Among the first things you see on a visit to the National Museum of Iceland in Reykjavik are skeletons: the remains of two bodies lying in the ground in which they were found. One is a woman believed to have been about 40 when she died in the 10th century. The other is that of a young warrior with his sword beside him. The black lava sand has been harsher on his bones than the less acidic earth that the woman was buried in; nonetheless, both have a strong presence. They are evocative representations of the first settlers on what had been an uninhabited land.
The tour guide mentioned that researchers had found traces of lead residue in the woman’s teeth which revealed that she…