[Sidenote: Svalbard probably Spitzbergen]
There have been different opinions as to what country Svalbard was. Many have thought that it might be the northern east coast of Greenland; Jan Mayen has also been mentioned; while others, like S. Thorlacius, a hundred years ago (1808), supposed that it was "the Siberian coasts of the Arctic Ocean, lying to the east of Permia (Bjarmeland), that the ancient Norsemen included under the name of Svalbard, i.e., the cold coast." Gustav Storm [1890, p. 344] maintained that Svalbard in all probability must be Spitzbergen,[151] and many reasons point to the correctness of this supposition.
No certain conclusion can be drawn about Svalbard from the passage quoted from the Landnámabók. "On the north in Hafsbotn" must mean in some northerly direction; for it is only the chief points of the compass, north, south and west, that are mentioned, and no intermediate points; for one course alone, from Bergen to Hvarf in Greenland, the direction "due west" is given, which must be true west.[152] Langanes is said to lie on the north side of Iceland instead of on the north-east, from Reykjanes to Ireland the course was south, instead of south-east, etc. The points of the compass are evidently used in the same way as is still common in Norway; "in the north of the valley" may be used even if the valley bends almost to the west. The Landnáma's statement (Sturlubók) that it is four "dœgr's sea" from Snæfellsnes "west" to Greenland (i.e., Hvarf) then agrees entirely with the common mode of expression that I have found among the arctic sailors of our day in Denmark Strait, where they never talk of anything but sailing east or west along the edge of the ice, even though it is north-east and south-west; we sail westward from Færder to Christianssand, or we travel south from Christiania to Christianssand. Consequently "on the north in Hafsbotn" means the same as when we say north in Finmark (cf. Ottar's directions, vol. i p. 171), or even north in the White Sea, and speak of sailing north to Jan Mayen. As Langanes in particular, the north-east point of Iceland, is mentioned as the starting-point, we should be inclined to think that Svalbard was supposed to lie in a north-easterly direction; it is true that the course to Ireland is calculated from Reykjanes and not from the south-east point of Iceland; but this may be because the voyage was mostly made from the west country.