The Icelandic Vikings

Landing

When the first Vikings came to settle Iceland, they were not the first people to settle there. Before were Irish men, so-called "Papes" they practiced Christian religion. The Vikings were then considered to be Irish monks. But probably those people who lived in small groups on the south coast were Irish slaves and their keepers who had been left by a Danish Vikings, or hunters who practiced walrus hunting there in the summer, but were based in Dublin during the winter. Many handworked caves have been found in parts of the south with traces about papes. Place names indicate that "Pape" has stayed close to preferred walrus paths, like Pape island and Pape estuary, and also Irish garden and Irish mountain and Irish river. Nobody knows what happen to the "Papes" after the Vikings. 

"PAPEs" Photo from "The Irish Times"