Nine shipwrecks in Siglufjörður are helping archaeologists reconstruct the maritime and industrial history of the North Iceland town that became the centre of the country’s herring boom. A survey of the inner part of the fjord has mapped the wrecks alongside machinery, bricks and other remains linked to a herring factory destroyed by an avalanche in 1919, creating what researchers describe as a much richer underwater archaeological landscape than previously expected.
The survey was led by archaeologist Ragnar Edvardsson, a research associate professor at the University of Iceland’s Research Centre in the Westfjords (Rannsóknasetur Háskóla Íslands á Vestfjörðum). According to Icelandic outlet Vísir, researchers used an underwater vehicle and autonomous drones to examine the seabed, as part of a broader project mapping shipwrecks around Iceland and assessing their condition.
Nine shipwrecks beneath Siglufjörður
Researchers have so far mapped the inner section of Siglufjörður, where they recorded nine wrecks dating from the 20th century. One of the vessels, however, was built considerably earlier.
The Tordenskjold was constructed in 1854 as a Danish warship and later ended its working life in a very different role, as storage for herring barrels in Siglufjörður. Its presence therefore links the fjord not only to Iceland’s industrial history but also to the country’s long historical relationship with Denmark.
The wreck itself is not a new discovery. Professional diver Erlendur Guðmundsson, working with the Herring Era Museum (Síldarminjasafn Íslands), located Tordenskjold in 2012. The significance of the latest survey lies instead in placing the vessel within a wider archaeological context formed by several wrecks and other traces of economic activity on the seabed.
The seabed preserves the herring era
Few Icelandic towns were transformed by the herring industry as profoundly as Siglufjörður. What had been a small settlement developed within a few decades into a town of more than 3,000 residents, with 23 salting stations and five reduction factories, according to the Herring Era Museum. At times, herring shipped from Siglufjörður alone represented more than 20% of Iceland’s total exports.
The wider industry became one of the forces behind Iceland’s economic modernisation. Herring accounted for around a quarter of the country’s export earnings for extended periods, and occasionally substantially more. Iceland’s first herring processing plant opened in Siglufjörður in 1911, while the expansion of such plants is regarded by the museum as the beginning of large-scale industry in the country.
The wrecks therefore form part of a larger material record of the period in which fishing, processing and maritime trade reshaped both Siglufjörður and Iceland’s economy.
The 1919 avalanche is still visible underwater
The survey also documented what researchers identify as traces of the 1919 avalanche that destroyed a herring factory beside the fjord.
Edvardsson and his team surveyed the seabed in front of the site where the factory once stood. They found rocks, machinery, wreckage and bricks from buildings scattered underwater, material consistent with the destruction caused by the avalanche.
The remains add another layer to the archaeological landscape. Siglufjörður’s seabed records not only the growth of an industry but also some of the natural disasters that repeatedly affected settlements built between steep mountains and the sea in northern Iceland.
Underwater archaeology may preserve more than expected
For Edvardsson, one of the most important results concerns the condition of the material itself. He told Vísir that underwater remains had proved to be “much better preserved than people had imagined”, with ships surviving longer and substantially more material remaining on the seabed than researchers had previously assumed.
The same methodology has already been used around the waterways of Reykjavík and at other historic trading locations. The wider project is intended to establish how many wrecks survive around Iceland, what condition they are in and what they can reveal about the development of fisheries, shipping and coastal communities.
The picture of Siglufjörður’s nine shipwrecks is not yet complete. Researchers have mapped the inner fjord, while the outer section remains to be surveyed, with Edvardsson saying the work could continue in autumn 2026 or in 2027. What is already visible suggests that a significant part of the history of Iceland’s former herring capital survives not in its streets or museums, but on the seabed itself.
