page_title: Hekla
section_title: Reputation
hierarchical_section_title: Hekla / Reputation
caption_attribution_description: English: Detail of Abraham Ortelius' map of Iceland (1585) showing the Volcano Hekla in eruption. The latin text "Hekla perpetuis/damnata estib. et ni:/uib. horrendo boatu/lapides evomit" means "The Hekla, perpetually condemned to storms and snow, vomits stones under terrible noise." Deutsch: Detail aus der Island-Karte von Abraham Ortelius (1585) zeigt den Vulkan Hekla während eines Ausbruchs. Der lateinische Text "Hekla perpetuis/damnata estib. et ni:/uib. horrendo boatu/lapides evomit" heisst übersetzt: "Hekla, fortwährend von Stürmen und Schnee gepeinigt, erbricht Steine unter grauenhaftem Getöse".
context_page_description: Hekla, or Hecla, is a stratovolcano in the south of Iceland with a height of 1,491 m. Hekla is one of Iceland's most active volcanoes; over 20 eruptions have occurred in and around the volcano since 874. During the Middle Ages, Europeans called the volcano the "Gateway to Hell".
  Hekla is part of a volcanic ridge, 40 km long. The most active part of this ridge, a fissure about 5.5 km long named Heklugjá, is considered to be within Hekla proper. Hekla looks rather like an overturned boat, with its keel being a series of craters, two of which are generally the most active.
  The volcano's frequent large eruptions have covered much of Iceland with tephra, and these layers can be used to date eruptions of Iceland's other volcanoes. Approximately 10% of the tephra created in Iceland in the last thousand years has come from Hekla, amounting to 5 km³. Cumulatively, the volcano has produced one of the largest volumes of lava of any in the world in the last millennium, around 8 km³.
context_section_description: After the eruption of 1104, stories, probably spread deliberately through Europe by Cistercian monks, told that Hekla was the gateway to Hell. The Cistercian monk Herbert of Clairvaux wrote in his De Miraculis (without naming Hekla): 
  The renowned fiery cauldron of Sicily, which men call Hell's chimney ... that cauldron is affirmed to be like a small furnace compared to this enormous inferno.
  — Herbert of Clairvaux, Liber De Miraculis, 1180
   A poem by the monk Benedeit from circa 1120 about the voyages of Saint Brendan mentions Hekla as the prison of Judas.
  In the Flatey Book Annal it was recorded that during the 1341 eruption, people saw large and small birds flying in the mountain's fire which were taken to be souls.
  In the 16th century Caspar Peucer wrote that the Gates of Hell could be found in "the bottomless abyss of Hekla Fell". The belief that Hekla was the gate to Hell persisted until the 19th century. There is still a legend that witches gather on Hekla during Easter.
caption: Detail of Abraham Ortelius' 1585 map of Iceland showing Hekla in eruption. The Latin text translates as "The Hekla, perpetually condemned to storms and snow, vomits stones under terrible noise".
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