Introduction
People have been living in Northern regions of Europe for tens of thousands of years.
But from medieval southern Europe, the far North was long seen as uninhabitable. Even Scotland and Iceland were considered on the very edges of civilisation. Following the ideas of ancient Greek geographers, a zone of lethal cold was thought to exist to the North of the habitable world, with monsters dwelling on the borders.
This was largely the imagination of medieval and early modern scholars. This exhibition explores their myths and imaginings of Northern regions, and how these have influenced more recent fantasy fiction.
Magnetic iron ore (magnetite)
An island at the North Pole made entirely of naturally magnetic rock appeared on maps drawn by European cartographers in the 16th century. The author of a lost 14th century text, Inventio Fortunata, claimed to have seen the island, surrounded by a deadly whirlpool. The island was an imagined explanation for why magnetic compasses pointed North.
