CHAPTER IX

IN NORTHERN MISTS

[Illustration]

IN NORTHERN MISTS

ARCTIC EXPLORATION IN EARLY TIMES

BY FRIDTJOF NANSEN

G.C.V.O., D.Sc., D.C.L., Ph.D.,

PROFESSOR OF OCEANOGRAPHY IN THE

UNIVERSITY OF CHRISTIANIA, ETC.

TRANSLATED BY ARTHUR G. CHATER

ILLUSTRATED

VOLUME TWO

LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN: MCMXI

PRINTED BY

BALLANTYNE & COMPANY LTD

AT THE BALLANTYNE PRESS

TAVISTOCK STREET COVENT GARDEN

LONDON

CONTENTS

CHAP. PAGE

IX. [CONTINUED] WINELAND THE GOOD, THE FORTUNATE ISLES, AND

THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA 1

X. ESKIMO AND SKRÆLING 66

XI. THE DECLINE OF THE NORSE SETTLEMENTS IN GREENLAND 95

XII. EXPEDITIONS OF THE NORWEGIANS TO THE WHITE SEA, VOYAGES

IN THE POLAR SEA, WHALING AND SEALING 135

XIII. THE NORTH IN MAPS AND GEOGRAPHICAL WORKS OF THE MIDDLE

AGES 182

XIV. JOHN CABOT AND THE ENGLISH DISCOVERY OF NORTH AMERICA 291

XV. THE PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES IN THE NORTH-WEST 345

CONCLUSION 379

LIST OF THE MORE IMPORTANT WORKS REFERRED TO 384

INDEX 397

[Illustration: From an Icelandic MS., fourteenth century]

CHAPTER IX

[continued]

WINELAND THE GOOD, THE FORTUNATE ISLES, AND THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA

[Sidenote: Wineland == the African islands]

A confirmation of the identity of Wineland and the Insulæ Fortunatæ, which

in classical legend lay to the west of Africa, occurs in the Icelandic

geography (in MSS. of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries) which may

partly be the work of Abbot Nikulás of Thverá (ob. 1159) (although perhaps

not the part here quoted), where we read:

"South of Greenland is 'Helluland,' next to it is 'Markland,' and then

it is not far to 'Vínland hit Góða,' which some think to be connected

with Africa (and if this be so, then the outer ocean [i.e., the ocean

surrounding the disc of the earth] most fall in between Vinland and

Markland)."[1]

This idea of the connection with Africa seems to have been general in

Iceland; it may appear surprising, but, as will be seen, it finds its

natural explanation in the manner here stated. It also appears in Norway.

Besides a reference in the "King's Mirror," the following passage in the

"Historia Norwegiæ" relating to Greenland is of particular importance:

"This country was discovered and settled by the Telensians [i.e., the

Icelanders] and strengthened with the Catholic faith; it forms the end

of Europe towards the west, nearly touches the African Islands

('Africanas insulas'), where the returning ocean overflows" [i.e.,

falls in].

It is clear that "Africanæ Insulæ" is here used directly as a name instead

of Wineland, in connection with Markland and Helluland, as in the

Icelandic geography. But the African Islands (i.e., originally the Canary

Islands) were in fact the Insulæ Fortunatæ, in connection with the

Gorgades and the Hesperides; and thus we have here a direct proof that

they were looked upon as the same.

[Illustration: The conception of the northern and western lands and

islands in Norse literature.]

G. Storm [1890] and A. A. Björnbo [1909, pp. 229, ff.] have sought to

explain the connection of Wineland with Africa as an attempt on the

part of the Icelandic geographers to unite new discoveries of western

lands with the classical-mediæval conceptions of the continents as a

continuous disc of earth with an outer surrounding ocean. But even if

such "learned" ideas prevailed in Iceland and Norway (cf. the "King's

Mirror"), it would nevertheless be unnatural to unite Africa and

Wineland, which lay near Hvítramanna-land, six days' sail _west_ of

Ireland, unless there were other grounds for doing so. Although

agreeing on the main point, Dr. Björnbo maintains (in a letter to me)

that the Icelanders may have got their continental conception from

Isidore himself, who asserted the dogma of the threefold division of

the continental circle; and the question whether Wineland was African

or not depended upon whether it came south or north of the line

running east and west through the Mediterranean. But the same Isidore

also described the Insulæ Fortunatæ and other countries as islands in

the Ocean, and his dogma could not thus have hindered Wineland from

being regarded as an island like other islands (cf. Adam of Bremen's

islands), but why then precisely African? Besides, the Icelandic

geography and the Historia Norwegiæ represent two different

conceptions, one as a continent, the other as islands. It cannot,

therefore, have been Isidore's continental dogma that caused them both

to assume the country to be _African_. It seems to me that no other

explanation is here possible than that given above.

[Sidenote: The vine North America]

It might be objected to the view that "Vínland hit Góða" originally meant

"Insulæ Fortunatæ," that several sorts of wild grape are found on the east

coast of North America; it might therefore be believed that the

Greenlanders really went so far and discovered these. Storm, indeed,

assumed that the wild vine grew on the outer east coast of Nova Scotia;

but he is unable to adduce any certain direct evidence of this, although

he gives [1887, p. 48] a statement of the Frenchman Nicolas Denys in 1672,

which points to the wild vine having grown in the interior of the

country.[2] He also mentions several statements of recent date that

wild-growing vines of one kind or another have been observed near

Annapolis and in the interior of the country, but none on the south-east

coast. Professor N. Wille informs me that in the latest survey of the

flora of North America Vitis vulpina is specified as occurring in Nova

Scotia; but nothing is said as to locality. The American botanist, M. L.

Fernald [1910, pp. 19, f.], on the other hand, thinks that the wild vine

(Vitis vulpina) is not certainly known to the east of the valley of the

St. John in New Brunswick (see map, vol. i. p. 335), where it is rare and

only found in the interior. From this we may conclude that even if it

should really be found on the outer south-east coast of Nova Scotia, it

must have been very rare there, and could not possibly have been a

conspicuous feature which might have been especially mentioned along with

the wheat. But even if we might assume that the saga was borne out to this

extent, it would be one of those accidental coincidences which often

occur. It must, of course, be admitted to be a strange chance that the

world of classical legend should have fertile lands or islands far in the

western ocean, and that Isidore should describe the self-grown vine and

the unsown cornfields in these Fortunate Isles, and that long afterwards

fertile lands and islands, where wild vines and various kinds of wild corn

grew, should be discovered in the same quarter. Since we have the choice,

it may be more reasonable to assume that the Icelanders got their wine

from Isidore, or from the same vats that he drew his from, than that they

fetched it from America. Again, even if the Greenlanders and Icelanders

had found some berries on creepers in the woods--is it likely that they

would have known them to be grapes? They cannot be expected to have had

any acquaintance with the latter.[3] The author of the

"Grönlendinga-þáttr" in the Flateyjarbók is so entirely ignorant of these

things that he makes grapes grow in the winter and spring (like the fruits

all the year round on the trees in the myth of the fortunate land in the

west), and makes Leif's companion Tyrker intoxicate himself by eating

grapes (like the Irishmen in the Irish legends), and finally makes Leif

cut down vine-trees ("vínvið") and fell trees to load his ship, and at

last fill the long-boat with grapes (as in the Irish legends); in the

voyage of Thorvald Ericson they also collect grapes and vine-trees for a

cargo, and Karlsevne took home with him "many costly things: vine-trees,

grapes and furs." It is scarcely likely that seafaring Greenlanders about

380 years earlier had any better idea of the vine than this saga-writer,

and we hear nothing in Eric's Saga about Leif or his companions having

ever been in southern Europe. No doubt it is for this very reason that the

"Grönlendinga-þáttr" makes a "southman," Tyrker, find the grapes.

[Sidenote: The wild wheat]

Wheat is not a wild cereal native to America. It has therefore been

supposed that the "self-sown wheat-fields" of Wineland might have been the

American cereal maize. As this proved to be untenable, Professor

Schübeler[4] proposed that it might have been the "wild rice," also called

"water oats" (Zizania aquatica), an aquatic plant that grows by rivers and

lakes in North America. But apart from the fact that the plant grows in

the water and has little resemblance to wheat, although the ripe ear is

said to be like a wheat-ear, there is the difficulty that it is

essentially an inland plant, which is not known in Nova Scotia. "Though it

occurs locally in a few New England rivers, it attains its easternmost

known limit in the lower reaches of the St. John in New Brunswick, being

apparently unknown in Nova Scotia" [Fernald, 1910, p. 26]. For proving

that Wineland was Nova Scotia it is therefore of even less use than the

wine.

It results in consequence that the attempts made hitherto to bring the

natural conditions of the east coast of North America into agreement with

the saga's description of Wineland[5] have not been able to afford any

natural explanation of the striking juxtaposition of the two leading

features of the latter, the wild vine and the self-sown wheat, which are

identical with the two leading features in the description of the Insulæ

Fortunatæ. If it were permissible to prove in this way that the ancient

Norsemen reached the east coast of North America, then it might be

concluded with almost equal right that the Greeks and Romans of antiquity

were there; for they already had the same two features in their

descriptions of the fortunate isles in the west. It should be remembered

that wheat was not a commonly known cereal in the North, where it was not

cultivated, and it would hardly be natural for the Icelanders to use that

particular name for a wild species of corn. Both wheat and grapes or vines

were to them foreign ideas, and the remarkable juxtaposition of these very

two words shows that they came together from southern Europe, where, as

has been said, we find them in Isidore, and where wine and wheat were

important commercial products which one often finds mentioned together.

[Sidenote: Encounters with the Skrælings in Wineland]

If we now proceed further in the description of the Wineland voyages in

the Saga of Eric the Red, we come to the encounters with the Skrælings.

These encounters are, of course, three in number: first they come to see,

then to trade, and then to fight; this again recalls the fairy-tale. The

narrative itself of the battle with the Skrælings has borrowed features.

The Skrælings' catapults make one think of the civilised countries of

Europe, where catapults (i.e., engines for throwing stones, mangonels)

and Greek fire (?) were in use.[6]

[Illustration: Icelandic representation of the northern and western lands

as connected with one another, by Sigurd Stefansson, circa 1590 (Torfæus,

1706). Cf. G. Storm, 1887, pp. 28, ff.]

Catapults, which are also mentioned in the "King's Mirror," had a long

beam or lever-arm, at the outer end of which was a bowl or sling,

wherein was laid a heavy round stone, or more rarely a barrel of

combustible material or the like [cf. O. Blom, 1867, pp. 103, f.]. In

the "King's Mirror" it is also stated that mineral coal ("jarðkol")

and sulphur were thrown; the stones for casting were also made of

baked clay with pebbles in it. When these clay balls were slung out

and fell, they burst in pieces, so that the enemy had nothing to throw

back. The great black ball, which is compared to a sheep's paunch, and

which made such an ugly sound (report ?) when it fell that it

frightened the Greenlanders, also reminds one strongly on the

"herbrestr" (war-crash, report) which Laurentius Kálfsson's saga [cap.

8 in "Biskupa Sögur," i. 1858, p. 798] relates that Þrándr Fisiler,[7]

from Flanders, produced at the court of Eric Magnusson in Bergen, at

Christmas 1294. It "gives such a loud report that few men can bear to

hear it; women who are with child and hear the crash are prematurely

delivered, and men fall from their seats on to the floor, or have

various fits. Thránd told Laurentius to put his fingers in his ears

when the crash came.... Thránd showed Laurentius what was necessary to

produce the crash, and there are four things: fire, brimstone,

parchment and tow.[8] Men often have recourse in battle to such a

war-crash, so that those who do not know it may take to flight."

Laurentius was a priest, afterwards bishop (1323-30) in Iceland; the

saga was probably written about 1350 by his friend and confidant, the

priest Einar Hafliðason. It seems as though we have here precisely the

same notions as appear in the description of the fight with the

Skrælings. It is true that this visit of Thránd to Bergen would be

later than the Saga of Eric the Red is generally assumed to have been

written; but this may have been about 1300. Besides, there is no

reason why the story of the "herbrestr" should not have found its way

to Iceland earlier.[9] In any case this part of the tale of the

Wineland voyages has quite a European air.

For the rest, this feature too seems to have a connection with the

"Navigatio Brandani." It is there related that they approach an island of

smiths, where the inhabitants are filled with fire and darkness. Brandan

was afraid of the island; one of the inhabitants came out of his house "as

though on an errand of necessity"; the brethren want to sail away and

escape, but

"the said barbarian runs down to the beach bearing a long pair of

tongs in his hand with a fiery mass in a skin[10] of immense size and

heat; he instantly throws it after the servants of Christ, but it did

not injure them, it went over them about a stadium farther off, but

when it fell into the sea, the water began to boil as though a

fire-spouting mountain were there, and smoke arose from the sea as

fire from a baker's oven." The other inhabitants then rush out and

throw their masses of fire, but Brendan and the brethren escape

[Schröder, 1871, p. 28].

In the narrative of Maelduin's voyage a similar story is told of the smith

who with a pair of tongs throws a fiery mass over the boat, so that the

sea boils, but he does not hit them, as they hastily fly out into the open

sea [cf. Zimmer, 1889, pp. 163, 329]. The resemblances to Karlsevne and

his people flying with all speed before the black ball of the Skrælings,

like a sheep's paunch, which is flung over them from a pole and makes an

ugly noise when it falls, is obvious; but at the same time it looks as

though this incident of the Irish myth--which is an echo of the classical

Cyclopes of the Æneid and Odyssey (cf. Polyphemus and the Cyclopes), and

the great stones that were thrown at Odysseus--had been "modernised" by

the saga-writer, who has transferred mediæval European catapults and

explosives to the Indians.

The curious expression--used when the Skrælings come in the spring for the

second time to Karlsevne's settlement--that they came rowing in a

multitude of hide canoes, "as many as though [the sea] had been sown with

coal before the Hóp" [i.e., the bay], seems to find its explanation in

some tale like that of the "Imram Brenaind" [cf. Zimmer, 1889, p. 138],

where Brandan and his companions come to a small deserted land, and the

harbour they entered was immediately filled with "demons in the form of

pygmies and dwarfs, who were as black as coal."

The "hellustein" (flat stone) which lay fixed in the skull of the fallen

Thorbrand Snorrason is a curious missile, and reminds one of trolls (cf.

Arab myth, chapter xiii.). Features such as that of the Skrælings being

supposed to know that white shields meant peace and red ones war have an

altogether European effect.[11]

Another purely legendary feature in the description of the fight is that

of Freydis frightening the Skrælings by taking her breasts out of her sark

and whetting the sword on them ("ok slettir á sverdit"). As it stands in

the saga this incident is not very comprehensible, and appears to have

been borrowed from elsewhere. Possibly, as Moltke Moe thinks, it may be

connected in some way with the legend of the wood-nymph with the long

breasts who was pursued by the hunter. The mention of Unipeds and

"Einfötinga-land" shows that classical myths have also been adopted. The

idea was, moreover, widely current in the Middle Ages. Thus in the

so-called Nancy map of Claudius Clavus (of about 1426) we find "unipedes

maritimi" in the extreme north-east of Greenland. In the "Heimslýsing" in

the Hauksbók [F. Jónsson, 1892, p. 166] and in the "Rymbegla" [1780]

"Einfötingar" are mentioned with a foot "so large that they shade

themselves from the sun with it while asleep" (cf. also Adam of Bremen,

vol. i. p. 189). But in the Saga of Eric the Red the incident of the

Uniped and the pursuit of him are described as realistically as the

encounters with the Skrælings. Einfötinga-land is also mentioned in the

same manner as Skrælinga-land in its vicinity.

[Sidenote: The Skrælings are originally mythical beings]

In reading the Icelandic sagas and narratives about Wineland and Greenland

one cannot avoid being struck by the remarkable, semi-mythical way in

which the natives, the Skrælings, are always spoken of;[12] even Are

Frode's mention of them appears strange. Through finding the connection

between Wineland the Good and the Fortunate Isles, and between the latter

again and the lands of the departed, the "huldrelands," fairylands, and

the lands of the Irish "síd," I arrived at the kindred idea that perhaps

Skræling was originally a name for those gnomes or brownies or mythical

beings, and that it was these that Are Frode meant by the people who "were

inhabiting Wineland"--and further, that when the Icelanders in Greenland

found a strange, small, foreign-looking people, with hide canoes and

implements of stone, bone and wood, which also looked strange to them,

they naturally regarded them as these same Skrælings; and then they may

afterwards have found similar people (Eskimo, and perhaps Indians) on the

coast of America. It agrees with the view of the Skrælings as a small

people that elves and brownies in Norway were small, often only two or

three feet high, and that the underground or huldre-folk in Skåne were

called "Pysslingar" (dwarfs). This idea that the Skræling was originally

a brownie was strengthened by the discovery of the above-mentioned

probable connection between many features in the description of the

Skrælings' appearance in Wineland and the demons, like pygmies and dwarfs,

that Brandan meets with in a land in the sea (see p. 10), and the smiths

(or Cyclopes) in another island who throw masses of fire at Brandon and

Maelduin (see p. 9). That Unipeds and Skrælings are both mentioned as

equally real inhabitants of the new countries, and that a Uniped even

kills Thorvald Ericson near Wineland, and is pursued, points in the same

direction.

[Illustration: Eskimos cutting up a whale. Woodcut from Greenland,

illustrating a fairy-tale; drawn and engraved by a native]

I then asked Professor Alf Torp whether he knew of anything that might

confirm such an interpretation of the word Skræling; he at once mentioned

the German word "walt-schreckel" for a wood-troll, and afterwards wrote to

me as follows:

"The word I spoke about is found in modern German dialects:

'schrähelein' 'ein zauberisches Wesen, Wichtlein'; cf. Middle High

German 'walt-schreckel,' which is translated by 'faunus.' This

'schrähelein' (from the Upper Palatinate) agrees entirely both in form

and meaning with 'skrælingr': the only difference is that one has the

diminutive termination '*-ilîn' (primary form '* skrahilîn'), the

other the diminutive termination '-iling' (primary form '*

skrahiling'). The primary meaning was doubtless 'shrunken figure,

dwarf.' From a synonymous verbal root come the synonymous M.H.G. words

'schraz' and 'schrate,'[13] 'Waldteufel, Kobold.' This seems greatly

to strengthen your interpretation of 'skrælingr' as 'brownie' or the

like. Now, of course, 'skræling' means 'puny person' or the like, but

it is to be remarked that we do not find that meaning in the ancient

language."

It seems to me that this communication is of great importance. It is

striking that the word Skræling is never used in the whole of Old Norse

literature as a term of reproach or to denote a wretched man, and there

must have been plenty of opportunity for this if it had been a word of

common application with its present meaning, and not a special designation

for brownies. It only occurs there as applied to the Skrælings of

Wineland, Markland and Greenland. Again, the Skrælings in Greenland are

called "troll" or "trollkonur" in the Icelandic narratives, and in the

descriptions of the Wineland voyages demoniacal properties are attributed

to them as to the underground folk. In the fight with the Skrælings they

frightened Karlsevne and his people not only with the great magic

ball,[14] but also by glamour. And in the "Grönlendinga-þattr" it is

related that when the Skrælings came for the second time to trade with

Karlsevne,

"his wife Gudrid was sitting within the door by the cradle of her son

Snorre, and there walked in a woman in a black gown, rather low in

stature, and she had a band on her head, and light-brown hair, was

pale and big-eyed, so that no one had seen such big eyes in any human

head. She went up to where Gudrid sat, and said: What is thy name?

says she. My name is Gudrid, and what is thy name? My name is Gudrid,

says she. Then Gudrid, the mistress of the house, stretched out her

hand to her, and she sat down beside her; but then it happened at the

same time that Gudrid heard a great crash ['brest mikinn,' cf. the

noise or crash of the great ball in the Saga of Eric the Red] and that

the woman disappeared, and at the same moment a Skræling was slain by

one of Karlsevne's servants, because he had tried to take their

weapons, and they [the Skrælings] went away as quickly as possible;

but they left their clothes and wares behind them. No one had seen

this woman but Gudrid."[15]

This phantasmal Gudrid is obviously a gnome or underground woman; and as

she makes both her appearance and disappearance together with the

Skrælings it is reasonable to suppose that they too were of the same kind,

like the illusions in the battle with the Skrælings. It is further to be

remarked that she is short, and has extraordinarily large eyes, exactly as

is said of the Skrælings and of huldre- and troll-folk (cf. vol. i. p.

327), and also of pygmies.

[Illustration: Fight with mythical creatures (From an Icelandic MS.)]

On account of the identity of name one might perhaps be tempted to think

that it was Gudrid's "fylgja" (fetch) coming to warn her. But she does

nothing of the kind in the saga, nor was there any reason for it, as the

Skrælings came to trade with peaceful intentions, and fled as soon as

there was disagreement. But the story is obscure and confused, and it is

probable that this is a borrowed incident, and that something of the

meaning or connection has dropped out in the transfer. Another remarkable

feature (which Moltke Moe has pointed out to me) is that while in Eric's

Saga Karlsevne pays for the Skrælings' furs and red cloth, in the

"Grönlendinga-þáttr" he makes "the women carry out milk-food ('búnyt') to

them" (it was placed outside the house or even outside the fence), "and as

soon as the Skrælings saw milk-food they would buy that and nothing else."

Now the natives of America cannot possibly have known milk-food; but on

the other hand it happens to be a characteristic of the underground folk

that they are fond of milk and porridge (cream-porridge), which is put out

for the mound-elves and the "nisse." Another underground feature comes out

in the incident of the five Skrælings in Markland, three of whom "escaped

and sank into the earth" ("ok sukku i jorð niðr"). Possibly the statement

that the people in Markland "lived in rock-shelters and caves" may have a

similar connection.

As the Skrælings of Greenland were dark, it was quite natural that they

should become trolls, and not elves, which were fair.

It may also be supposed that the troll-like nature of the Skrælings is

shown in the curious circumstance that Are Frode, speaking of them in

Greenland, only mentions dwelling-places and remains of boats and stone

implements that they had left behind (see vol. i. p. 260), as a sign that

they had been both in the east and west of the country, while the people

themselves are never mentioned; this is like troll-folk, who leave their

traces without being seen themselves. One might suppose that such a mode

of expression agreed best with the current Icelandic view of them as

trolls. In a similar way it might be related of the first discoverer of an

earlier Norway, inhabited only by supernatural beings, that he found

traces both in the east and the west of the land which showed that the

kind of folk ("þjóð") had been there that inhabit Risaland, and that the

Norwegians call giants. In this way possibly this passage in Are may be

understood (but cf. p. 77); it might be objected that this expression: who

"inhabited Wineland" ("hefer bygt") does not suggest troll-folk, but real

human beings; if, however, the existence of these troll-folk is supported

by the actual finding of natives, in any case in Greenland (and doubtless

also in Markland), then such an expression cannot appear unreasonable.

Besides, there would be a general tendency on the part of the

rationalising Icelanders, with their pronounced sense of realistic

description, to make these trolls or brownies or "demons" into living

human beings in Wineland, while the designation of troll still persisted

for a long time in Greenland, side by side with Skræling--as a name

approximately synonymous therewith. The realistic description of the

Uniped affords a parallel to this. One is inclined to think that the

Skrælings of the saga have come about through a combination of the

original mythical creatures (like the síd-people in the Irish happy lands)

to whom at first the name belonged with the Eskimo that the Icelanders

found in Greenland, and perhaps the Eskimo and Indians that they found on

the north-east coast of North America. It is, as in fact Moltke Moe has

maintained in his lectures, by the fusing of materials taken from the

world of myth and from reality that the human imagination is rendered

most fertile and creative in the formation of legend. The points of

departure may often be pure accidents, resemblances of one kind or

another, which have a fructifying effect.

That the Skrælings, from being originally living natives, should later

have become trolls or brownies, is an idea that Storm among others seems

to have entertained (cf. note, p. 11); but this would be the reverse of

what usually happens. That the Eskimo should have made a strange and

supernatural impression on the superstitious Norsemen when they first met

them is natural, and so it is that this impression should have persisted

so long, until it gradually wore off through more intimate acquaintance

with them in Greenland; but the contrary, that the supernatural ideas

about them should only have developed gradually, although they were

constantly meeting them, is incredible.

In Scandinavian literature also we find mythical ideas attached to the

Skrælings of Greenland. In the Norwegian "Historia Norwegiæ" (thirteenth

century) it is said that when "they are struck with weapons while alive,

their wounds are white and do not bleed, but when they are dead the blood

scarcely stops running." The Dane Claudius Clavus (fifteenth century)

relates that there were pygmies in Greenland two feet high (like our elves

and brownies), and the same is reported in a letter to Pope Nicholas V.

(circa 1450), with the addition that they hide themselves in the caves of

the country like ants (see next chapter); that is, like underground

beings, although this trait may well be derived from knowledge of the

Eskimo. Mythical tales about the Greenland Eskimo also appear in Olaus

Magnus, and in Jacob Ziegler's Scondia (sixteenth century) [cf. Grönl.

hist. Mind., iii. pp. 465, 501].

[Sidenote: Borrowed features]

A little touch like that of Thorvald Ericson drawing the Uniped's arrow

out of his intestines and saying: "There is fat in the bowels, a good land

have we found..." shows how the saga-writer embroidered his romance:

Thorvald was the son of a chief and naturally required a more honourable

death than other men. The Fosterbrothers' Saga and Snorre have the same

thing about Thormod Kolbrunarskald at the battle of Stiklestad, when he

drew out the arrow and said, "Well hath the king nourished us, there is

still fat about the roots of my heart." But of course there had to be a

slight difference; while Thormod receives the arrow in the roots of his

heart and has been well treated by the king, Thorvald gets it in his small

intestines and has been well nourished by the country. Similar features

are found in other Icelandic sagas.

It is a characteristic point that both in the "Navigatio Brandani" and in

the "Imram Maelduin" three of the companions perish, or disappear, either

through demons or mythical beings. With this the circumstance that in

Karlsevne's voyage three of his companions fall, two by the Skrælings and

one by a Uniped, seems to correspond. We may also compare the incident in

the "Imram Brenaind" where Brandan and his companions come to a large,

lofty and beautiful island, where there are dwarfs ("luchrupán") like

monkeys, who instantly fill the beach and want to swallow them, and devour

one of the men (the "crosan") (cf. the circumstance that in the fight with

the Skrælings two men fell, of whom only one is mentioned by name).

When it is related first that Karlsevne found five Skrælings asleep near

Wineland, whom they took for exiles (!) and therefore slew, and that in

the following year they again found five Skrælings, of whom, however, they

only took two boys, while the others escaped, we may probably regard these

as two variants of the same story. This feature also has an air of being

borrowed in its dubious form, especially in the former passage; but I have

not yet discovered from whence it may be derived.

In the "Grönlendinga-þáttr" there is yet another variant. There

Thorvald Ericson and his men see three hide-boats on the beach, and

three men under each. "Then they divided their people, and took them

all except one who got away with his boat. They killed the eight...."

This is altogether improbable. Since one man could run away with his

boat, the hide-boats must be supposed to be kayaks, and the men

Eskimo; but in that case only one man would have been lying under

each; if they were larger boats (women's boats ?) it would be unlike

the Eskimo for three men to lie under each, and in any case one man

could not run away with a boat.

The tale of the kidnapped Skræling children also shows incidents and ideas

from wholly different quarters that have been introduced into this saga.

That the grown-up Skræling was bearded ("skeggjaðr") agrees, of course,

neither with Eskimo nor Indians, but it agrees very well with trolls,

brownies and pygmies, and also with the hermits of the Irish legends who

were heavily clothed with hair. That this man, with the two women who

escaped, "sank down into the earth" has already been mentioned as an

underground feature. That the Skrælings of Markland had no houses, but

lived in caves, does not sound any more probable; unless indeed this

feature is taken from underground gnomes, it may come from the hermits in

Irish legends. Thus the holy Paulus [Schröder, 1871, p. 32] dwelt in a

cave and was covered with snow-white hair and beard (cf. the bearded

Skræling), whom Brandan met on an island a little while before he came to

the Terra Repromissionis (cf. the circumstance that Markland lay a little

to the north of Wineland). The myth of Hvítramanna-land is derived from

Ireland, and has of course nothing to do with the Skræling boys. Storm, it

is true, thought they might have told of a great country (Canada or New

Brunswick) with inhabitants in the west, which later became the Irish

mythical land; but this too is not very credible. The names they gave are

obviously not to be relied on: they may be later inventions, from which no

conclusion at all can be drawn as to the language of the Skrælings, as has

been attempted by earlier inquirers.[16] The two kings' names,

"Avalldamon" and "Avalldidida" (or "Valldidida"), which are attributed to

them, may be supposed to be connected with "Ívaldr" or "Ívaldi." He was of

elfin race, was the father of Idun, who guarded the apples of

rejuvenation, and his sons, "Ívalda synir," were the elves who made the

hair for Sif, the spear Gungner for Odin, and Skiðblaðnir for Frey. In

Bede he is called "Hewald," and in the Anglo-Saxon translation

"Heávold."[17] The name "Vætilldi" (nom. "Vætilldr" ?) of the mother of

the Skræling boys recalls Norse names; it might be a combination of "vætr"

or "vættr" (gnome, sprite, cf. modern Norwegian "vætt," a female sprite)

and "-hildr" (acc., dat. "-hildi"); the word is also written in some MSS.

"Vætthildi," "Vetthildi," "Vethildi," "Veinhildi."

[Sidenote: The maggot-sea]

The last tale of Bjarne Grimolfsson who got into the maggot-sea

("maðk-sjár") bears a stamp of travellers' tales as marked as those of the

Liver-sea. But even this feature seems to have prototypes in the Irish

legends; it resembles the incident in the tale of the voyage of the three

sons of Ua Corra (twelfth century ?), where the sea-monsters gnaw away the

second hide from under the boat (which originally had three hides) [cf.

Zimmer, 1889, pp. 193, 199].

* * * * *

[Sidenote: The saga narrative a mosaic]

It will therefore be seen that the whole narrative of the Wineland

voyages is a mosaic of one feature after another gathered from east and

west. Is there, then, anything left that may be genuine? To this it may be

answered that even if the romance of the voyages be for the most part

invented--to some extent perhaps from ancient lays--the chief persons

themselves may be more or less historical. It is nevertheless curious that

it should be reserved to father and son first to discover and settle

Greenland, and then accidentally to discover Wineland. That to Leif, the

young leader, should further be attributed the introduction of

Christianity, and that he should thus represent the new faith in

opposition to his father, the old leader, who represented heathendom, may

also seem a remarkable coincidence, but it may find an explanation in the

probability of a new faith being introduced by men of influence, and just

as in Norway it was done by kings, so in Greenland it was naturally the

work of the future chief of the free state. Although it is strange that

such a circumstance should not be mentioned when Leif's name occurs in the

oldest authorities ("Landnáma"), this may thus appear probable. On the

other hand, no such explanation can be found for the circumstance that he

of all others should accidentally discover America. It would be somewhat

different if, as in the "Grönlendinga-þáttr," Leif had of set purpose gone

out to find new land, like his father. It is also curious that in the saga

we hear no more either of Leif or his ship on the new voyages, after his

accidental discovery, while it is another, Karlsevne, who becomes the

hero. It looks as though the tale of Leif had been inserted without proper

connection. In the "Grönlendinga-þáttr," too, this discovery is attributed

to another man, Bjarne Herjolfsson, which shows that the tradition about

Leif was not firmly rooted. It may be supposed that there was a tradition

in Iceland of the discovery of new land to the south-west of Greenland,

and this became connected with the legends of the fortunate "Wineland the

Good." Popular belief then searched for a name with which to connect the

discovery, and as it could not take that of the discoverer of Greenland

itself, the aged Eric who was established at Brattalid, it occurred to

many to take that of his son; whilst others chose another. It is doubtless

not impossible that Leif was the man; but what is suggested above, coupled

with so much else that is legendary in connection with the voyages of him

and the others, does not strengthen the probability of it.

But however this may be, it may in any case be regarded as certain that

the Greenlanders discovered the American continent, even though we are

without any means of determining how far south they may have penetrated.

The statements as to the length of the shortest day in Wineland, which are

given in the Flateyjarbók's "Grönlendinga-þáttr," are scarcely to be more

depended upon than other statements in this romantic tale.

[Sidenote: Features that appear genuine]

Incidents such as the bartering for skins with the Wineland Skrælings, and

the combat with unfortunate results, seem to refer to something that

actually took place; they cannot easily be explained from the legends of

the Fortunate Isles, nor can representations of fighting in which the

Norsemen were worsted be derived from Greenland. They must rather be due

to encounters with Indians; for it is incredible that the Greenlanders or

Icelanders should have described in this way fights with the unwarlike

Eskimo, or at all events with the Greenland Eskimo, who, even if they had

been of a warlike disposition, cannot have had any practice in the art of

war. This in itself shows that the Greenlanders must have reached America,

and come in contact with the natives there.

The very mention of the countries to the south-west: first the treeless

and rocky Helluland (Labrador ?), then the wooded Markland (Newfoundland

?) farther south, and then the fertile Wineland south of that, may also

point to local knowledge. It must be admitted that this could be explained

away as having been put together from the general experience that

countries in the north are treeless, but become more fertile as one

proceeds southward; but the names Helluland and especially Markland have

in themselves an appearance of genuineness, as also has Kjalarnes. The

different saga-writers, in the Saga of Eric the Red and in the

Flateyjarbók's "Grönlendinga-þáttr," give different explanations of the

reason for the name of Kjalarnes, which shows that the name is an old one

and that the explanations have been invented later (cf. vol. i. p. 324). A

point which agrees remarkably well with the trend of the Labrador coast

and may point to a certain knowledge of it, is that Karlsevne steers well

to the south-east from Helluland; but this may possibly be connected with

the idea mentioned later in the saga, that Wineland became broader towards

the south, and the coast turned eastwards, which was evidently due to the

assumption that it was connected with Africa (cf. vol i. p. 326).

[Illustration: Felling trees. Marginal decoration of the Jónsbók

(fifteenth century)]

The oldest and most original part of Eric's Saga, as of most other sagas,

is probably the lays. Of special interest are the lays attributed to

Thorhall the Hunter; they give an impression of genuineness and do not

harmonise well with the prose text, which was evidently composed much

later. One of the lays, which describes the poet's disappointment at not

getting wine to drink in the new country instead of water, shows that a

notion was current that wine was abundant there, and this notion must have

come from the myth of the Fortunate Land or Wineland; for, if we confine

ourselves to this one saga, the notion cannot have been derived from the

single earlier voyage thither that is there mentioned--namely, Leif's:

during his short visit he cannot possibly have had time to make wine, even

if he had known how to do so. The lay seems therefore to show that men had

really reached a country which was taken to be the "Wineland," or

Fortunate Isles, of legend, but which turned out not to answer to the

ideas which had been formed of it. The second lay attributed to Thorhall

(see vol. i. p. 326) may also point to the country they had arrived at not

being so excessively rich, for they had to cook whales' flesh on

Furðustrandir (and consequently were obliged to support themselves by

whaling). This gives us an altogether more sober picture than the prose

version of the saga; the latter, moreover, says nothing of whales except

the one that made them ill and was thrown out.

[Sidenote: Surest historical evidence]

The surest historical evidence that voyages were made to America from

Greenland is the chance statement, referred to later, in the Icelandic

Annals: that in 1347 a ship from Greenland bound for Markland was driven

by storms to Iceland. This reveals the fact that, occasionally at any

rate, this voyage was made; and if the sagas about the Wineland voyages

must be regarded as romances, or as a kind of legendary poetry--which

therefore made no attempt whatever to give a historical exposition of the

communication with the countries to the south-west--then many more voyages

may have been made thither than the sagas had use for. A prominent feature

of the different tales is that of the Greenlanders bringing timber from

thence; this appears already in the story of Leif's discovery of the

country--he found various kinds of trees and "mǫsurr," and brought them

home with him--and still more in the tales of the Flateyjarbók, where on

each voyage it is expressly stated that they felled timber to load their

ships, as though that were their chief object. In the Icelandic geography

mentioned on p. 1, there is an addition, probably of late date:

"... It is said that Thorfinn Karlsevne felled wood [in Markland ?]

for a 'húsa-snotra,' and then went on to seek for Wineland the Good,

and arrived where this land was thought to be, but was not able to

explore it, and did not settle there ..."[19]

In the Flateyjarbók's "Grönlendinga-þáttr" it is stated that Karlsevne, in

Wineland, cut down timber to load his ship, and that he had a

"húsa-snotra" of "masur" from Wineland. Both accounts show how highly

timber was prized in Greenland and Iceland. It is likely enough that this

was so, since they had no timber in Greenland but driftwood, dwarf birch

and osiers. But in order to find timber the Greenlanders need have gone no

farther south than Markland (Newfoundland ?); and this name (perhaps also

Helluland) may therefore have the surest historical foundation.

[Sidenote: Are Frode's evidence]

If Adam of Bremen (circa 1070) mentions no more than Wineland, this is

doubtless because he has only heard of that legendary country; the belief

in its existence may already have been confirmed in his time by the

discovery of new lands. More remarkable is the statement of the sober Are

Frode (circa 1130) as to the Skrælings who "inhabited Wineland" ("Vínland

hefer bygt"). This looks as if Wineland was familiar to him; it may be the

mythical name that has passed into a common designation for the countries

discovered in the south-west (cf. vol. i. pp. 368, 384). But there is also

a possibility that only the mythical country is in question, and that, as

suggested above (vol. i. p. 368; vol. ii. p. 16), its inhabitants are

merely the Skrælings of myths, since this mythical land and its

inhabitants were the best known and most talked of. If this be so, it does

not exclude the possibility of Are's having heard of other, less well

known, but actually discovered countries in the south-west, which he does

not mention. To make use of a parallel, let us suppose that Utröst with

its fairy people was better known in Nordland than the islands to the

north with their semi-mythical Lapps. If then we had read of a discovery

of Finmark that traces had been found there of the same kind of folk

("þjóð") who inhabit Utröst, then we should no more be able from this to

conclude that Utröst was a real land than that Vesterålen and Senjen, for

instance, had not been discovered. It must be remembered that it does not

appear with certainty from Are's words where he got his Wineland from (cf.

vol. i. p. 367).

Another document of a wholly different nature, wherein possibly the name

of Wineland is mentioned, has been found--namely, the runic stone of

Hönen.

[Sidenote: Runic stone from Hönen]

On the estate of Hönen, in Ringerike, there was found at the beginning of

last century a runic stone, which was still from to be seen there in 1823,

when the inscription was copied. Afterwards the stone disappeared.[20] The

drawing made in 1823 is now only known from a somewhat indistinct copy;

but from this Sophus Bugge [1902] has attempted to make out the runic

inscription, and he reads it thus:

"Ut ok vítt ok þurfa

þerru ok áts

Vínlandi á ísa

í úbygð at kómu;

auð má illt vega,

[at] döyi ár."

[Illustration: The existing drawing of the runic stone from Hönen,

Ringerike (S. Bugge, 1902)]

In prose this verse may, according to Bugge, be rendered somewhat as

follows:

"They came out [into the ocean] and over wide expanses ('vîtt'), and

needing ('þurfa') cloth to dry themselves on ('þerru') and food

('áts'), away towards Wineland, up into the ice in the uninhabited

country. Evil can take away luck, so that one dies early."

Bugge regards this reading of this somewhat difficult inscription as

doubtful; but if it is correct, this verse may be part of an inscription

cut upon one or more stones in memory of a young man (or perhaps several)

from Ringerike, who took part in an expedition by sea. According to his

explanation, they were then driven far out into the ocean in the direction

of Wineland, and were lost, perhaps in the ice on the east coast of

Greenland (which in the sagas is generally called the uninhabited country,

"ubygð"); they abandoned their ship and had to take to the drift-ice. He

(or they) to whom the inscription refers thereby met his death at an early

age, while at any rate some one must have made his way back and brought

the tale of the voyage. Probably there was a commencement of the

inscription, now lost, giving the name of the young man, who must

certainly have been of good birth; for otherwise, as Bugge points out, a

memorial with an inscription in verse would hardly have been raised to

him. He or his family belonged to Ringerike, and to the neighbourhood in

which the stone was put up.

The form of the runes makes it probable, according to Bugge, that the

inscription dates from the eleventh century, and perhaps from the period

between 1000 and 1050; scarcely before that, though it may be later. The

inscription would thus acquire a value as possibly the earliest document

in which Wineland is mentioned. What kind of expedition the inscription

records we cannot tell; there is nothing to show that it was a real

Wineland voyage; the words seem rather to point to their having been

driven against their will out to sea in the direction of "Wineland,"

whether we are to regard this as the Wineland of myth or as a historical

country; it might well be used figuratively in an epitaph to describe more

graphically how far they went from the beaten track. It may equally well

have been on a voyage to Ireland, the Faroes, Iceland, or merely to the

north of Norway that the disaster occurred, and they were driven by

storms to the Greenland ice; but since it cannot be denied that, as the

verse has been translated, the expressions appear somewhat unnatural, it

is difficult to form any opinion as to this.[21]

If this runic inscription from Ringerike has been correctly copied and

interpreted--which, as has been said, is uncertain--then this and Adam of

Bremen's information from Denmark would show that Wineland was known and

discussed in various parts of the North in the eleventh century, long

before Icelandic literature began to be put into writing. But strangely

enough, in the Norwegian thirteenth-century work, "Historia Norwegiæ," no

mention is made of Wineland, although in other respects the author has

made extensive use of Adam of Bremen's work; he merely states that

Greenland approaches the African Islands, by which, as pointed out above

(p. 1), he shows clearly enough that Wineland was regarded as belonging to

the African Islands, or Insulæ Fortunatæ. The "King's Mirror,"[22] which

gives a detailed description of Greenland, does not mention Wineland,

although the author evidently held the view that Greenland approached the

universal continent (i.e., Africa) on the south. The knowledge of it must

soon have been forgotten in Norway, or it was regarded as a mythical

country, while the tradition persisted longer in Iceland.

[Sidenote: Bishop Eric seeks Wineland]

The last time we meet with the name of Wineland in connection with a

voyage is in the "Islandske Annaler,"[23] where it is related in the year

1121 that "Eirikr, bishop of Greenland [also called Eirikr Upsi], went out

to seek (leita) Wineland." But we are not told anything more of this

expedition. The use of "leita" shows that Wineland was not a known

country, it can only apply to lands about which legends or reports are

current; just in the same way Gardar in the Sturlubók "went to seek ('fór

at leita') Snælandz" on the advice of his mother, who had second sight

(vol. i. p. 255), or Ravna-Floki "fór at leita Gardarshólms" (vol. i. p.

257), and Eric the Red "ætlaði at leita lands þess" which Gunnbjörn had

seen, etc. (vol. i. p. 267). As soon as the way was known, it was no

longer necessary to "leita" countries. If the voyage is historical, it may

have been to seek for the mythical country, the happy Wineland that Bishop

Eric set out, as St. Brandan in the legend sought for the Promised Land,

and as, 359 years later, the city of Bristol actually sent men out to look

for the happy isle of Brazil; but as the coast of America seems to have

been known, it may apply to a country there, of which reports had come,

and to which the name of the mythical country had been transferred. As

Eric is called a bishop, it has been thought that this was a missionary

voyage, which met with disaster [cf. Y. Nielsen, 1905, p. 8]; but who was

there to be converted in an unknown land, for which one had first to

"seek"? It would have to be the unknown Skrælings; but is this really

likely, when we hear of no mission to the Skrælings of Greenland? There

must have been enough of the latter to convert for the time being, if it

had been thought worth the trouble. Nor do we know much more about this

Eric Upsi.[24] Probably he was the same man who is called in the

Landnámabók "Eirikr Gnupssonr Grönlendinga-byskup." It is possible that

the see of Greenland was founded as early as 1110,[25] and that Eric was

the first bishop of Greenland, and went out there in 1112,[26] but he

cannot have been solemnly consecrated at Lund, like later bishops after

1124. It is possible that Eric was lost, for we hear no more of him, and

in 1122 and 1123 the Greenlanders made efforts to obtain a new bishop, who

was consecrated at Lund in 1124; but it is curious that nothing is then

said about any earlier bishop; moreover, the entry in the annals about

Eric dates at the earliest from the thirteenth century.

Some years ago it was asserted that a stone with a runic inscription

had been found in Minnesota, the so-called Kensington stone. On this

is narrated a journey of eight Swedes and twenty-two Norwegians from

Wineland as far as the country west of the Great Lakes. But by its

runes and its linguistic form this inscription betrays itself clearly

enough as a modern forgery, which has no interest for us here [cf. H.

Gjessing, 1909; K. Hoegh, 1909; H. R. Roland, 1909; O. J. Breda,

1910].

[Sidenote: Wineland in mediæval literature]

The name of Wineland occurs extremely rarely in mediæval literature and on

maps outside Iceland, and as a rule it is confused with Finland, as

already mentioned (vol. i. p. 198), or again with Vindland (Vendland).

Ordericus Vitalis (1141) gives "The Orkneys and Finland, together with

Iceland and Greenland" as islands under the king of Norway.[27] As the

passage seems to be connected with Adam of Bremen, who also erroneously

mentions these islands and Wineland as subject to the Norwegians (see vol.

i. p. 192), this Finland may be Wineland. It was pointed out in vol i. p.

198, that the Latin "vinum" was translated into Irish as "fín." Ordericus

(1075-1143), who lived in England until his tenth year, and wrote in an

abbey in Normandy, may well have had communication with Irishmen. In

Ranulph Higden's "Polychronicon" (circa 1350) the following are described

as islands in the outer ocean (surrounding the disc of the earth): first

the "Insulæ Fortunatæ" (see vol i. p. 346), immediately afterwards "Dacia"

(== Denmark), and to the _west_ of this island "Wyntlandia," besides

"Islandia," which has Norway to the south and the Polar Sea to the north,

"Tile" (Thule) the extreme island on the north-west, and "Noruegia"

(Norway). As this "Wyntlandia," which in the various editions of Higden's

map is called Witland, Wintlandia, Wineland, etc., is placed out in the

ocean on the west, it is possibly connected with the old Wineland which

was an oceanic island; but as it is mentioned together with Dacia, it may

also be confused with Vindland (Vendland),[28] and the circumstance that

the inhabitants are supposed to have sold winds to sailors who came to

them may have contributed to this. This may be connected with what Mela

[iii. 6] says about the island of Sena in the British Sea, off Brittany

(see vol. i. p. 29), where the nine priestesses of the oracle of the

Gaulish deity

"set seas and winds in motion through their incantations, change

themselves into what animal they please, cure sickness ... know the

future and foretell it, but they only assist those sailors who come to

ask counsel of them."

But the wind-selling wizards of the Polychronicon have also evidently been

confused with the Finns (Lapps) of Finmark, whom Adam of Bremen had

already described as particularly skilled in magic. The Polychronicon is a

free revision of an earlier English work, the "Geographia Universalis," of

the thirteenth century. In this "Winlandia" (or "Wynlandia") and its

inhabitants, who sell winds, are described at greater length; it is there

placed on the continent on the sea-coast and borders on the mountains of

Norway on the east.[29] It is therefore Finland, or perhaps rather the

country of the Lapp wizards, Finmark. Thus through similarity of sound

three countries may have been confused in the Polychronicon: Wineland,

Vindland, and Finland (Finmark). Evidently the "Vinland" to be found on

the continent in the map of the world in the "Rudimentum Novitiorum" of

Lübeck (1475) refers to Finland, and likewise the "Vinlandia" mentioned in

a Lübeck MS. of 1486-1488, which is an extensive island reaching as far as

Livonia.[30] Whether we regard Wineland as merely a mythical country, or

as a country actually discovered to which the name of the mythical land

was transferred, this limited dissemination of it in literature and on

maps is striking. It shows that knowledge of the myth, or of the country

with the mythical name, belonged to older times, was not very widely

spread outside the Scandinavian countries and Ireland, and was afterwards

forgotten, in spite of the frequent communication that existed between the

intellectual world of the North and that of the South [cf. Jos. Fischer,

1902, pp. 106, ff.].

[Sidenote: Wineland in Faroese lays]

While probably the name of Hvítramanna-land is still preserved in the

fairy-tale of Hvittenland, it is possibly the name of Wineland that has

been preserved in that "Vinland" which is mentioned in the Faroese lay of

"Finnur hinn Fríði";[31] but if so, it is the only known instance of its

occurrence in popular poetry. The Norwegian jarl's son, Finnur hinn Fríði

(Finn the Fair), courts Ingebjörg, the daughter of an Irish king; she is

beautiful as the sun, and the colour of her maiden cheeks is like blood

dropped upon snow.[32] She makes answer: "Hadst thou slain the Wine-kings,

then shouldst thou wed me." To Wineland is a far voyage, with currents and

mighty billows. But Finn begs his brother, Halfdan, to go with him over

the Wineland sea. They hoist their silken sail, and never lower it till

they arrive at Wineland. There they found the three Wine-kings. Thorstein,

the first, came on a black horse, but Finn tore him off at the navel; the

second, Ivint, also came on a black horse. But the third transformed

himself into a flying dragon; arrows flew from each of his feathers, and

he killed many of their men. The worst was that he shot venom from his

mouth under Finn's coat of mail, who, though he could not be killed by

arms, had to die. He then drew a golden ring from his arm and sent it by

Halfdan to Ingebjörg, bidding her live happily. But Halfdan sprang into

the air, seized the third Wine-king, and tore him off at the navel.

Halfdan sailed back to Ireland, brought Ingebjörg these tidings and the

ring, and slept three nights with her, but on the fourth she dies of

grief, since she can love no chieftain after Finn. Halfdan had a castle

built for himself and passed his years in Ireland, but all his days he

mourned for his brother. Although the whole of this legend seems to have

no connection with what we know about Wineland, it is most probable that

it is the same name, but that--like the tale itself of the Irish king's

daughter whose cheek was as blood upon snow--it came from Ireland. The

name may thus be a last echo of the Irish mythical ideas from which the

Wineland of the Icelanders arose.

[Illustration: Map by the Icelander Jón Gudmundsson, born 1574 (Torfæus,

1706)]

[Sidenote: Helluland in legend]

Curiously enough Helluland is the only one of the names of the western

lands that has been widely adopted in Icelandic fairy-tales and legendary

sagas. It has to some extent become a complete fairyland, with trolls and

giants, and it is located in various places, usually far north, even to

the north of Greenland, and sometimes on its north-east coast. In this

fairyland was the fjord "Skuggi" (shadow); it is mentioned in Örvarodds

Saga (circa 1300), where the hero departs to seek his enemy, the wizard

Ǫgmund, in Helluland, and again in Bárðarsaga Snæfellsáss (fifteenth

century), in the "Þáttr" of Gunnari Keldugnúpsfífl, in the Hálfdanarsaga

Brönufóstra, in the Saga of Hálfdani Eysteinssyni, and in Gest Bárdsson's

Saga.[33]

In the geography which under the name of "Gripla" was included in Björn

Jónsson's "Grönland's Annaler," it is said of the countries opposite

Greenland:

"Furðustrandir is the name of a land, where is severe frost, so that

it is not habitable, so far as people know; south of it is Helluland,

which is called Skrælingja-land; thence it is a short distance to

Wineland the Good, which some people think goes out from Africa...."

With this may be compared another MS. of the seventeenth century, where we

read:

"West of the great ocean from Spain, which some call Ginnungagap, and

which goes between lands, there is first towards the north Wineland

the Good, next to it is called Markland farther north, thereafter are

the wastes [i.e., the wastes of Helluland] where Skrælings live, then

there are still more wastes to Greenland." [Cf. Grönl. hist. Mind.,

iii. pp. 224, 227.]

From this it looks as if Helluland was regarded as inhabited by Skrælings,

which agrees with the reality, if it is Labrador. But these MSS. belong

to the seventeenth century, and may be influenced by the geographical

knowledge of later times. In Gripla there is evident confusion, as

Furðustrandir has been confounded with Helluland, and the latter with

Markland[34].

[Sidenote: Voyage to Markland, 1347]

No record is found of any voyage to Wineland after 1121; but on the other

hand there is mention more than two hundred years later of the voyage,

referred to above, to Markland from Greenland in 1347. Of this we read in

the Icelandic Annals (Skálholts-Annals) for that year: "Then came also

[i.e., besides ships from Norway already mentioned] a ship from Greenland,

smaller in size than the small vessels that trade to Iceland. It came to

Outer Straumfjord [on the south side of Snæfellsnes]; it was without an

anchor. There were seventeen men on board [in the Flatey-annals there are

eighteen men], and they had sailed to Markland, but afterwards [i.e., on

the homeward voyage to Greenland] were driven hither."

As the Skálholts-Annals were written not many years after this (perhaps

about 1362), it must be regarded as quite certain that this ship had been

to Markland; but on the homeward voyage, perhaps while she lay at anchor,

was overtaken by a storm, so that the cable had to be cut, and was driven

out to sea past Cape Farewell right across to the west coast of Iceland.

It is not likely that they sailed so far as Markland simply to fish, which

they might have done off Greenland; the object was rather to fetch timber

or wood for fashioning implements, which was valuable in treeless

Greenland; the driftwood which came on the East Greenland current did not

go very far. It is true that they could not carry much timber on their

small vessel; but they had to make the best of the craft they possessed,

and they could always carry a sufficient supply of the more valuable woods

for the manufacture of tools, weapons and appliances. They must for

instance have had great difficulty in obtaining wood for making bows;

driftwood was of little use for this.

But if this voyage took place in 1347, and we only hear of it through the

accident of the vessel getting out of her course and being driven to

Iceland, we may be sure that there were many more like it; only that these

were not the expeditions of men of rank, which attracted attention, but

everyday voyages for the support of life, like the sealing expeditions to

Nordrsetur, and when nothing particular happened to these vessels, such as

being driven to Iceland, we hear nothing about them. We must therefore

suppose that, even if they had to give up the idea of forming settlements

in the west, the Greenlanders occasionally visited Markland (Newfoundland

or the southernmost part of Labrador ?), perhaps chiefly to obtain wood of

different kinds.

In the so-called Greenland Annals, put together from old sources by Björn

Jónsson of Skardsá (beginning of the seventeenth century), it is said of

the districts on the west coast of Greenland, to the north of the Western

Settlement, that they "take up trees and all the drift that comes from the

bays of Markland" (cf. vol i. p. 299). This shows that it was customary to

regard Markland as the region from which wood was to be obtained. The name

itself (== woodland) may have contributed to this view; but the fact that

it survived long after all mention of Wineland had ceased may probably be

due to communication with the country having been kept up in later times,

and to this name being the really historical one on the coast of America.

According to the Icelandic Annals the voyagers from Markland who came to

Iceland in 1347, proceeded in the following year (1348) to Norway. This

was no doubt with the idea of getting back to Greenland, as there was no

sailing to that country from Iceland, and they would not trust their

vessel on another ocean voyage. But in Norway, where they arrived at

Bergen, they had a long while to wait. "Knarren," the royal trading ship,

seems to have been the only vessel that kept up communication with

Greenland at that time. We know that "Knarren" returned to Bergen in 1346,

and did not sail again until 1355. From a royal letter of 1354, which has

been preserved, it appears that extraordinary preparations were made for

the fitting-out and manning of this expedition, to prevent Christianity in

Greenland from "falling away." Perhaps the presence in Norway of these

Markland voyagers from Greenland had something to do with the awakening of

interest in that distant country, and perhaps it is not altogether

impossible that the intention was not only to secure and strengthen the

possessions in Greenland, but also to explore the fertile countries

farther west. It cannot be remarked, however, that it brought about any

change in the fading knowledge of these valuable regions, and we hear no

more of them until their rediscovery at the close of the fifteenth

century.

[Sidenote: Norse ball-game in America]

Ebbe Hertzberg, Keeper of the Public Records of Norway, has shown [1904,

pp. 210, ff.] that there is a remarkable and interesting similarity

between the game of lacrosse, which is played by the Indians of the

north-east of North America, and the ancient Norse game, "knattleikr"

(i.e., ball-game), so far as we know it from the sagas. It was greatly in

favour in Iceland. If Hertzberg is right in his supposition that the

Indians may have got this game from the Norsemen, this would lend strong

support to the view that the latter had considerable intercourse with

America and its natives.

According to Hertzberg's acute interpretation of the accounts of

"knattleikr" in the various sagas, it was played on a large level

piece of ground ("leikvǫllr," i.e., playing-ground), or on the ice,

usually by many players. These were divided into two sides, in such a

way that those most nearly equal in strength on each side were paired

as opponents and stood near to each other, and the two teams were thus

spread in pairs over the whole ground. Each player had a club with

which he either struck or caught and "carried" the ball. The club had

a hollow or a net in which the ball could be caught and lie. When the

ball was set going, the game was for the one who was nearest to seize

or catch it, preferably with his club, and to run off with it and try

to "carry it out," i.e., past a goal or mark; but in this his

particular opponent tried to hinder him with all his strength and

agility. The other players might not interfere directly in the

struggle of the two opponents for the ball. If the one who had the

ball was so hard pressed by his opponent that he had to give it up, he

tried to throw it to one of his own side, who then again had to reckon

with his own opponent in his attempt to "carry it out." This game was

much played by the Icelanders; it was apt to be rough, and men were

often disabled, or even killed, by their opponents.

[Illustration:The game of Lacrosse among the Menomini Indians (after W. J.

Hoffmann, 1896). On the left, a "crosse," about a yard long]

Hertzberg shows how the Canadian Indians' game of lacrosse, which has

become the national game of Canada, completely resembles in all

essentials this peculiar Norse ball-game from Iceland. The game of

lacrosse is, as Professor Y. Nielsen has pointed out [1905], more

widely diffused among the Indian tribes of North America than

Hertzberg was aware. Dr. William James Hoffman[35] has described it

among the Menomini Indians in Wisconsin, the Ojibwa tribe in northern

Minnesota, the Dakota Indians on the upper Missouri, and among the

Chactas, Chickasaws and kindred tribes farther south. Hoffmann also

mentions that opponents are picked and that the game is played in

pairs [1896, i. p. 132]. Among the Ojibwas, he says, the player who is

carrying the ball is often placed hors de combat by a blow on the arm

or leg; serious injuries only occur when the stakes are high, or when

there is enmity between some of the players. Among the more southern

tribes, on the other hand, the game is much more violent, the crosse

is longer, made of hickory, and it is often sought to disable the

runner. This, then, is even more like the Icelandic game.

Hoffmann thinks that the game is undoubtedly derived from one of the

eastern Algonkin tribes, possibly in the valley of the St. Lawrence.

Thence it reached the Huron Iroquois, and later it spread farther south to

the Cherokees, etc. In a similar way it was carried westwards and adopted

by many tribes. This then points to its having originated in just those

districts where one would have expected it to come from, if it was brought

by the Norsemen, as Hertzberg thinks. That the game is so widely diffused

in America and has become so much a part of the Indians' life, even of

their religious life, shows that it is very ancient there, and this too

supports Hertzberg's assumption that it is derived from the Norsemen. It

is true that Eug. Beauvois[36] has pointed out the possibility of the game

having been introduced into Canada by people from Normandy after the

sixteenth century; but before such an objection could carry weight, it

would have to be made probable that the characteristic Norse game was

really played in Normandy; but this is not known. In support of

Hertzberg's view it may also be adduced--a point that he himself has not

noticed--that the Icelanders appear to have introduced the same ball-game

to another American people with whom they came in touch, namely, the

Eskimo of Greenland. Hans Egede [1741, p. 93] says:

"Playing ball is their most usual game, especially by moonlight, and

they have two ways of playing: When they have divided themselves into

two sides, one throws the ball to another who is on his own side.

Those of the other side must endeavour to get the ball from them, and

thus it goes on alternately among them...." (The other way of playing

mentioned by Egede is more like football.)

[Illustration: Game of ball among the Eskimo of Greenland (Hans Egede,

1741)]

This description, together with Egede's drawing, from which it appears,

amongst other things, that the opponents are arranged in pairs, seems to

show that the Eskimo game was very like the Icelanders' "knattleikr" and

the Indians' "lacrosse"; but with the difference that according to Egede's

account the Eskimo did not use any club or crosse; moreover, from Egede's

drawing it looks as if both men and women took part, as with certain

Indian tribes. That there is a connection here appears natural. The most

probable explanation may be that the Eskimo as well as the Indians got

this ball-game from the Norsemen. That the Eskimo should have learnt it

from the whalers after the rediscovery of Greenland in the sixteenth

century is unlikely, as also that it should have come to the Indians from

the Eskimo round the north of Baffin Bay and through Baffin Land and

Labrador; nor is it any more likely that the Icelanders should have learnt

it of the Eskimo in Greenland, who again had it from America.

[Sidenote: Difficulties in the way of colonisation]

It is in itself a strange thing that the discovery of a country like North

America, with conditions so much more favourable than Greenland and

Iceland, should not have led to a permanent settlement. But there are

many, and in my judgment sufficient, reasons which explain this. We must

remember that such an outpost of civilisation as Greenland offered poor

opportunities for the equipment of such settlements; the settlers would

have to be prepared for continual conflicts with the Indians, who with

their warlike capacity and their numbers might easily be more than a

match for a handful of Greenlanders, even though the latter had some

advantage in their weapons of iron--and of these too the Greenlanders

never had a very good supply, as appears from several narratives. There

would also be need of ships, which were costly and difficult to procure in

Greenland; the few that were there certainly had enough to do, and could

hardly manage more than an occasional trip to Markland for timber.

Moreover, as the Greenland settlements themselves and their oversea

communications declined after the close of the thirteenth century, so also

of course did their communication with America decrease, until it finally

ceased altogether.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Hvítramanna-land]

It would thus appear, from all that has been put forward in this chapter,

that Wineland the Good was originally a mythical country, closely

connected with the happy lands of Irish myths and legends--which had their

first source in the Greek Elysium and Isles of the Blest, in Oriental

sailors' myths, and an admixture of Biblical conceptions. The description

of the country has acquired important features from Isidore's account of

the Insulæ Fortunatæ and from older classical literature. This mythical

country is to be compared with "Hvítramanna-land" (the white men's land),

"which some call Ireland the Great ('Irland hit Mikla')." Of this the

Landnáma tells us (cf. vol i. p. 353) that it lay near Wineland, in the

west of the ocean, six "dœgr's" sail west of Ireland (according to the

Eyrbyggja Saga it lay to the south-west); the Icelandic chief Are Mársson

was driven there by storms, was not allowed to depart, but was baptized

there and held in great esteem. Furthermore, the same land is mentioned in

the Saga of Eric the Red as lying opposite Markland (cf. vol. i. p. 330).

Finally, in the Eyrbyggja Saga there is a tale of a voyage (see later)

which evidently had the same country as its object, though it is not

mentioned by name. Since Thorkel Gellisson is given as the authority for

the story in the Landnáma, the legend may have reached Iceland about the

close of the eleventh century.

[Sidenote: Origin of the name]

This Irish land may also be derived from an adaptation of the ancients'

myth of the western Isles of the Blest,[37] and it evidently corresponds

to one of the mythical countries of the Christianised Irish legends. It

bears great resemblance in particular to "the Island of Strong Men"

("Insula Virorum Fortium") in the Navigatio Brandani, which is also called

there "the Isle of Anchorites" [Schröder, 1871, pp. 24, 17]. Three

generations dwelt there: the first generation, the children, had clothes

white as driven snow, the second of the colour of hyacinth, and the third

of Dalmatian purple. The name itself, which in Old Norse would become

"Starkramanna-land," shows much similarity of formation; besides which it

is the Isle of Anchorites that is in question, and one of the three

generations wears white garments; we are thus not far from the formation

of a name "Hvítramanna-land." There is yet another point of agreement, in

that, just as Are Mársson was not allowed to leave Hvítramanna-land, so

one of Brandan's companions had to stay behind on the Isle of Anchorites.

It may also be supposed that the name of the White Men's Land is connected

with the White Christ and with the white garments of the baptized; the

circumstance of Are Mársson being baptized there points in the same

direction.[38] But to this it may be added that various myths and legends

show it to have been a common idea among the Irish that aged hermits and

holy men were white. The old man who welcomes Brendan to the promised land

in the "Imram Brenaind" [cf. Zimmer, 1889, p. 139; Schirmer, 1888, p. 34]

has no clothes, but his body is covered with dazzling white feathers, like

a dove or a gull, and angelic is the speech of his lips. In the Latin

account of Brandan's life ("Vita sancti Brandani") the man is called

Paulus, he is again without clothes, but his body is covered with white

hair,[39] and in both tales the man came from Ireland [cf. Schirmer, 1888,

p. 40]. The cave-dweller Paulus on an island in the Navigatio Brandani

[Schröder, 1871, p. 32] is without clothes, but wholly covered by the hair

of his head, his beard and other hair down to the feet, and they were

white as snow on account of his great age. It is evident that the

whiteness is often attributed, as in the last instance, to age; but it is

also the heavenly colour, and the white clothing of hair (or feathers)

may also have some connection with the white lamb in the Revelation. In

the tale of Maelduin's voyage, which is older than those of Brandan's,

Maelduin meets in two places, on a sheep-island and on a rock in the sea,

with hermits wholly covered with the white hair of their bodies--they too

were both Irish--and on two other islands, the soil of one of which was as

white as a feather, he meets with men whose only clothing was the hair of

their bodies[40] [cf. Zimmer, 1889, pp. 162, 163, 169, 172, 178]. In the

Navigatio Brandan also meets on the island of Alibius an aged man with

hair of the colour of snow and with shining countenance. (Cf. Christ

revealing himself among the seven candlesticks to John on the isle of

Patmos: "His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow;

and his eyes were as a flame of fire" [Rev. i. 14].)

Among the Irish the white colour again forms a conspicuous feature in

the description of persons, especially supernatural beings, in ancient

non-Christian legends and myths. The name of their national hero Finn

means white. To Finn Mac Cumaill there comes in the legend a king's

daughter of unearthly size and beauty, "Bebend" (the white woman),

from the Land of Virgins ("Tír na-n-Ingen") in the west of the sea,

and she has marvellously beautiful white hair [cf. Zimmer, 1889, p.

269]. The corresponding maiden of the sea-people, in the "Imram

Brenaind," whom Brandan finds, is also whiter than snow or sea-spray

(see vol. i. p. 363). The physician Libra at the court of Manannán,

king of the Promised Land, has three daughters with white hair. When

Midir, the king of the síd (fairies), is trying to entice away Etáin,

queen of the high-king of Ireland, he says: "Oh, white woman, wilt

thou go with me to the land of marvels?... thy body has the white

colour of snow to the very top," etc. etc.[41] [cf. Zimmer, 1889, pp.

273, 279]. A corresponding idea to that of the Irish síd-people,

especially the women, being white, is perhaps that of the Norse elves

being thought light (cf. "lysalver," light-elves), or even white. The

elf-maiden in Sweden is slender as a lily and white as snow, and elves

in Denmark may also be snow-white (cf. also the fact that elves are

described as white nymphs, "albæ nymphæ").

It seems natural that these ideas--of whiteness as specially beautiful,

and mostly applied to the "síd" or elves, to the garments of baptism, and

to holy men and hermits--led to a name which, in conformity with the

Strong Men's Island of the Navigatio, would become the White Men's Land,

for the mythical western land oversea, where Are Mársson was baptized, but

which he could not leave again, and where, according to the Eyrbyggja

Saga, the language resembled Irish. This, then, is precisely the "Isle of

Anchorites." The country may have originated through a contact of ideas

from the religious world and the profane, original conceptions from the

latter having become Christianised. Doubtless the white garments, which

were connected with the other world, and which became the heavenly raiment

of the Christians, have also played a part. In Plato a white-clad woman

(i.e., one from the other world) comes to Socrates in a dream and

announces to him that in three days he is to depart. During the

transfiguration on the mountain Jesus' face "did shine as the sun, and his

raiment was white as the light" [Matt. xvii. 2], or "his raiment became

shining, exceeding white as snow" [Mark ix. 3]. On the basis of this

Christian conception the image of the world beyond the grave has taken the

form of a fair, shining land, as in the immense literature of visions; and

thus too in the Floamanna Saga [Grönl. hist. Mind., ii. p. 103], where

Thorgils's wife Thorey sees in a dream a "fair country with shining white

men" ("menn bjarta"), and Thorgils interprets it to mean "another world"

where "good awaits her" and "holy men would help her."

There is further a possibility that some of the conceptions attached to

Hvítramanna-land may be connected with ancient Celtic tales which in

antiquity were associated with the Cassiterides (in Celtic Brittany); in

any case there is a remarkable similarity between the mention in Eric the

Red's Saga of men who went about in white clothes, carried poles before

them, and cried aloud (see vol. i. p. 330), and Strabo's description (see

vol. i. p. 27) of the men in the Cassiterides in black cloaks with kirtles

reaching to the feet, who wander about with staves, like the Furies in

tragedy. That Strabo should see a resemblance to the Eumenides (Furies)

and therefore make his men black, while the Northern author has the

Christian ideas and in agreement with the name of Hvítramanna-land gives

them white clothes, need not surprise us. Even if Storm [1887] is correct

in his supposition that the white men's banners, or "poles to which strips

were attached" (see vol. i. p. 330), are connected with ecclesiastical

processions, this may be a later popular modification, just as the white

hermits out in the ocean may be a modification of pre-Christian, or at any

rate non-religious, conceptions in Ireland.

Reference has been made (p. 32) to the resemblance between the

accounts of the inhabitants of Wyntlandia (== Wineland), who were

versed in magic, and of the Celtic priestesses in the island of Sena

off Brittany. One might be tempted to think that here again there is

some connection or other between these Breton priestesses and, on the

one hand the Irishmen in Hvítramanna-land, on the other the men of the

Cassiterides (near Sena) who were like the Furies. Dionysius

Periegetes [510; cum Eustath. 1] relates that on this island of Sena

women crowned with ivy conducted nocturnal bacchanals, with shrieks

and violent noise (cf. the men in white clothes in Hvítramanna-land,

who carried poles and cried aloud). No male person might set foot on

the island, but the women went over to the men on the mainland, and

returned after having had intercourse with them (cf. vol. i. p. 356).

Exactly the same thing is related by Strabo [iv. 198] of the Samnite

women on a little island in the sea, not far from the mouth of the

Liger (Loire); inspired by Bacchus they honour that god in mysteries

and other unusually holy actions. The druids had their sanctuaries on

islands, and Mona (Anglesey) was their headquarters. Tacitus [Ann.

xiv. 30] tells of their fanatical women who, in white clothes

(grave-clothes), with dishevelled hair and flaming torches, conducted

themselves altogether like Furies on the arrival of the Romans.

The circumstance of Hvítramanna-land being, according to the Eyrbyggja

Saga, a forbidden land may correspond to that of men being prohibited from

setting foot on the priestesses' island, or again to the way to the

Cassiterides being kept secret and to the precautions taken to prevent

people from reaching them (cf. vol. i. p. 27). Something similar, it may

be added, is told of the rich, fertile island which the Carthaginians

discovered in the west of the ocean, and which, under pain of death, they

forbade others to visit [Aristotle, Mir. Auscult., c. 85; cf. also

Diodorus, v. 20]. That in late classical times there was a confusion

between the Cassiterides and the mythical isles in the west appears

further from Pliny's saying [Hist. Nat., iv. 36] that the Cassiterides

were also called "Fortunatæ," and from Dionysius Periegetes making tin,

the product of the Cassiterides, come from the Hesperides.

[Sidenote: The name Great-Ireland]

It was mentioned above (vol. i. p. 357) that the name of the promised

land, "the Land of Marvels," was also called in Irish legend the "Great

Strand" ("Trág Mór"), or the "Great Land" ("Tír Mór"); "two or three times

as large as Ireland" (vol. i. p. 355). It does not seem unlikely that the

Icelanders, hearing from Ireland of this great land, should come to call

it "Irland hit Mikla" (Ireland the Great); and this seems to be a more

natural explanation than Storm's [1887, p. 65] interpretation of the name

as meaning "the Irish colony," like "Magna Græcia" (the Greek colony in

Italy) and "Svíþjód it Mikla" (the Swedish colony in Russia, the name of

which may however have been derived from the name of the latter: "Scythia

Magna"); on the other hand, he gives an obvious parallel in "Great Han,"

the mythical land in the Great Ocean beyond China (Han).

In the Eyrbyggja Saga we read of Björn Asbrandsson, called

Breidvikinge-kjæmpe, and his exploits. He bore illicit love to Snorre

Gode's sister, Thurid of Fróðá, the wife of Thorodd, and had by her an

illegitimate son, Kjartan. Finally he had to leave Iceland on account of

this love; but his ship was not ready till late in the autumn. They put to

sea with a north-east wind, which held for a long time that autumn.

Afterwards the ship was not heard of for many a day.

[Sidenote: Gudleif's voyage]

Gudleif Gudlaugsson was the name of a great sailor and merchant; he

owned a large merchant vessel. In the last years of St. Olaf's reign

he was on a trading voyage to Dublin; "when he sailed westward from

thence he was making for Iceland. He sailed to the west of Ireland,

encountered there a strong north-east wind, and was driven far to the

west and south-west in the ocean," until they finally came to a great

land which was unknown to them. They did not know the people there,

"but thought rather that they spoke Irish." Soon many hundred men

collected about them, seized and bound them, and drove them up into

the country. They were brought to an assembly and sentence was to be

pronounced upon them. They understood as much as that some wanted to

kill them, while others wanted to make slaves of them. While this was

going on, a great band of men came on horseback with a banner, and

under it rode a big and stately man of great age, with white hair,

whom they guessed to be the chief, for all bowed before him. He sent

for them; when they came before him he spoke to them in Norse and

asked from what country they came, and when he heard that most of them

were Icelanders, and that Gudleif was from Borgarfjord, he asked after

nearly all the more important men of Borgarfjord and Breidafjord, and

particularly Snorre Gode, and Thurid of Fróðá, his sister, and most of

all after Kjartan, her son, who was now master there. After this big

man had discussed the matter at length with the men of the country, he

again spoke to the Icelanders and gave them leave to depart, but

although the summer was far gone, he advised them to get away as soon

as possible, as the people there were not to be relied upon. He would

not tell them his name; for he did not wish his kinsmen such a voyage

thither as they would have had if he had not helped them; but he was

now so old that he might soon be gone, and moreover, said he, there

were men of more influence than he in that country, who would show

little mercy to foreigners. After this he had the ship fitted out, and

was himself present, until there came a favourable wind for them to

leave. When they parted, this man took a gold ring from his hand, gave

it to Gudleif, and with it a good sword, and said: "If it be thy lot

to reach Iceland, thou shalt bring this sword to Kjartan, master of

Fróðá, and the ring to Thurid, his mother." When Gudleif asked him who

he was to say was the sender of these costly gifts, he answered: "Say

he sent them who was more a friend of the mistress of Fróðá than of

the 'gode' of Helgafell, her brother...." Gudleif and his men put to

sea and arrived in Ireland late in the autumn, stayed that winter at

Dublin, and sailed next summer to Iceland [cf. Grönl. hist. Mind., i.

pp. 769, ff.].

It is clear that Björn Breidvikinge-kjæmpe here is the same as Are Mársson

in the Landnáma, who was also driven by storms to Hvítramanna-land, had to

stay there all his life, and according to the report of Thorfinn earl of

Orkney (ob. circa 1064) had been recognised (by travellers like Gudleif

?), and was much honoured there. This incident of the travellers coming to

an unknown island and there finding a man who has been absent a long while

has parallels in many Irish legends. Thus it may be mentioned that

Brandan, in the Navigatio, comes to the convent-island of Alibius, with

the twenty-four Irish monks of old days, and meets there the old

white-haired man who was prior of the convent and had been there for

eighty years, but who does not tell his name. Brandan asks leave to sail

on, but this is not permitted until they have celebrated Christmas there

[Schröder, 1871, pp. 15, ff].[42]

[Sidenote: Guð-Leifr and Leifr hinn Heppni]

The resemblance between the two names "Guð-Leifr" (Gudleif == God-Leif)

and "Leifr hinn Heppni" (Leif the Lucky) also deserves notice, as perhaps

it is not merely accidental. One sails during the last years of St. Olaf

from Ireland to Iceland and is carried south-westwards to

Hvítramanna-land; the other sails during the last years of Olaf Tryggvason

from Norway to Greenland and is carried south-westwards to Wineland the

Good.

It might also be thought to be more than a mere coincidence that,

while Leif Ericson is given the surname of "hinn heppni," a closely

related surname is mentioned in connection with Gudleif in the

Eyrbyggja Saga, where he is called "Guðleifr Guðlaugsson hins auðga"

(i.e., son of Gudlaug the rich). In the one case, of course, it is the

man himself, in the other the father, who bears the surname. "Auðigr"

means rich, but originally it had the meaning of lucky, and the rich

man is he who has luck with him (cf. further "auðna" == luck,

"auðnu-maðr" == favourite of fortune). Gudleif Gudlaugsson also occurs

in the Landnámabók, but this surname is not mentioned, nor is anything

said about this voyage, in exactly the same way as Leif Ericson is

named there, but without a surname and without any mention of a voyage

or a discovery; in both cases this is an addition that occurs in later

sagas. In spite of the difference alluded to, one may suspect that

there is here some connection or other. Possibly it might be that, as

Guðriðr is the Christian woman among all the names beginning with

Thor- and Freyðis, so the name of Guðleifr, which was placed in

association with the Christian Hvítramanna-land, was used because it

had a more religious stamp than "happ" and "heppen," which in any case

are as nearly allied to popular belief as to religiosity, and which

were associated with the non-Christian Wineland.

[Sidenote: Voyage of eight adventurers in Edrisi]

The following tale in Edrisi, the Arabic geographer, whose work dates from

1154, bears considerable resemblance to the remarkable story of Gudleif's

voyage.[43]

Eight "adventurers" from Lisbon built a merchant ship and set out with

the first east wind to explore the farthest limits of the ocean. They

sailed for about eleven days [westwards] and came to a sea with stiff

(thick) waves [the Liver-sea] and a horrible stench,[44] with many

shallows and little light (cf. precisely similar conceptions, vol. i.

pp. 38, 68, 181, 182, note 1). Afraid of perishing there, they sailed

southward for twelve days and reached the Sheep-island ("Djazîrato

'l-Ghanam"), with innumerable flocks of sheep and no human beings (cf.

Dicuil's account of the Faroes, and Brandan's Sheep-island, vol. i.

pp. 163, 362). They sailed on for twelve days more towards the south

and found at last an inhabited and cultivated island. On approaching

this they were soon surrounded by boats, taken prisoners, and brought

to a town on the coast. They finally took up their abode in a house,

where they saw men of tall stature and red complexion, with little

hair on their faces, and wearing their hair long (not curled), and

women of rare beauty. Here they were kept prisoners for three days. On

the fourth day a man came who spoke to them in Arabic and asked them

who they were, why they had come, and what country they came from.

They related to him their adventures. He gave them good hopes, and

told them that he was the king's interpreter. On the following day

they were brought before the king, who asked them the same questions

through the interpreter. On their replying that they had set out with

the object of exploring the wonders of the ocean and finding out its

limits, the king began to laugh and told the interpreter to explain

that his father had once ordered one of his slaves to set out upon

that ocean; this man had traversed its breadth for a month, until the

light of heaven failed them and they were obliged to renounce this

vain undertaking. The king further caused the interpreter to assure

the adventurers of his benevolent intentions. They then returned to

prison and remained there until a west wind came. Then they were

blindfolded and taken across the sea in a boat for about three days

and three nights to a land where they were left on the shore with

their hands tied behind their backs. They stayed there till sunrise in

a pitiable state, for the cords were very tight and caused them great

discomfort. Then they heard voices, and upon their cries of distress

the natives, who were Berbers, came and released them. They had

arrived on the west coast of Africa, and were told that it was two

months' journey to their native land.

[Sidenote: Resemblance between Edrisi's tale and Gudleif's voyage]

As points of similarity to Gudleif's voyage it may be pointed out that the

Portuguese sail for thirty-five days altogether, to the west and

afterwards to the south, and arrive at a country which thus lies

south-south-west. Gudleif is carried before a north-east wind towards the

south-west and reaches land after a long time. Both the Portuguese and the

Icelanders are taken prisoners shortly after arrival; the former are

surrounded by boats, the latter by hundreds of men. The Portuguese saw

red-complexioned men of tall stature with long hair, the Icelanders saw a

tall, stately man with white hair coming on horseback. They had to wait

awhile before they were addressed in a language they could understand; the

Portuguese being first spoken to by an interpreter in Arabic[45] who gave

them good hopes, and afterwards brought them before the king, who assured

them of his benevolent intentions; while the Icelanders were sent for by

the great chief, who, when they came before him, spoke to them in Norse

and was friendly towards them, and after long deliberations spoke to them

again, and gave them leave to depart. The Portuguese had to wait in prison

for a west wind before they could get away; the Icelanders had to wait for

a favourable wind, which was again a west wind. The Portuguese were led

away blindfold, obviously in order that they should not find their way

back; when the Icelanders left it was enjoined upon them never to return.

The Portuguese came to the west coast of Africa, from whence they

afterwards had to sail northward to Lisbon; the Icelanders arrived in

Ireland, and sailed thence the next summer northward to Iceland. It seems

reasonable to suppose that there is some connection between the two tales;

the same myth may in part form the foundation of both, and this again may

be allied to the myth alluded to above of the Carthaginians' discovery of

a fertile island out in the ocean to the west of Africa. But there are

also striking resemblances between Edrisi's tale and the description in

the Odyssey of Odysseus's visit to the Phæacians in the western isle of

Scheria. On his arrival there Athene warns Odysseus to be careful, as this

people is not inclined to tolerate foreigners, and no other men come to

them. Odysseus is brought before the king, Alcinous, who receives him in

friendly fashion, and tells him that no Phæacian shall "hold him back by

force," and Odysseus relates his many adventures. Finally the Phæacians

convey him while asleep across the sea in a boat, carry him ashore at

dawn, and go away before he awakes [Od. xiii. 79, ff.]; this corresponds

to the Portuguese being taken blindfold across the sea and left bound on

the shore, until they are released at sunrise. The promise of the

Phæacians, after Poseidon's revenge for their helping Odysseus, never

again to assist any seafarer that might come to them, may bear some

resemblance to the incident of Björn Breidvikinge-kjæmpe trying to prevent

Icelanders from seeking a land which "would show little mercy to

foreigners."

Moreover, the tales, both of Gudleif's voyage and of Edrisi's Portuguese

adventurers, resemble ancient Irish myths.

[Sidenote: Irish myth]

In the "Imram Snedgusa acus meic Riagla" [of the tenth or close of the

ninth century, cf. Zimmer, 1889, pp. 213, f., 216], the men of Ross

slay King Fiacha Mac Domnaill for his intolerable tyranny. As a

punishment, sixty couples of the guilty were sent out to sea, and

their judgment and fate left to God. The two monks, Snedgus and Mac

Riagail, afterwards set out on a voluntary pilgrimage on the

ocean--while the sixty couples went involuntarily--and, after having

visited many islands,[46] reached in their boat a land in which there

were generations of Irish, and they met women who sang to them and

brought them to the king's house (cf. Odysseus's meeting first with

the women in the Phæacians' land, and their showing him the way to the

palace of Alcinous). The king received them well and inquired from

whence they came. "We are Irish," they replied, "and we belong to the

companions of Columcille." Then he asked: "How goes it in Ireland, and

how many of Domnaill's sons are alive?" They answered: "Three Mac

Domnaills are alive, and Fiacha Mac Domnaill fell by the men of Ross,

and for that deed sixty couples of them were sent out to sea." "That

is a true tale of yours; I am he who killed the King of Tara's son

[i.e., Fiacha], and we are those who were sent out to sea. This

commends itself to us, for we will be here till the Judgment [i.e.,

the day of judgment] comes, and we are glad to be here without sin,

without evil, without our sinful desires. The island we live on is

good, for on it are Elijah and Enoch, and noble is the dwelling of

Elijah...."

The similarity to the meeting of Gudleif and the Icelanders with the

likewise exiled great man and chief, who did not give his name but hinted

at his identity, is evident. If we suppose that the island Gudleif reached

was originally the white men's, or the holy (baptized) men's land, then it

may be possible that the great man's words to Gudleif about there being

men on the island who were greater ("ríkari") than he is connected with

the mention of Elijah and Enoch.

Thus we see a connection between Gudleif's voyage (and the exiled

Breidvikinge-kjæmpe on the unknown island) and Irish myths and legends,

the Arabic tale, and finally the Odyssey. What the mutual relationship

may be between Edrisi's tale and the Irish legends is to us of minor

importance. As the Norse Vikings had much communication with the Spanish

peninsula[47] it might be supposed that the Norse tale, derived from Irish

myths, had reached Portugal; but as the Arabic tale has several

similarities to the voyages of Brandan and Maelduin, and to Dicuil's

account of the Faroes (with their sheep and birds), which are not found in

the Norse narrative, it is more probable that the incidents in the

experiences of the Portuguese adventurers are derived directly from

Ireland, which also had close connection with the Spanish Peninsula,

chiefly through Norse ships and merchants. We must in any case suppose

that the Icelandic tale of Gudleif's voyage came from Ireland; but it may

have acquired additional colour from northern legends.

[Sidenote: Northern tales]

There is a Swedish tale of some sailors from Getinge who were driven

by storms over the sea to an unknown island; surrounded by darkness

they went ashore and saw a fire, and before it lay an uncommonly tall

man, who was blind; another equally big stood beside him and raked in

the fire with an iron rod. The old blind man gets up and asks the

strangers where they come from. They answer from Halland, from Getinge

parish. Whereupon the blind man asks: "Is the white woman still

alive?" They answered yes, though they did not know what he meant.

Again he asks: "Is my goat-house still standing?" They again answered

yes, though ignorant of what he meant. He then said: "I could not keep

my goat-house in peace because of the church that was built in that

place. If you would reach home safely, I give you two conditions."

They promised to accept these, and the blind old man continued: "Take

this belt of silver, and when you come home, buckle it on the white

woman; and place this box on the altar in my goat-house." When the

sailors were safely come home, the belt was buckled on a birch-tree,

which immediately shot up into the air, and the box was placed on a

mound, which immediately burst into flame. But from the church being

built where the blind man had his goat-house the place was called

Getinge [in J. Grimm, ii. 1876, p. 798, after Bexell's "Halland,"

Göteborg, 1818, ii. p. 301]. Similar tales are known from other

localities in Sweden and Norway. The old blind man is a heathen giant

driven out by the Christian church or by the image of Mary (the white

woman); sometimes again he is a heathen exile.

Here we have undeniable parallels to the storm-driven Icelanders' meeting

with the exiled Breidvikinge-kjæmpe, who asks after his native place and

his woman, Thurid,[48] and who also sends two gifts home, though with very

different feelings and objects. It may be supposed that the

Swedish-Norwegian tale is derived from ancient myths, and the Icelandic

narrative may have borrowed features, not, of course, from this very tale,

but from myths of the same type.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Japanese fairy-tale]

Remarkable points of resemblance both to the voyages of the Irish (Bran's

voyage) to the Fortunate Isles in the west, and to those of Gudleif and of

the eight Portuguese (in Edrisi), are found in a Japanese tale of the

fortunate isles of "Horaisan," to which Moltke Moe has called my

attention.[49]

This happy land lies far away in the sea towards the east; there on

the mountain Fusan grows a splendid tree which is sometimes seen in

the distance over the horizon; all vegetation is verdant and flowering

in eternal spring, which keeps the air mild and the sky blue; the

passing of time is unnoticed, and death never finds the way thither,

there is no pain, no suffering, only peace and happiness. Once on a

time Jofuku, body physician to a cruel emperor of China, put to sea

on the pretext of looking for this country and seeking for his master

the plant of immortality which grows on Fusan, the highest mountain

there. He came first to Japan; but went farther and farther out into

the ocean until he really reached Horaisan; there he enjoyed complete

happiness, and never thought of returning to prolong his tyrant's

life.

The old Japanese wise man, Vasobiove, who had withdrawn from the world

and passed his days in contemplative peace, was one day out fishing by

himself (to avoid many trivial visits), when he was driven out to sea

by a violent storm; he then rowed about the sea, keeping himself alive

by fishing. After three months he came to the "muddy sea," which

nearly cost him his life, as there were no fish there. But after a

desperate struggle, and finally twelve hours' hard rowing, he reached

the shore of Horaisan. There he was met by an old man whom he

understood, for he spoke Chinese. This was Jofuku, who received

Vasobiove in friendly fashion and told him his story. Vasobiove was

overjoyed on hearing where he was. He stayed there for a couple of

hundred years, but did not know how long it was; for where all is

alike, where there is neither birth nor death, no one heeds the

passing of time. With dancing and music, in conversation with wise and

brilliant men, in the society of beautiful and amiable ladies, he

passed his days.

But at last Vasobiove grew tired of this sweet existence and longed

for death. It was hopeless, for here he could not die, nor could he

take his own life, there were no poisons, no lethal weapons; if he

threw himself over a precipice or ran his head against a sharp rock,

it was like a fall on to soft cushions, and if he threw himself into

the sea, it supported him like a cork. Finally he tamed a gigantic

stork, and on its back he at last returned to Japan,[50] after the

stork had carried him through many strange countries, of which the

most remarkable was that of the Giants, who are immensely superior to

human beings in everything. Whereas Vasobiove was accustomed to

admiration wherever he propounded his philosophical views and systems,

he left that country in humiliation; for the Giants said they had no

need of all that, and declared Vasobiove's whole philosophy to be the

immature cries of distress of the children of men.

A connection between the intellectual world of China and Japan and that of

Europe in the Middle Ages may well be supposed to have been brought about

by the Arabs, who penetrated as far as China on their trading voyages, and

who, on the other hand, had close communication with Western Europe.

Furthermore, it must be remembered how many of our mythical conceptions

and tales are more or less connected with India, just as many of the

Arabian tales evidently had their birthplace there [cf. E. Rohde, 1900,

pp. 191, ff.]; while on the other side there was, of course, a close

connection between India and the intellectual world of China and Japan, as

shown by the spread of Buddhism. A transference of the same myths both

eastward to Japan and westward to Europe is thus highly probable, whether

these myths originated in Europe or in India and the East. It is striking,

too, that even a secondary feature such as the curdled, dead sea (cf.

"Morimarusa," see vol. i. p. 99; the stinking sea in Edrisi, vol. ii. p.

51) is met with again here as the "muddy sea" without fish (cf.

resemblances to Arab ideas, chapter xiii.).

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Retrospect]

If we now look back upon all the problems it has been sought to solve in

this chapter, the impression may be a somewhat heterogeneous and negative

one; the majority will doubtless be struck at the outset by the

multiplicity of the paths, and by the intercrossing due to this

multiplicity. But if we force our way through the network of by-paths and

follow up the essential leading lines, it appears to me that there is

established a firm and powerful series of conclusions, which it will not

be easy to shake. The most important steps in this series are:

(1) The oldest authority,[51] Adam of Bremen's work, in which Wineland is

mentioned, is untrustworthy, and, with the exception of the name and of

the fable of wine being produced there, contains nothing beyond what is

found in Isidore.

(2) The oldest Icelandic authorities that mention the name of "Vinland,"

or in the Landnáma "Vindland hit Góða," say nothing about its discovery or

about the wine there; on the other hand, Are Frode mentions the Skrælings

(who must originally have been regarded as a fairy people). The name of

Leif Ericson is mentioned, unconnected with Wineland or its discovery.

(3) It is not till well on in the thirteenth century that Leif's surname

of Heppni, his discovery of Wineland ("Vinland" or "Vindland"), and his

Christianising of Greenland are mentioned (in the Kristni-saga and

Heimskringla), but still there is nothing about wine.

(4) It is not till the close of the thirteenth century that any

information occurs as to what and where Wineland was, with statements as

to the wine and wheat there, and a description of voyages thither (in the

Saga of Eric the Red). But still the accounts omit to inform us who gave

the name and why.

(5) The second and later principal narrative of voyages to Wineland (the

Flateyjarbók's Grönlendinga-þáttr) gives a very different account of the

discovery, by another, and likewise of the later voyages thither.

(6) The first of the two sagas, and the one which is regarded as more to

be relied on, contains scarcely a single feature that is not wholly or in

part mythical or borrowed from elsewhere; both sagas have an air of

romance.

(7) Even among the Greeks of antiquity we find myths of fortunate isles

far in the western ocean, with the two characteristic features of

Wineland, the wine and the wheat.

(8) The most significant features in the description of these Fortunate

Isles or Isles of the Blest in late classical times and in Isidore are the

self-grown or wild-growing vine (on the heights) and the wild-growing

(uncultivated, self-sown or unsown) corn or wheat or even cornfields

(Isidore). In addition there were lofty trees (Pliny) and mild winters.

Thus a complete correspondence with the saga's description of Wineland.

(9) The various attempts that have been made to bring the natural

conditions of the North American coast into agreement with the saga's

description of Wineland are more or less artificial, and no natural

explanation has been offered of how the two ideas of wine and wheat, both

foreign to the Northerners, could have become the distinguishing marks of

the country.

(10) In Ireland long before the eleventh century there were many myths and

legends of happy lands far out in the ocean to the west; and in the

description of these wine and the vine form conspicuous features.

(11) From the eleventh century onward, in Ireland and in the North, we

meet with a Grape-island or a Wineland, which it seems most reasonable to

suppose the same.

(12) From the Landnámabók it may be naturally concluded that in the

eleventh century the Icelanders had heard of Wineland, together with

Hvítramanna-land, in Ireland.

(13) Thorkel Gellisson, from whom this information is derived, probably

also furnished Are Frode with his statement in the Islendingabók about

Wineland; this is therefore probably the same Irish land.

(14) The Irish happy lands peopled by the síd correspond to the Norwegian

huldrelands out in the sea to the west, and the Icelandic elf-lands.

(15) Since the huldre- and síd-people and the elves are originally the

dead, and since the Isles of the Blest or the Fortunate Isles of antiquity

were the habitations of the happy dead, these islands also correspond to

the Irish síd-people's happy lands, and to the Norwegian huldrelands and

the Icelandic elf-lands.

(16) The additional name of "hit Góða" for the happy Wineland and the name

"Landit Góða" for huldrelands in Norway correspond directly to the name of

"Insulæ Fortunatæ," which in itself could not very well take any other

Norse form. And as in addition the huldrelands were imagined as specially

good and fertile, and the underground, huldre- and síd-people or elves are

called the "good people," and are everywhere in different countries

associated with the idea of "good," this gives a natural explanation of

both the Norse names.

(17) The name "Vinland hit Góða" has a foreign effect in Norse

nomenclature; it must be a hybrid of Norse and foreign nomenclature,

through "Vinland" being combined with "Landit Góða," which probably

originated in a translation of "Insulæ Fortunatæ."

(18) The probability of the name of Skrælings for the inhabitants of

Wineland having originally meant brownies or trolls--that is, small

huldre-folk, elves or pygmies--entirely agrees with the view that Wineland

was originally the fairy country, the Fortunate Isles in the west of the

ocean.

(19) The statement of the Icelandic geography, that in the opinion of some

Wineland the Good was connected with Africa, and the fact that the

Norwegian work, Historia Norwegiæ, calls Wineland (with Markland and

Helluland) the African Islands, are direct evidence that the Norse

Wineland was the Insulæ Fortunatæ, which together with the Gorgades and

the Hesperides were precisely the African Islands.

(20) Even though the Saga of Eric the Red and the Grönlendinga-þáttr

contain nothing which we can regard as certain information as to the

discovery of America by the Greenlanders, we yet find there and elsewhere

many features which show that they must have reached the coast of America,

the most decisive amongst them being the chance mention of the voyagers

from Markland in 1347. To this may be added Hertzberg's demonstration of

the adoption of the Icelandic game of "knattleikr" by the Indians. The

name of the mythical land may then have been transferred to the country

that was discovered.

(21) Hvítramanna-land is a mythical land similar to the wine-island of the

Irish, modified in accordance with Christian ideas, especially perhaps

those of the white garments of the baptized--as in the Navigatio Brandani

in reference to the Isle of Anchorites or the "Strong Men's Isle" (==

Starkra-manna-land)--and of the white hermits.

(22) Finally, among the most different people on earth, from the ancient

Greeks to the Icelanders, Chinese and Japanese, we meet with similar myths

about countries out in the ocean and voyages to them, which, whether they

be connected with one another or not, show the common tendency of humanity

to adopt ideas and tales of this kind.

* * * * *

But even if we are obliged to abandon the Saga of Eric the Red[52] and the

other descriptions of these voyages as historical documents, this is

compensated by the increase in our admiration for the extraordinary powers

of realistic description in Icelandic literature. In reading Eric's Saga

one cannot help being struck by the way in which many of the events are so

described, often in a few words, that the whole thing is before one's eyes

and it is difficult to believe that it has not actually occurred. This is

just the same quality that characterises our Norwegian fairy-tales: all

that is supernatural is made so natural and realistic that it is brought

straight before one. The Icelanders created the realistic novel; and at a

time when the prose style of Europe was still in its infancy their prose

narrative often reaches the summit of clear simplicity. In part this may

doubtless be explained by their not being merely authors, but men of

action; their presentment acquired the stamp of real life and the brevity

that belongs to the narrator of things seen. And to this, of course, must

be added the fact that as a rule the tales were sifted and abridged by

generations of oral transmission. In later times this style became

corrupted by European influence.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Postscript]

After I had given, on October 7, 1910, the outlines of this examination of

the sagas of the Wineland voyages before the Scientific Society of

Christiania, attention was called in Sweden, by Professor F. Läffler, to

the fact that the Swedish philologist, Professor Sven Söderberg, whose

early death in 1901 is much to be regretted, had announced views about

Wineland similar to those at which I have arrived. The manuscript of a

lecture that he delivered on the subject at Lund in May 1898, but which

was never printed, was then found, and has been published in the

"Sydsvenska Dagbladet Snällposten" for October 30, 1910. As I have thus

become acquainted with this interesting inquiry too late to be able to

include it in my examination, I think it right to mention it here.

Professor Söderberg thinks, as I do, that there can be no doubt about the

Norsemen having discovered a part of North America; but he looks upon the

tales of the wine and everything connected therewith as later inventions.

He maintains that the name of "Vinland" originally meant grass-land or

pasture-land (from the old Norse word "vin" == pasture), therefore

something similar to the meaning of Greenland, and that it may have been

the name of a country discovered in the west. Curiously enough, I took at

first the same view, and thought too that Adam of Bremen might have

misunderstood such a word, just as Söderberg thinks; but I allowed myself

to be convinced by the linguistic objection that the word "vin" (pasture)

seems to have gone out of use before the eleventh century (cf. vol. i. p.

367). However, Söderberg's reasons for supposing that the word was still

in use appear to have weight; and he also makes it probable that the name

formed thereby might be Vinland and not Vinjarland. (In support of this

Mr. A. Kiær gave me as an example the Norwegian name Vinås.) Professor

Söderberg then thinks that Adam of Bremen heard this name in Denmark, and,

misinterpreting it as a foreigner to mean the land of wine, himself

invented the explanation of the country's being so called. Söderberg gives

several striking examples to show how this kind of "etymologising" was

just in Adam's spirit (e.g., Sconia or Skåne is derived from Old German

"sconi" or "schön"; Greenland comes from the inhabitants being

bluish-green in the face, etc.). An example from a country lying near

Denmark, which appears to me even more striking than those given by

Söderberg, is Adam's explanation of Kvænland as the Land of Women (cf.

vol. i. pp. 186, f., 383), the Wizzi as white people, or Albanians, the

Huns as dogs, etc. Söderberg has difficulty in explaining the statement

about the unsown corn in Wineland; but if he had noticed Isidore's

description of the Insulæ Fortunatæ with the self-grown vine and the

wild-growing corn, he would have found a perfectly natural explanation of

this also. If Adam had misunderstood a "Vinland" (== grass-land), and then

perhaps Finland (Finmark, cf. vol i. p. 382), as meaning the land of wine,

it would be just in his spirit to transfer thither Isidore's description

of the Insulæ Fortunatæ; a parallel case is that in interpreting Kvænland

as Womanland he transfers thither the myth of the Amazons and its fables,

and this in spite of its being a country on the Baltic about which it must

have been comparatively easy for him to obtain information. In the same

way he transfers to the "island" of Halagland, mentioned immediately

before Wineland, an erroneous account of the midnight sun and the winter

night taken from older writers (cf. vol. i. p. 194, note 2). But one

reason for thinking that "Vinland" really meant the land of wine as early

as that time is the circumstance put forward above (vol. i. p. 365), that

at about the same time there occurs a Grape-island in the Navigatio

Brandani.

Professor Söderberg then goes through the Icelandic accounts of Wineland,

and points out, in the same way as has been done in this chapter, that the

oldest authorities have nothing remarkable to report about the country,

and do not mention wine there, and he rightly lays stress on this being

particularly significant in the case of Snorre Sturlason,

"knowing as we do how prone Snorre is to digress from his proper

subject, when he has anything really interesting to communicate. The

reason must be that he did not know anything particularly remarkable

about Wineland; and without doubt this is due to his not having known

Adam of Bremen. It has, in fact, been shown that Snorre has not a

single statement from Adam."

Later, Söderberg thinks, Adam of Bremen's fourth book became known in

Iceland, and on the foundation of that the tale of Leif's discovery of the

country with the wine and corn arose, and the later sagas developed,

especially that of Thorfinn Karlsevne's voyage, which he thinks in the

main "rests on a truthful foundation," though he points out that a

particular feature like that of the two Scottish runners must be "pure

invention, or rather ... borrowed from another saga." If Professor

Söderberg had remarked how most of the incidents in this saga are

spurious, he would have found even stronger support for his views in this

fact.

[Illustration]