Vinland – America Before Columbus

About five centuries before Columbus, Norsemen set foot on American soil. For a long time this was thought a legend – until the spade proved it.

Every child learns that Christopher Columbus ‘discovered America’ in 1492. But around 500 years earlier, Norsemen were already there – proof of the incredible range of their ships.

From Iceland to Greenland and Westward

The Vikings settled Iceland, then Greenland. From there it was only one more step westward. The Vinland sagas tell how Leif Erikson, around the year 1000, reached a fertile land with forest and wild grapes and named it Vinland.

From Myth to Proof

For a long time the sagas were taken for fiction. Then, in the 1960s, archaeologists found the remains of a Viking settlement at the northern tip of Newfoundland: L'Anse aux Meadows. Houses in the Norse longhouse style, iron nails, a smithy – the clear proof that Norsemen had indeed been in North America. The site is today a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Why They Did Not Stay

The settlement lasted only briefly. The great distance from home and conflicts with the native population probably made a permanent stay impossible. But the achievement remains: across the North Atlantic in open wooden ships, to the edge of a new world.

Read more about the ships that made it possible in our post on the dragon ships.

The discovery of America – 500 years before Columbus

Around the year 1000 northern people reached the coast of North America from Greenland. In the sagas the land is called Vinland. Thus Europeans set foot on the American continent about half a millennium before Columbus – the boldest voyage of the whole Viking Age.

Leif Erikson and the Vinland sagas

Two Icelandic sagas – the Saga of the Greenlanders and the Saga of Erik the Red – tell of the voyages. Their most famous hero is Leif Erikson, son of Erik the Red, who explored Vinland. The sagas contradict each other in details but complement each other in the larger picture.

L'Anse aux Meadows – the proof

Long the sagas were regarded as mere legend – until in 1960 a real Norse settlement was excavated at L'Anse aux Meadows on Newfoundland: houses, a smithy, Norse tools. The final proof that the Vikings really were in America.

The year 1021

In 2021 even an exact dating succeeded: from a cosmic radiation event in the wood, researchers could prove that trees were felled at the site in the year 1021 – the first securely dated year of a European in America.

Why did they not stay?

The settlement was abandoned after a short time. Conflicts with the natives (called "Skrælings" in the sagas), the great distance and the small number of settlers made a permanent stay impossible.

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