Research and consultancy under one roof

Elín Ósk Hreiðarsdóttir, Managing Director, Head of Survey, Archaeologist (MA).

Elín has worked at the Institute of Archaeology, Iceland, since 1998 and has served as Managing Director since 2019. She specializes in archaeological survey and studies of cultural landscape. In the last decades she has led numerous research and surveying projects across Iceland. She also has a strong interest in material culture and one of her research focuses has been on beads from the Viking Age and later periods. Elín has published extensively and has been active in professional organisations, including serving as Chair of the Icelandic Archaeological Society and as a board member of ICOMOS Iceland.

Orri Vésteinsson, PhD in History, UCL, MA in Archaeology from the Institute of Archaeology, UCL. He was awarded a Chair in archaeology at the University of Iceland in 2010. Orri has participated in research in the UK, Japan and Iceland, and directed many excavation, survey and publication projects in Iceland since 1989.

Selected recent publications: Polity and Neighbourhood in Early Medieval Europe (ed. with S. Brooks and J. Escalona, 2020), Minjaþing (2020). Since 2016 he has been the editor of the journal Archaeologia Islandica.

Guðrún Alda Gísladóttir, MA in archaeology from the University of Iceland. Since 2001, Gísladóttir has worked for the Institute of Archaeology, Iceland, primarily as a finds specialist and finds manager. She has also taught a material culture module at the University of Iceland for several years.

Gylfi Helgason, MA in landscape archaeology, University of Leicester. Gylfi has taken part in a raft of survey projects at the Institute and undertaken standing building surveys in the UK. His research interests lie within landscape archaeology, in particular in the use of novel methods to contribute to classical archaeological debates.

Hildur Gestsdóttir, MSc in Osteology, Palaeopathology and Funerary Archaeology from the University of Bradford 1998, and PhD from the University of Iceland 2016. She has participated in excavations in Iceland, the UK and Kenya. Gestsdóttir has extensive experience in the analysis of archaeological human remains for the Institute, the National Museum of Iceland, Bath Archaeological Trust, Exeter Archaeology, Cornwall Archaeological Unit and Somerset County Council.

Kristborg Þórsdóttir, MA in Archaeology from the University of Iceland. Þórsdóttir has worked for the Institute since 2008 on various survey and excavation projects.

Kristjana Vilhjálmsdóttir, MA in conservation from Cardiff University. Vilhjálmsdóttir has taught a conservation module at the University of Iceland since 2019.

Ragnheiður Gló Gylfadóttir, MA in Archaeology from the University of Iceland. Gylfadóttir has worked for the Institute since 2008 on a wide array of survey and excavation projects.

Sólveig Guðmundsdóttir Beck has a PhD in archaeology from the University of Iceland and an MSc in geoarchaeology from the University of Reading. Beck has worked on excavations and survey for the Institute since 2003.

Stefán Ólafsson has an MA in Archaeology from the University of Iceland. Ólafsson has worked for the Institute since 2003 on excavations and various survey projects.

Adolf Friðriksson, PhD Sorbonne. Friðriksson has participated in excavations in the UK, France, Italy, Norway, the Caribbean and Iceland, and has directed various excavations, survey and publication projects since 1989. He was a member of the board of directors of the Nordic World Heritage Office in Oslo 1999–2001.

Adolf is the author of Sagas and Popular Archaeology in Iceland (Avebury 1994), and co-author of Kuml og haugfé – Pagan Burials in Iceland (Mál og menning 2000, 2016).

Garðar Guðmundsson, BSc (Hons) in Archaeology, Institute of Archaeology, UCL, London. Guðmundsson has participated in various research projects in the UK, Greenland and Iceland.

Mjöll Snæsdóttir, Fil.Kand. in Archaeology and Ethnology, Uppsala. Snæsdóttir has participated in research in Norway, Sweden and Iceland. She was the director of the Stóraborg excavation 1978–1990, which is the largest salvage excavation project carried out in Iceland to date. Snæsdóttir was the editor of Árbók – The Archaeological Society Transactions – from 1993 to 2006.

Gavin Lucas, PhD in Archaeology from the University of Cambridge. Lucas has participated in various excavations in the UK, Italy, Turkey, South Africa and Iceland.

Selected recent publications: Writing the Past (Routledge, 2019), Understanding the Archaeological Record (Routledge, 2012), ‘Later Historical Archaeologies of the North Atlantic’ (chapter in The Oxford Handbook of Historical Archaeology, 2017).