This was later changed to Jotunheimen by the poet Aasmund Olavsson Vinje in 1862 – this name/form was directly inspired by the name Jötunheimr in Norse mythology.

Jotunheimen is a residual mountain area, which is a mass of rock that has remained in place as the surrounding relief has been eroded.

Towards the west, the Scandinavian Ice Sheet disintegrated in several glacier tongues and caused the formation of the Norwegian Fiords.

The high mean annual precipitation in the west leads to a low glaciation limit of less than 1500 meters, the altitude where glaciers can be formed.

[6] Since the 1980s, the Jotunheimen area has got increased scientific interest from geologists and geomorphologists due to its climate creating periglacial landforms and widespread and often thick permafrost occurrences.

Archaeologists estimate that the leather shoe was made between 1800 and 1100 BC,[11] making it the oldest article of clothing discovered in Scandinavia.

In February 2020, Secrets of the Ice Program researchers discovered a 1,500-year-old Viking arrowhead dating back to the Germanic Iron Age and locked in a glacier in southern Norway caused by the climate change in the Jotunheimen Mountains.

The arrowhead made of iron was revealed with its cracked wooden shaft and a feather, is 17 centimetres (6.7 in) long and weighs just 28 grams (1.0 oz).

A small exception, however, is a blind road in the Veodalen to Glitterheim, whose head is inside the national park area near the Glittertind.