Eggert Ólafsson
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Eggert Ólafsson (1726-68) was an Icelandic explorer, writer and conservator of the Icelandic language.
He was the son of a farmer from Svefneyjar in Breiðafjörður. He studied natural sciences, Classics, Grammar, Law and Agriculture at the University of Copenhagen.
Eggert wrote on a wide range of topics, including published and unpublished works. He wrote a standardised spelling of Icelandic, however this spelling is quite different from the current Icelandic spelling. He is considered one of the greatest conservators of the Icelandic language of the eighteenth century.[citation needed]
Eggert went on a trip for a research about Iceland with Bjarni Pálsson (who later became Iceland's Director of Health) between 1752 and 1757. During this trip they visited many Icelandic natural sites, and from the information they gathered made many proposals for the improvement of the land.
Eggert and his wife, Ingibjörg Halldórsdóttir, drowned in 1768 when going back home from a winter sojourn in Sauðlauksdalur. Matthías Jochumsson wrote a commemorative poem called Eggert Ólafsson in honour to him.
Although he was a man of enlightenment he was a great inspiration to the Icelandic romantic poets, namely Jónas Hallgrímsson who set out on a great poem in his honour, Hulduljóð. Unfortunately it was never finished.
[edit] Further reading
- Halldór Hermannsson. Eggert Ólafsson, A Biographical Sketch. Islandica; an annual relating to Iceland and the Fiske Icelandic collection in Cornell university library, vol. 16. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell university library, 1925.
