How populous can modern Iceland be?

currently in Iceland, I’ve been thinking about this. As of now there are 330,000 people in Iceland. According to the wiki page on the Icelandic commonwealth medieval Iceland had a population of around 50,000 (but this number is unsourced). When danish records began in the early 1700’s Iceland’s population was still just 50,000. That’s due to the little ice age, Danish trade monopoly, volcanic eruptions, Turkish raids etc. However I’m pretty sure we can keep Iceland’s population growing (though I don’t know by how much) if we can tame some of these elements. Let’s say that there’s a Danish commitment to developing Iceland. They decide to set up ports in Iceland as trading posts, attracting some migration, and allow the local population to trade for food with everyone (limiting the effects the little ice age had on agriculture). If we decide to, we can just hand wave the volcanic eruptions away, though that feels kinda like cheating. Barring any weird stuff (like settling all the Jews who are expelled from European countries in Iceland) how large can we get Iceland’s population to be? Is 1 million realistic? I’m pretty sure the modern island can support that, you just need a large enough premodern starting population.
 
Most of the population is on the coast, I think, and in the late 19th and 20th century it should be doable to import fertile soil and make some of the barren inland more agriculturally productive. The island is large, and with greater food production it could easily have a population over a million, but demographics might hinder that, unless there is a large immigration.
 
Maybe a Iceland that has more independance could be able to service it's needs better than distant bureucrats?
 
_Very_ roughly, it took 50 years from the start of settlement for all the good land to be taken and then another 50 years for population to double or so to the 50k+ range.

If you want more population, there needs to be some way to increase food production, more population will be a natural result from that.
 
They can rely on food imports like many other countries do, there needs to be a reason why the growth would be so big while emigration stays low, especially considering Iceland's position.
 
_Very_ roughly, it took 50 years from the start of settlement for all the good land to be taken and then another 50 years for population to double or so to the 50k+ range.

If you want more population, there needs to be some way to increase food production, more population will be a natural result from that.
How about fishing? AFAIK Iceland’s fishing resources were under utilized before the little ice age because the population preferred to farm the land. Fishing villages don’t take a lot of arable land, so that won’t be a problem. And some stuff (like whale oil) can be traded for food abroad.
 
Not in premodern age, I think.

But Iceland can be as populous as you want, if you have people immigrating in, say, 19th century and importing their food, yes.

I was mostly thinking about having a larger seed population when technology starts allowing either increased food production or imports.

EDIT

Maintaining ships in Iceland is somewhat problematic because Iceland does not have good shipbuilding timber.
 
Could Iceland maintain higher fertility rates than they did OTL? OTL Iceland had a high TFR from a European perspective from the end of world war 2 till today(2018).
Icelandic TFR compared to that of Norway and Ireland.JPG
 
How about fishing? AFAIK Iceland’s fishing resources were under utilized before the little ice age because the population preferred to farm the land. Fishing villages don’t take a lot of arable land, so that won’t be a problem. And some stuff (like whale oil) can be traded for food abroad.
Their was also rather a lack of trees, meaning they couldn't make boats.
 
Well you can't tame the volcanic eruptions, since that's a geologic POD. But 75-100K might be possible in premodern Iceland, which in the modern age would perhaps result in a population around 500-750K.

Maybe start with importing reindeer and some Sami, who might culturally blend with the Norse and impart reindeer-herding on Icelandic culture. Later, in the 16th century (as early as possible, really), have potatoes and quinoa arrive from South America, and by the time of the Laki eruption, have their use become much more widespread. This would likely have a major impact on other European cultures, where both crops will become more widespread earlier, but in Iceland at least, it will increase the total population.

Their was also rather a lack of trees, meaning they couldn't make boats.

The Norse deforested Iceland, and as seen nowadays, there's plenty of ways to reforest parts of Iceland. Not sure how viable reforestation would be during the height of the Little Ice Age and what would happen during major volcanic eruptions, though. Finding a way to get management of forests would be nice, though.
 
The Norse deforested Iceland, and as seen nowadays, there's plenty of ways to reforest parts of Iceland. Not sure how viable reforestation would be during the height of the Little Ice Age and what would happen during major volcanic eruptions, though. Finding a way to get management of forests would be nice, though.
It would come down to how early they begin it though, and there might be issues with grazing animals eating all the new tree sprouts, or people cutting down trees for fuel. In Greenland it got to the piont where neither metal nor wood was used in constructing houses. The lack of metal perhaps being due in part to the King of Norway outlawing anyone traveling there except for the one ship that went to pick up valuable ivory and to sell luxury goods for the churches and nobles. And then they never removed the law even when the one permitted boat sank. Heck, the Pope still thought Norsemen were still in Greenland a century after they died off, though to be fair he mentioned that in a letter when he said he was hoping the ice would no longer be as big a problem that year so someone could finally send a ship there. I don't think the king of Norway bothered.
 
Unlike Greenland, Iceland actually _did_ have iron bogs, but I'm not sure about the amount. They did import iron stuff, but I think it may actually have been things like swords. Of course, if they had timber to build ships, increased iron consumption might well have made them run out.

Icelandic forests were small birch, which was not really suitable for shipbuilding. I believe shipbuilding timber actually _could_ have grown there, but you'd had to import the saplings and then wait for them to grow...
 
If you prevent the two outbreaks of the plague in Iceland (first outbreak killing 50-60%, second 30-40%) then you could get potentially get a smaller amount of population on the island. The big issue was that the soil was losing its fertility (soil erosion?) and they would have only been able to handle a little bit more before having food scarcity.
 
From what I have read pre-industrial Iceland had a max carriage capacity of 300.000 people, they would never reach that, but we could see large population. Some of the main problem with Iceland was low population growth thanks to horrendous infant mortality rate (and of the mothers too), thank to horrible midwife techniques. If the Danish state had ever discovered this it could have dealt with it pretty cheaply. Next Iceland suffered under regularly population collapse, every time a epidemic made it to the island, this is pretty much unavoidable, but a higher birth rate means not returning to square one again each time. Early introduction of potatoes would also help, the Basque sailor who over wintered on the island could have introduced potato, this would be pretty revolutionary, as the Icelander had plenty of food, but lacked a good source of carbs (the Icelander had good sources of protein and fat). Reforestation of regions of the Iceland should also be possible, maybe some medieval monastics introduce other trees [1], and established forestry, the Danish state would upkeep these after the Reformation, as they would have great local value. Even a relative small percent of Iceland being forest would be revolutionary and give the Icelanders access to much needed sources of fuel and timber. Next if someone find a way to use geothermal heat to produce salt from saltwater it would also be great, the Icelanders desperate lacked salt, and was heavy depended on imports from Denmark.

All these thing would give Iceland a bigger population as we moved into the 19th century, which would make population increase easier.

[1] the main tree on Iceland the Icelandic birch are pretty useless as anything other than fuel
 
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