The Natural History of Iceland (Danish : Tilforladelige efterretninger om Island) is a natural history of Iceland by Danish lawyer Niels Horrebow. It was published in Danish in 1752, with an English translation in 1758.
The book was intended to correct errors in past natural histories of Iceland, particularly the work of Hamburg mayor Johann Anderson, who had written about the island without ever actually visiting it. Anderson had relied entirely on accounts from German and Dutch sea captains, [1] but Horrebow lived in Iceland for two years, studying the animals, plants, weather, and geological features. He also made note of the cultural practices of the Icelandic people. Horrebow's resulting work was published in Danish in 1752, then translated into German (1753), Dutch (1754), English (1758) and French (1764). [2]
The Natural History of Iceland is often noted for its seventy-second chapter, "Concerning Snakes", which, in its English translation, consists solely of one sentence:
No snakes of any kind are to be met with throughout the whole island. [2]
Several works of English literature make light of this brief passage. For example, James Boswell's Life of Johnson (1791) relates how Samuel Johnson bragged to a friend that he could recite the chapter in its entirety. [3] And William Morris' utopian novel News From Nowhere (1890) contains a short chapter called "Concerning Politics", in which a resident of "Nowhere" tells the narrator, "We are very well off as to politics,—because we have none. If you ever make a book out of this conversation, put this in a chapter by itself, after the model of old Horrebow's Snakes in Iceland." [4]
The original Danish version of the chapter on snakes was actually a full paragraph, rather than just one sentence. It was a direct response to a paragraph in Johann Anderson's book, which claimed that snakes could not survive the cold of Iceland. Horrebow's full chapter was translated into English in an 1870 issue of Notes and Queries :
Serpents there are none in Iceland, as our author [Anderson] truly observes. But when he gives as a reason for this the intense cold of that country, he has been led into an error by false information. We have already spoken of the cold in Iceland, and it may be seen from the accompanying meteorological observations that the cold in the South of Iceland is not more severe than with us in Denmark, so that serpents could as easily live there as here. But since these creatures have not come to Iceland it is well, for no one is likely to trouble himself to transplant them thither. [1]
Although the contributor to Notes and Queries remarked that "Horrebow's chapter is ... not so ridiculous as generally supposed", [1] the earlier English translation of the chapter is still much better-known. The phrase "snakes in Iceland" is listed in the Oxford English Dictionary , where it is traced to the 1758 translation and defined as "something posited only to be dismissed as non-existent". [5]
Anacondas or water boas are a group of large snakes of the genus Eunectes. They are found in tropical South America. Four species are currently recognized.
A sea serpent or sea dragon is a type of dragon sea monster described in various mythologies, most notably Mesopotamian (Tiamat), Judaeo-Christian (Leviathan), Greek, and Norse (Jörmungandr).
Samuel Johnson, often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, literary critic, sermonist, biographer, editor, and lexicographer. The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography calls him "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history".
Ragnar Lodbrok, according to legends, was a Viking hero and a Swedish and Danish king.
James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck, was a Scottish biographer, diarist, and lawyer, born in Edinburgh. He is best known for his biography of his friend and older contemporary, the English writer Samuel Johnson, which is commonly said to be the greatest biography written in the English language. A great mass of Boswell's diaries, letters, and private papers were recovered from the 1920s to the 1950s, and their ongoing publication by Yale University has transformed his reputation.
Johann David Michaelis was a German biblical scholar and teacher. He was member of a family that was committed to solid discipline in Hebrew and the cognate languages, which distinguished the University of Halle in the period of Pietism. He was a member of the Göttingen School of History.
Benjamin Thorpe was an English scholar of Anglo-Saxon literature.
This article presents lists of the literary events and publications in 1767.
Charlotte Lennox, néeRamsay, was a Scottish author and a literary and cultural critic, whose publishing career flourished in London. Best known for her novel The Female Quixote (1752), she was frequently praised for her genius and literary skill. As a result, Sir Joshua Reynolds painted her portrait and she was featured in The Nine Living Muses of Great Britain in 1778. Samuel Johnson declared her superior to all other female writers, and Henry Fielding said that she "excelled Cervantes." Her pioneering study of Shakespeare's source material is still cited and her magazine (1760-1761) is the focus of "The Lady's Museum Project."
Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets (1779–81), alternatively known by the shorter title Lives of the Poets, is a work by Samuel Johnson comprising short biographies and critical appraisals of 52 poets, most of whom lived during the eighteenth century. These were arranged, approximately, by date of death.
George Horne was an English churchman, academic, writer, and university administrator.
The Life of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. (1791) by James Boswell is a biography of English writer Dr. Samuel Johnson. The work was from the beginning a critical and popular success, and represents a landmark in the development of the modern genre of biography. It is notable for its extensive reports of Johnson's conversation. Many have called it the greatest biography written in English, but some modern critics object that the work cannot be considered a proper biography. Boswell's personal acquaintance with his subject began in 1763, when Johnson was 54 years old, and Boswell covered the entirety of Johnson's life by means of additional research. The biography takes many critical liberties with Johnson's life, as Boswell makes various changes to Johnson's quotations and even censors many comments. Nonetheless, the book is valued as both an important source of information on Johnson and his times, as well as an important work of literature.
The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy is a cookbook by Hannah Glasse (1708–1770) first published in 1747. It was a bestseller for a century after its first publication, dominating the English-speaking market and making Glasse one of the most famous cookbook authors of her time. The book ran through at least 40 editions, many of which were copied without explicit author consent. It was published in Dublin from 1748, and in America from 1805.
The Lady of the Mountain is the female incarnation of Iceland.
In Icelandic folklore, the Lagarfljótsormur or Lagarfljót worm is a lake monster purported to live in Lagarfljót, a lake by the town of Egilsstaðir.
The kraken is a legendary sea monster of enormous size, etymologically akin to a squid or octopus, said to appear in the sea between Norway and Iceland. It is believed the legend of the Kraken may have originated from sightings of giant squid, which may grow to 12–15 m in length.
Johann Philipp Fabricius was a German Christian missionary and a Tamil scholar in the later part of his life. He arrived in South India in 1740 to take charge of a small Tamil Lutheran congregation in Madras and expanded it during his stay. During his time in Madras he wrote several Christian hymns in Tamil and published the first Tamil to English Dictionary. Of his works his translation of the Bible to Tamil is considered to be most noteworthy.
James Grainger was a Scottish doctor, poet and translator. He settled on St. Kitts from 1759 until his death of a fever on 16 December 1766. As a writer, he is best known for his poem The Sugar Cane, which is now valued as an important historical document.
John Ellis (1698–1791) was an English scrivener and literary figure.
John Ranby (1743–1820) was an English pamphleteer, known for his anti-abolitionist writings. James Boswell interpolated in his Life of Johnson a reference to Ranby, his "learned and ingenious friend", as a pendant to Samuel Johnson's expressed wish for the abolition of slavery, stating that Johnson was poorly informed.