Vatnsfjörður, an ancient manor farm and setting of Sagas, on a fjord of the same name. Church and parsonage. Many clergymen there became wealthy. Among noted farmers was Björn Einarsson Jórsalafari (“who visited Jerusalem”) (d.1415) who travelled widely, to Jerusalem among other places. He also went once to Greenland and three times to Rome, travelling like a king with a large retinue. His daughter Kristín was the mother of governor Björn ríki (“the rich”) Þorleifsson (1408?–1467) who was killed by Englishmen at Rif (see Skarð). The Rev. Hjalti Þorsteinsson (1665–1754) was the best painter in Iceland in his day. Three Vatnsfjörður pastors in a row wrote annals, the most recent being the Rev. Guðlaugur Sveinsson (1731–1807). In 1791 he published an essay together with sketches which were to cause a revolution in the placing of farmhouses and their appearance, being the first known conception of the Icelandic gabled farmhouse (see Hrafnseyri). Above the farm is the hollow cairn Grettisvarða, once thought to have been made by Grettir the strong as a hide–out but more probably a watch tower of some sort, perhaps from the stormy time of the Sturlungas (1220–1262). Hjallur, large shack for drying stockfish, with stone walls and turf roof, built around 1880. In the keeping of the National Museum since 1975.