On the northeastern verge of Narragansett Bay is Mount Hope Bay, its
shores attractive alike in lovely scenery and the most interesting
tradition. It is also a region of most venerable antiquity in
America. Hither came the ancient Norsemen Vikings, who explored it,
and sojourned there almost a thousand years ago. These wandering
Norsemen, early colonizing Iceland and Greenland, are said to have
discovered the mainland of North America in the tenth century, the
energetic Leif, a son of Eric the Red, afterwards, in the year 1001,
sailing along the American coast, and finding first, Helluland, or the
"Flat Land," supposed to be Newfoundland, then Mark Land, or the "Wood
Land," now Nova Scotia, and Vinland, or the "Vine Land," being the
coasts of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, and wintering in
Narragansett and Mount Hope Bays. The next year Leif's brother,
Thorvald, came along these coasts with thirty men, and also passed a
winter in Mount Hope Bay. The following season he sent a party of
explorers hither, and in the year 1004 he again came personally, and
was killed in a skirmish with the Indians, his companions returning to
Greenland. There seem to have been subsequent Norsemen visits, and the
name of Vinland was given by them on account of the profusion of vines
growing on the shores and islands, which was a novelty to these
wanderers from the far north.
Mount Hope Bay is the broadening estuary of Taunton Great River, and
the elongated peninsula of Bristol Neck divides it from Narragansett
Bay to the westward, stretching up to Providence. Upon Taunton Great
River is a magnificent water-power which has produced the success of
Taunton, a busy manufacturing town of thirty thousand people, where
they make locomotives and tacks, bricks, screws and britannia ware,
its name coming from Taunton in Somersetshire, its founder having been
Elizabeth Pool, a pious Puritan lady of that place. When the first
settlers explored the river they made a wonderful antiquarian
discovery. Upon the shore, below Taunton, and opposite what are now
the gardens and pleasure-grounds of Dighton, was found the famous
"Writing Rock," lying partly submerged by the waterside, and when the
tide is out, presenting a smooth face slightly inclined towards the
river. It is a large greenstone boulder, the color changed to dusky
red by the elements, and it now has the faint impression of
hieroglyphics on its surface that have been almost effaced by the
action of the water. In the early colonial days these marks were very
distinct, and even after the beginning of the nineteenth century they
could be plainly distinguished from the deck of a passing vessel.
These inscriptions on the Dighton rock excited much wonder, and were
generally attributed to the Norsemen. Old Cotton Mather described it,
saying that among the "curiosities of New England, one is that of a
mighty rock, on a perpendicular side whereof, by a river which at high
tide covers part of it, there are very deeply engraved, no man alive
knows how or when, about half a score lines, near ten foot long and a
foot and a half broad, filled with strange characters." Another
learned man speaks of them as "Punic inscriptions which remain to this
day," made by the Phoenicians. Below, and near Fall River, many
years ago, there was exhumed a skeleton in sitting posture, wearing a
brass breast-plate and a belt of brass armor. Much marvel resulted
from this important discovery, which was thought to have produced a
veritable dead Viking, and it is said to have inspired Longfellow's
poem of "The Skeleton in Armor":
"Speak! speak! thou fearful guest!
Who, with thy hollow breast
Still in rude armor drest,
Comest to daunt me!
"Wrapt not in Eastern balms,
But with thy fleshless palms
Stretched, as if asking alms,
Why dost thou haunt me?"
Thus he answers:
"I was a Viking old!
My deeds, though manifold,
No Skald in song has told,
No Saga taught thee!
"Take heed, that in thy verse,
Thou dost the tale rehearse,
Else dread a dead man's curse;
For this I sought thee."
And then the poet unfolds his weird and romantic history. Despite the
Norsemen traditions, however, it is regarded as more probable that
both the hieroglyphics and the skeleton were of Indian origin.