In his article ‘Premarital sexual permissiveness and illegitimacy in the Nordic Countries’, Richard F. Tomasson discusses high illegitimacy rates
in preindustrial Iceland. He points out that during the nineteenth century
children born out of wedlock were proportionally more numerous in
Iceland than in other European countries. In Tomasson's view high
illegitimacy rates in Iceland were due to liberal attitudes towards
premarital sex – attitudes that were deeply rooted in traditional Nordic
society. In his words, ‘The Ancient Scandinavians accorded women
higher status, and along with this went liberal attitudes toward premarital
sex relations, illegitimacy, and divorce. Such attitudes often appear to be
a concomitant of a high degree of equality between the sexes.’