Beginning about 1,000 years ago, Europeans sailed to North America in search of natural resources and a sea route to Asia.
Stora Hammars 1 Stela (Detail) Gotland, about 1200 years ago
Bengt A. Lundberg Swedish National Heritage Board, ff941728
Encounters between First Peoples and the newcomers were characterized by curiosity, mutual distrust and sometimes violence. Yet they sought and found ways to coexist. A permanent European colony was the result.
One thousand years ago, First Peoples encountered Norse seafarers (sometimes called Vikings) along the shores of Eastern Canada. While the Norse did not stay, they now had knowledge of lands beyond the Atlantic Ocean.
Shortly after founding colonies in Greenland, the Norse sailed further west, to the eastern shores of Arctic and Atlantic Canada. Here they met Indigenous peoples. These encounters were not always peaceful, and Indigenous resistance to the Norse was a key factor in their failure to establish a permanent presence in North America.
Norse Voyages
Norse settlers from Iceland colonized Greenland during a period of global warming. They exploited pockets of land suitable for farming and hunted sea mammals. They imported other resources.
Norse from Greenland also travelled westward in search of essential materials such as wood. They established at least one small settlement in Canada, but their presence remained sporadic and temporary.
Norse Sagas
The Norse oral traditions known as sagas preserve a history of Norse activities in Greenland and North America. The earliest surviving written versions date to the 1300s. The Saga of Erik the Red relates how an expedition from Iceland led by Erik established a colony in southern Greenland in the late 900s. It continues with the story of his son Leif’s travels to North America, and his encounters with First Peoples who the Norse called Skraelings.
Pages from the Saga of Erik the Red, Jóhanna Ólafsdóttir, 1420 to 1450
Árni Magnússon Institute for Icelandic Studies, Iceland, AM 557 4to
The Saga of Erik the Red
Two original manuscripts of this saga have survived. This page is from one that was produced in the early 1400s. Another is from the early 1300s.
Skálholt Map
In the late 1500s, Sigurd Stefánsson, a teacher from Skálholt, Iceland, used information from the sagas to create this map of the North Atlantic. Do you see any similarities with a modern map?
The Greenlander Saga
Listen to a description of the earliest known exploration of North America by a European, Leif, son of Erik the Red.
A Norse Settlement in Newfoundland
An archaeological site in Newfoundland provides definitive evidence of Norse settlement in North America. L’Anse aux Meadows consists of the remains of dwellings and workshops. These wood chips and metal fragments found at the site were likely left behind by Norse sailors repairing their ship about 1,000 years ago.
There they found fields of wild wheat… and the vine in all places… every rivulet there was full of fish… there was great plenty of wild animals of every form in the wood… early one morning, as they looked around, they beheld nine boats made of hides
Evidence of contact in the Eastern Arctic
Evidence of Inuit contact with the Norse has been recovered from a handful of archaeological sites in the Eastern Arctic.
The range of materials found at Skraeling Island might indicate that Inuit had encountered Norse traders or salvaged useful items from an abandoned ship. At other sites, yarn, possibly manufactured in Greenland, and other Norse manufactured items may have been acquired by Inuit through trade.
An Inuit view of the Norse
Inuit wooden figurines depicting Inuit people share distinct characteristics: round heads without features, short limbs without hands or feet, and typical hairstyles. However, the carving from the Okivilialuk archaeological site on Baffin Island is likely an Inuit artist’s portrayal of a Norse traveller. The figure appears to wear European rather than Inuit clothing. The artist has carved a cross on its chest. The Norse at the time were Christians, and may have worn such symbols.
