Skjaldbreiður, meaning the broad shield in Icelandic

Icelandic language

Icelandic is a North Germanic language, the main language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese.Icelandic is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic or Nordic branch of the Germanic languages. Historically, it was the westernmost of the Indo-European languages prior to the...

, is an Iceland

Iceland

Iceland , described as the Republic of Iceland, is a Nordic and European island country in the North Atlantic Ocean, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Iceland also refers to the main island of the country, which contains almost all the population and almost all the land area. The country has a population...

ic mountain from whose name the term "shield volcano

Shield volcano

A shield volcano is a type of volcano usually built almost entirely of fluid lava flows. They are named for their large size and low profile, resembling a warrior's shield. This is caused by the highly fluid lava they erupt, which travels farther than lava erupted from more explosive volcanoes...

" derives. It was formed in a huge and protracted eruption roughly 9,000 years ago. The extensive lava fields which were produced by this eruption, flowed southwards, and formed the basin of Þingvallavatn

Þingvallavatn

Þingvallavatn is a lake in south-western Iceland. With a surface of 84 km² it is the largest natural lake in Iceland. Its greatest depth is at 114 m. At the northern shore of the lake, at Þingvellir , the Alþingi, the national parliament, was founded in the year 930.The lake is part of the...

, Iceland's largest lake, and Þingvellir

Þingvellir

|Thing]] Fields) is a place in Bláskógabyggð in southwestern Iceland, near the peninsula of Reykjanes and the Hengill volcanic area. Þingvellir is a site of historical, cultural, and geological importance and is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Iceland. It is the site of a rift...

, the "Parliament Plains" where the Icelandic national assembly, the Alþing

Althing

The Alþingi, anglicised variously as Althing or Althingi, is the national parliament of Iceland. The Althingi is the oldest parliamentary institution in the world still extant...

 was founded in the year 930

930

Year 930 was a common year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar.- Europe :* With the establishment of the Althing, now one of the world's oldest parliaments, the Icelandic Commonwealth is founded....

.

The volcano culminates at 1,060 metres, and its crater

Volcanic crater

A volcanic crater is a circular depression in the ground caused by volcanic activity. It is typically a basin, circular in form within which occurs a vent from which magma erupts as gases, lava, and ejecta. A crater can be of large dimensions, and sometimes of great depth...

 measures roughly 300 metres in diameter.

Straddling the Mid-Atlantic ridge

Mid-Atlantic Ridge

The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is a mid-ocean ridge, a divergent tectonic plate boundary located along the floor of the Atlantic Ocean, and part of the longest mountain range in the world. It separates the Eurasian Plate and North American Plate in the North Atlantic, and the African Plate from the South...

, the lava fields from Skjaldbreiður have been torn and twisted over the millennia, forming a multitude of fissures and rifts inside the Þingvellir National Park, the best known of which are Almannagjá, Hrafnagjá and Flosagjá.