At the start of the eighteenth century, Iceland had no towns or villages, only scattered rural settlements from coast to interior. Yet, in 1707, an invisible traveller arrived from mainland Europe: the smallpox virus, known in Icelandic as bólusótt. What followed would be remembered as Stórabóla, the Great Smallpox, a disaster that carved a deep mark on the history and structure of Icelandic society.
How the epidemic reached Iceland
Smallpox had struck Iceland before, but only sporadically, outbreaks between the mid-1600s and early 1670s were limited to parts of the island. Because of Iceland’s sparse population and geographic isolation, epidemic diseases like smallpox did not take root permanently. However, this meant that when the virus did arrive, most Icelanders had little or no immunity, as past outbreaks had left only the oldest with any protections.
The 1707 epidemic can be traced to a Danish merchant ship making land at Eyrarbakki. Contemporary sources link the introduction of the virus to belongings of Gísli Bjarnason, an Icelandic student who died of smallpox after studying in Copenhagen. His clothing was sent home to his family at the Ás í Holtum farm, where one of his sisters soon fell ill. There are variations in accounts as to whether the ship brought the virus to one or several locations in the south of Iceland more or less simultaneously, but soon the disease spread quickly across the island.
Devastation in rural communities
With no towns and a population already reduced by previous decades of famine, Iceland was vulnerable. By 1708 the epidemic had reached almost every region, extending to the most remote areas by 1709. Estimates put the death toll at between 12,000 and 18,000, about a quarter of Iceland’s population, which had been around 50,000 according to the 1703 census. The fatalities were not equally spread: some parishes lost more than a quarter of their inhabitants. In the Álftanes area, for example, nearly two hundred out of fewer than a thousand people perished. Houses and even entire districts were left without enough survivors to care for the sick.
The social consequences were profound. The epidemic struck hardest among young adults and working-age people, leaving a shortage of labour and a generation of orphans and bereaved parents. Many farms and fishing stations were abandoned because there were too few hands to work them. The population of Iceland grew only slowly for years after the outbreak, and the structure of rural life shifted in its aftermath. Cattle farming declined as sheep farming became more important, sheep required less labour, and wool and sheep products played a greater role in exports.
Stórabóla reshaped communities and livelihoods in Iceland. For the families that lived through it, the epidemic was a defining event, changing not only demography but the very patterns of daily life for decades.
Sources
- Wikipedia
- Wikipedia (Icelandic) in Icelandic
