When I think back on it, I’m surprised to realize that I walked through two or three times as many traditional museums in Mongolia than I did in Iceland. This was the only modern building called a museum that we went through in Iceland.
Pins and rings were used to hold clothing in place rather than buttons. Most of these were between finger and hand sized. I haven’t tried it, but I suspect they weren’t all the comfortable.
I’ve discussed in plenty of posts how Christianity followed the Vikings into Iceland and took over. Much of the country’s wealth went into the accouterments of the church. Vestments, artwork, furniture all showed off the local lord’s wealth as well as the devotion of the adherents.
Some of it could be quite exotic. For instance, they turned a coconut into a chalice. Middle Ages church gear could also include goblets made of ostrich eggs. These were finished in gold and could be very rare and expensive.
In contrast, chests were commonplace. Even if a family wasn’t wealthy enough to import much in the way of furniture – remembering that the woods in Iceland don’t grow large enough for lumber – they would at least have a chest. Chests were used to hold personal belongings like books and clothing. Though the plaques don’t say anything about it, I suspect they doubled as couches and tables. They would in my household.
Warp-Weighted Loom, which was common in ancient Europe was used in Iceland up until the 19th Century. A day’s work by a skilled weaver could produce half a meter of cloth that was a meter wide. This was called an ell. It’s called warp weighted because the cloth passes over the top beam while the warp is stretched tight by loom weights at the bottom. To my eyes, this is upside down. They used a piece of shale bone called a Sword Beater to beat the weft after the weft roll (in place of a shuttle) passed between the warp threads. Yeah, yeah, more than you wanted to know, but all stuff pulled from the plaque next to it that I wanted to remember.
By now you know that ships and seafaring are integral parts of Iceland. This display was a full-sized fishing boat. This type was used for a thousand years and had both oars and a sail. They were remarkably seaworthy and didn’t need man made harbors to land. Fishermen normally rowed out in the morning and returned in the evening, beaching in inlets overnight. They got bumped by schooners, motor boats, and trawlers in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Costume room. I got the feeling this was set up for kids, though if so, then the kids they had in mind are up to teenager sizes. You were welcomed to touch here. And yes, the chain mail shirt is heavy, though maybe not as heavy as I’d expected.
Clothing styles might not have shifted around in Iceland as quickly as in a place like France, but there was an evolution. There was even a fashion designer. Sigurdur Gudmundsson was a painter who wanted to improve women’s clothing choices and introduced a outfit named the Skautbunningur Costume in 1859. It actually became popular.
Lace making tools were displayed a bit further down, along with fancy hats. By passing the wooded bobs over and under one another lace is formed. Pins can be used to hold the lace openings in position and over all shape while moving the wooden bobs.
I remember using phones like this. After wending our way through two or three floors of displays, we came to a U shaped stand about knee high long enough to fill a room. At the top right U point were some of the oldest items found in Iceland – like the pins and rings. Then something ten or twenty years younger, followed by another item ten or twenty years younger all the way around the bottom of the U and back up to the other terminus. On the end – this phone. It gave a graphic representation of the modernization of Iceland.
So… if I’m old enough to have used the last item, does that mean I belong in a museum? Only as a tourist, I hope.
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