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| One of the purposes of this website is to compare the landscape of Iceland in the eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries with its appearance today. This is accommlished by juxtaposing scenes from the old travel accounts with contemporary photographs. In most cases, the contemporary photographs are suggestive of similar scenes rather than duplicates of them. In some instances, however, I have been able to find photographs in my collection which mirror very closely a drawing or painting that is a hundred years old or more. Here are a few examples of the latter. |
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Although they show quite different parts of Iceland, the illustration to
the left
and the photograph to the right are eerily similar, both in subject-matter and mood. |
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| Two views of Gullfoss, the "Golden Waterfall". |
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| Þingvellir. |
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| Reykjavík street scenes. |
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Although they are not the same farm, nor even taken from the same part of Iceland, these two
illustrations
give a good idea of the rural landscape of Iceland at two points separated by about a hundred years. |
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The table-mountain Herðubreið, shown on the left in a rather stylized version by Ebenezer Henderson
around 1810, and on the right in a modern photo that looks towards the mounain over Lake Mývatn. |
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| The centre of Reykjavík. |
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| Skógafoss, a spectacular waterfall in southern Iceland. |
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Öxaráfoss, at Þingvellir, was described by J.R. Browne in 1865 as follows: The course
of the river is entirely hidden by the great wall in front, and nothing of it is visible
till the whole river bursts over the dark precipice, and tumbles, foaming and
roaring, into the tremendous depths below...
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| Places page || Travels in 19th-Century Iceland home page |