The Faroe Islands were colonised much earlier than previously believed, and it wasn't by the Vikings, according to new research.
New archaeological evidence places human colonisation in the 4th to 6th centuries AD, at least 300-500 years earlier than previously demonstrated.
The research, directed by Dr Mike J Church from Durham University and Símun V Arge from the National Museum of the Faroe Islands as part of the multidisciplinary project "Heart of the Atlantic", is published in the Quaternary Science Reviews.