The Vikings only named it greenland to make it more appealing and attract more people to live there An early case of false advertising

I believe it is based upon the time of year that each of these islands were first discovered by Europeans - Iceland was discovered in the winter, Greenland in the summer.

When they were discovered: one was green and the other covered in snow All part and parcel of the changing earth, due to many factors, tilt of the axis, magnetic fields, sun spots, vulcanos,very little to do with man

1) "The name Greenland comes from Scandinavian settlers. In the Icelandic sagas, it is said that Norwegian-born Erik the Red was exiled from Iceland for murder. He, along with his extended family and thralls, set out in ships to find the land that was rumoured to be to the northwest. After settling there, he named the land Grænland ("Greenland"), possibly in order to attract more people to settle there. Greenland was also called Gruntland ("Ground-land") and Engronelant (or Engroneland) on early maps. Whether green is an erroneous transcription of grunt ("ground"), which refers to shallow bays, or vice versa, is not known. It should also be noted, however, that the southern portion of Greenland (not covered by glacier) is indeed very green in the summer, and was likely to have been even greener in Erik's time because of the Medieval Warm Period." Source and further information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenland#Etymology 2) "According to Landnámabók, Iceland was discovered by Scandinavian sailor Naddoddr, who was sailing from Norway to the Faroe Islands, but got lost and drifted to the east coast of Iceland. Naddoddr named the country Snæland (Snowland). Swedish sailor Garðar Svavarsson also accidentally drifted to the coast of Iceland. He discovered that the country was an island and named it Garðarshólmi (literally Garðar's Islet) and stayed for the winter at Húsavík. The first Scandinavian who deliberately sailed to Garðarshólmi was Flóki Vilgerðarson, also known as Hrafna-Flóki (Raven-Flóki). Flóki settled for one winter at Barðaströnd. It was a cold winter, and when he spotted some drift ice in the fjords he gave the island its current name, Ísland (Iceland)." Source and further information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Iceland

Iceland is not covered in green. Iceland is mostly rock. As for Greenland, during the Medieval Warm Period (between 850 and 1300 AD) the Vikings discovered this particular part of the world and named it Greenland, not because they had an ironic sense of humor, but because it was green. The earth was much warmer back then and Greenland was a verdant paradise. Then things cooled off, the Viking colonies died out, and it became largely an ice-covered wasteland. (http://holycoast.blogspot.com/2007/05/question-for-pelosi-how-did-greenland.html)

The reason Iceland is called "Iceland" even though it is green is because Iceland was the home to a very ruthless murauders called the vikings. the vikings were a very closed kind of people and didnt like others coming to it so they gave thier country a very unattractive name. But some still came, so they used Greenland to attract the others but it would'nt be what they expected.