Papar

The Papar (Icelandic pronunciation: ​[ˈpʰaːpar̥]; from Latin papa, via Old Irish, meaning "father" or "pope") were, according to early Icelandic sagas, wandering Christian monks who took hermetic residence in parts of what is now Iceland before that island's habitation by the Norsemen of Scandinavia, as evidenced by the sagas and recent archeological findings.

The first Norsemen began settling in Iceland in 874 AD. The oldest Scandinavian source mentioning the existence of the Papar, however, the Íslendingabók ("Book of the Icelanders") by Icelandic chronicler Ari Þorgilsson, was written between 1122 and 1133, some time after the event. Þorgilsson writes of "Christian men," titled the 'Papar' by the Norsemen, who departed the isle because of their dislike of the 'heathen' Norse, pointing to the possibility of the Papar having arrived before the Norse.

An earlier source that could possibly refer to the Papar is the work of Dicuil, an early 9th-century Irish monk and geographer, which included mention of the wandering of "holy men" to the lands of the north. However, it is not known whether Dicuil is speaking about Iceland, as Gaelic hermits also settled in other islands of the north such as Orkney and Shetland.

Several Icelandic toponyms have been linked to the Papar, including the island of Papey, as well as the Vestmannaeyjar ("islands of the Westmen") but no archaeological evidence in these places has yet confirmed the link.

Another theory is that the two sources were conflated and that Þorgilsson based his history on the writings of Dicuil.

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