tabulis videre est. Vnde constat nec Islandiam vltra Arcticum circulum positam esse, nec menses plures noctibus in æstiuo, vel diebus in brumali solstitio carere.

The same in English.

THE SECOND SECTION.

[Sidenote: Munsterus, Olaus Magnus and others.] In this Iland, at the Summer solstitium, the Sun passing thorow the signe of Cancer, there is no night, and therefore at the Winter solstitium there is no day. Also: Vadianus. But in that Iland, which farre within the artic circle is seated in the maine Ocean, at this day called Island, and next vnto the lands of the frozen sea, which they call Engrontland, there be many moneths in the yere without nights.

At the solstitium of winter, that there is no day (that is to say, no time, wherein the Sunne is seene aboue the horizon) we confesse to be true onely in that angle of Island (if there be any such angle) where the pole is eleuated full 67. degrees. But at Holen (which is the bishops seat for the North part of Island, and lieth in a most deepe valley) the latitude is about 65. degrees and 44. minutes, as I am enformed by the reuerend father, Gudbrand, bishop of that place: and yet there, the shortest day in all the yere is at least two houres long, and in South-Island longer, as it appeareth by the tables of Mathematicians. [Sidenote: Island is not within the circle arctic.] Heerehence it is manifest, first that Island is not situate beyond the arctic circle: [Footnote: This is true, except for the very small portion of Iceland round about Cape North.] secondly, that in Island there are not wanting in Summer solstitium many nights, nor in Winter solstitium many dayes.

SECTIO TERTIA.

[Sidenote: Musterus Saxo.] Nomen habet à glacie quæ illi perpetuo ad Boream adheret Item. A latere Occidentali Noruagiæ Insula, quæ Glacialis dicitur, magno circumfusa Oceano repentur, obsoletæ admodum habitationis tellus, &c. Item, Hæc est Thyle, nulli veterum non celebrata.

Nomen habet à glacie) Tria nomina consequenter sortita est Islandia. [Sidenote: Snelandia.] Nam qui omnium primus eius inuentor fuisse creditur Naddocus genere Noruagus, cum versus insulas Farenses nauigaret tempestate valida, ad littora Islandiæ Orientalis fortè appulit: vbi cum fuisset aliquot septimanas cum socijs commoratus, animaduertit immodicam niuium copiam, montium quorundam cacumina obtegentem, atque ideò à niue nomen Insulæ Snelandia indidit. Hunc secutus alter, Gardarus, fama quam de Islandia Naddocus attulerat impulsus, Insulam quæsitum abijt, reperit, & nomen de suo nomine Gardarsholme id est, Gardars Insula imposuit. Quin & plures nouam terram visendi cupido incessit: nam & post illos duos adhuc tertius quidam Noruagus (Floki nomen habuit) contulit se in Islandiam, illique à glacie qua viderat ipsam cingi nomen fecit.

Obsoletæ admodum) Ego ex istis verbis Saxonis hanc sententiam nequaquam eruo, vt quidam, quòd inde ab initio habitatam esse Islandiam, seu vt verbo dicam, Islandos autocthonas dicat, cum constet vix ante annos 718. incoli coeptam.

Hæc est Thyle) Grammatici certant & adhuc sub iudice lis est. Quam tamen facilè dirimi posse crediderim, si quis animaduertat, circa annum Domini 874. primùm fuisse inhabitatam. Nisi quis dicere velit Thulen illum Ægypti Regem, quem hoc ipsi nomen dedisse putant, ad Insulam iam tum incultam & inhabitatam penetrasse. Illud verò rursus si quis neget, per me sanè licebit, vt illud sit quaddam quasi spectaculum, dum ita in contrarias scinduntur sententias. Vnus affirmat esse Islandiam. Alter quandam insulam, vbi arbores bis in anno fructificant. Tertius vnam ex Orcadibus, siue vitimam in ditione Scoti, vt Ioannes Myritius & alij, qui nomen illius referunt, Thylensey, quod etiam Virgilius per suam vltimam Thylen sensisse videtur. Siquidem vltra Britannos, quo nomine Angli hodie dicti & Scoti veniunt, nullos populos statueret. Quod vel ex illo Virgilij Eclog I. apparet:

Et penitus toto diuisos orbe Britannos.

Quartus vnam ex Farensibus. Quintus Telemarchiam Noruagiæ. Sextus Schrichfinniam.

Perpetuò ad Boream adhæret.) Illud verò, Glaciem Insulæ perpetuò, vel vt paulò post asserit Munsterus: Octo continuis mensibus adhærere: neutrum verum est. [Sidenote: Glacies Aprili aut Maio soluitur.] Nam vt plurimum in mense Aprili aut Maio soluitur, & Occidentem versus propellitur, nec ante Ianuarium aut Februarium sæpissimè etiam tardius redit. Quid? quòd plurimos annos numerare licet, quibus glaciem illam huius nationis immite flagellum, ne viderit quidem Islandia: Quod etiam hoc anno 1592. compertum est. Vnde constat quàm verè à Frisio scriptum sit, nauigationem ad hanc insulam tantùm quadrimestrem patere, propter glaciem & frigora, quibus intercludatur iter, Cùm Anglicæ naues quotannis nunc in Martio, nunc in Aprili, quædam in Maio, Germanorum & Danorum in Maio & Iunio, plærumque ad nos redeant, & harum quædam non ante Augustum iterum hinc soluunt. Superiore autem anno 1591. quædam nauis Germanica, cupro onusta, portum Islandiæ Vopnafiord 14. dies circiter in Nouembri occupauit, quibus lapsis inde foeliciter soluit Quare cum glacies Islandiæ, nec perpetuò, neque octo mensibus adhæreat, Munsterus & Frisius manifestè falluntur.

The same in English.

THE THIRD SECTION.

It is named of the ice which continually cleaueth vnto the North part thereof. [Sidenote: Munsterus Saxo] Another writeth: From the West part of Norway there lieth an Iland which is named of the ice, enuironed with an huge sea, and being a countrey of ancient habitation, &c. Zieglerus. This is Thyle [Footnote: Thule] whereof most of the ancient writers haue made mention.

It is named of ice, &c. Island hath beene called by three names, one after another. [Sidenote: Island first discouered by Naddocus in a tempest.] For one Naddocus a Noruagian borne, who is thought to be the first Discouerer of the same, as he was sailing towards the Faar-Ilands, [Footnote: Faroe Islands.] through a violent tempest did by chance arriue at the East shore of Island; [Sidenote: Sneland.] where staying with his whole company certaine weeks, he beheld abundance of snow couering the tops of the mountaines, and thereupon, in regard of the snow, called this Iland Sneland. [Sidenote: Gardarsholme] After him one Gardarus, being mooued thereunto by the report which Naddocus gaue out concerning Island, went to seeke the sayd Iland who when he had found it, called it after his owne name Gardars-holme, that is to say, Gardars Ile. There were more also desirous to visit this new land. [Sidenote: Island.] For after the two former a certaine third Noruagian, called Flok, went into Island, and named it of the ice, wherewith he saw it enuironed.

Of ancient habitation &c. I gather not this opinion out of these wordes of Saxo (as some men do) that Island hath bene inhabited from the beginning or (to speake in one word) that the people of Island were autochthones, that is, earth-bred, or bred out of their owne soile like vnto trees and herbs: sithens it is euident that this Island scarse began to be inhabited no longer agoe then about 718 yeres since. [Footnote: The Viking Naddodr is said to have discovered Iceland in 860, and it was colonised by Ingulf, a chieftain from the west coast of Norway.]

This is Thyle, &c. Grammarians wrangle about this name, and as yet the controuersie is not decided. Which notwithstanding, I thinke might easily grow to composition, if men would vnderstand that this Iland was first inhabited about the yeere of our Lord 874. Vnlesse some man will say that Thule King of Ægypt (who, as it is thought, gaue this name thereunto) passed so farre vnto an Iland, which was at that time vntilled, and destitute of inhabitants. Againe, if any man will denie this, he may for all me, that it may seeme to be but a dreame, while they are distracted into so many contrary opinions. One affirmes that it is Island: another, that it is a certeine Iland, where trees beare fruit twise in a yeere: the third, that it is one of the Orcades, or the last Iland of the Scotish dominion, as Iohannes Myritius and others, calling it by the name of Thylensey, which Virgil also seemeth to haue meant by his vltima Thyle. If beyond the Britans (by which name the English men and Scots onely at this day are called) he imagined none other nation to inhabit. Which is euident out of that verse of Virgil in his first Eclogue:

And Britans whole from all the world diuided.

The fourth writeth, that it is one of the Faar-Ilands: the fift, that it is Telemark in Norway: the sixt, that it is Scrichfinnia.

[Sidenote: The ice of Iseland sets always to the West.] Which continually cleaueth to the North part of the Iland. That clause that ice continually cleaueth &c. or as Munster affirmeth a little after, that it cleaueth for the space of eight whole moneths, are neither of them both true, when as for the most part the ice is thawed in the moneth of April or May, and is driuen towards the West: neither doth it returne before Ianuarie or Februarie, nay often times it commeth later. [Sidenote: No ice at all some yeres in Island.] What if a man should recken vp many yeeres, wherein ice (the sharpe scourge of this our nation) hath not at all bene seene about Island? which was found to be true this present yeere 1592. Heereupon it is manifest how truely Frisius hath written that nauigation to this Iland lieth open onely for foure moneths in a yeere, and no longer, by reason of the ice and colde, whereby the passage is shut vp, when as English ships euery yere, sometimes in March, sometimes in April, and some of them in May; the Germans and Danes, in May and Iune, doe vsually returne vnto vs, and some of them depart not againe from hence till August. [Sidenote: Nauigation open to Island from March till the midst of Nouember.] But the last yere, being 1591, there lay a certeine shippe of Germanie laden with Copper within the hauen of Vopnafiord in the coast of Island about fourteene dayes in the moneth of Nouember, which time being expired, she fortunately set saile. Wherefore, seeing that ice, neither continually, nor yet eight moneths cleaueth vnto Iland, Munster and Frisius are much deceiued. [Footnote: The mean temperature of Iceland is said to be 40 degrees.]