Íslendingabók
book by Ari Þorgilsson
Íslendingabók (Icelandic pronunciation: [ˈistlɛntiŋkaˌpouːk], Old Norse pronunciation: [ˈiːslɛndɪŋɡaˌboːk], lit. 'Book of Icelanders'; Latin: Libellus Islandorum) is a historical work dealing with early Icelandic history. The author was an Icelandic priest, Ari Þorgilsson, working in the early 12th century. The work originally existed in two different versions but only the younger one has survived. The older contained information on Norwegian kings, made use of by later writers of kings' sagas.
Manuscripts and dating
Íslendingabók is preserved in two paper manuscripts from the seventeenth century, AM 113 a fol. (B) and AM 113 b fol. (A), which have been used as the basis for all modern print editions and are currently housed at the Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies in Reykjavík. The two manuscripts are copies made by the priest Jón Erlendsson in Villingaholt (died 1672) at the behest of bishop Brynjólfur Sveinsson using the same exemplar. The latter of the two was made because the bishop was unhappy with the first version, which can be dated to 1651. The exemplar, likely a medieval manuscript dating from c.1200, was apparently lost in the course of the late 17th century, and when Árni Magnússon looked for it, it had disappeared without a trace.
The public source identifies “Íslendingabók” as book by Ari Þorgilsson. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Íslendingabók, book and Þorgilsson.
Why this record matters
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Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q183362. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1672, 1651 and 1200.
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Three-step research path
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Íslendingabók” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.