History of Iceland

Iceland was settled almost 1150 years ago. Just as Iceland was the last country in Europe to be physically born, it was also the last to be settled by man, in the ninth century. The first settlers were Norwegian Vikings who brought with them slaves from Ireland and other Celtic isles.
Sixty years after the country was settled, Icelanders founded a unique way of democracy when they established the first National Parliament in the world which is still functioning and is actually older than the British Parliament.
Since the year 1000, Icelanders have been Christians and belong to the Lutheran Church.
Iceland is famous for its Sagas and the old manuscripts, written between the 12th and 14th century. Hundreds of Sagas were written on calfskin and they needed a lot of cattles. For the largest book, 120 calf skins were used. The pages in the Sagas are richly decorated. Most of them were written in the monestaries.