There's been intermittant contact between the old and new world for at least 4000 years. With the ocean currents and trade winds being the way they are, it's inevitable.
The oldest human remains undisputedly found in North America are just under 20000 years old, 19500 +/- 300 years old. These are found in three places I know of, all on the Eastern coast, and all show that the persons involved came from Europe, probably Iberia or maybe France, and had the Solutrean culture complex, and were thus of Caucasian race if the Solutreans were-- and I have never heard that disputed.
It is not as though either Viking or human history generally, is affected by the final verdict on this map. I do not believe that a chemical analysis of ink traces can resolve this, and the other factors outweigh that and suggest its genuineness IMHO.
But even if a fake, we know that others from the 1000-1400 era were in existence in Europe which were like it and were genuine. So big deal, all in all.
Public release date: 29-Jul-2002
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Contact: Elizabeth Tait
taite@publicaffairs.si.edu
202-357-2627 129
Smithsonian Institution
Scientists determine age of first New World map
Parchment points to authenticity of Vinland Map
For the first time, scientists have ascribed a date – 1434 A.D., plus or minus 11 years – to the parchment of the controversial Vinland Map, possibly the first map of the North American continent. Collaborators from the Smithsonian Center for Materials Research and Education (SCMRE), Suitland, Md., the University of Arizona, Tucson, and the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, N.Y., used carbon-dating techniques to analyze the parchment on which the map is drawn. Their findings, published in the August edition of the journal Radiocarbon, place the parchment of the map 60 years ahead of Christopher Columbus' arrival in the West Indies, and provide compelling evidence that the map is authentic.
"Many scholars have agreed that if the Vinland Map is authentic, it is the first cartographic representation of North America, and its date would be key in establishing the history of European knowledge of the lands bordering the western Atlantic Ocean," said Jacqueline S. Olin, assistant director for archaeometric research at SCMRE when the study began in 1995. Olin and co-authors Douglas Donahue, a physicist at the University of Arizona and Garman Harbottle, a chemist at Brookhaven National Laboratory, along with SCMRE paper conservator Dianne Van Der Reyden, sampled the bottom right edge of the parchment for analysis. The dating was carried out at the National Science Foundation-University of Arizona Accelerator Mass Spectrometer in Tucson. The unusually high precision of the date was possible because the Vinland Map's date fell in a very favorable region of the carbon-14 dating calibration curve.
The parchment analysis again indicates the map's connection with the Catholic Church's Council of Basel, convened between 1431 and 1449, first posited by R.A. Skelton, T.E. Marston and G.D. Painter, the scholars who undertook a six-year investigation of the Vinland Map and accompanying "Tartar Relation," and made their argument for the map's authenticity in the book, The Vinland Map and the Tartar Relation, published in 1965 by Yale University Press. Paul A. Mellon had purchased the map and manuscript for $1 million in 1958, and requested the study after donating them to Yale.
The map came to light in Europe in the mid-1950s without any record of previous ownership or provenance in any library or collection. It is now in the collection of Yale's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library in New Haven, Conn. The name "Vinland" derives from text on the map that recounts Bjarni and Leif Eriksson discovering "a new land, extremely fertile and even having vines, … which island they named Vinland." The "Island of Vinland" appears on the map in the northwest Atlantic Ocean. Scholars postulate it may represent present-day Labrador, Newfoundland or Baffin Island. The map also shows Europe, Africa and Asia.
Several previous studies challenging the map's authenticity focused on the chemical composition of the ink used to draw it, and pointed to the presence of anatase, which was not produced commercially until the 20th century. But there are questions about how an ink containing anatase could have been formulated and used by a forger. More recently, the ink has been shown to contain carbon, which also has been presented as evidence of a forgery. However, carbon can be present in a medieval ink.
"Anatase may be a result of the chemical deterioration of the ink over the centuries, or may even have been present naturally in the ink used in medieval times," Olin said, adding, "The elemental composition of the ink is consistent with a medieval iron gall ink, based on historical evidence regarding ink production."
Present carbon-dating technology does not permit the analysis of samples as small as the actual ink lines on the map.
Concluded Olin, "While the date result itself cannot prove that the map is authentic, it is an important piece of new evidence that must be considered by those who argue that the map is a forgery and without cartographic merit."
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The article is available online at www.radiocarbon.org.
The Smithsonian Center for Materials Research and Education advises and assists the Smithsonian and other museums in the study, preservation and conservation of artistic and historic objects. Its staff conducts research in the areas of material technology, chemistry, art and cultural history, as well as in the development of treatment procedures. The Center also offers educational programs about the properties and preservation of collections to museums and associated professionals around the world.
Note to editors: Brookhaven National Laboratory and the University of Arizona are issuing concurrent releases.
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Public release date: 29-Jul-2002
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Contact: Beverly Hassell
b_hassell@acs.org
202-872-4065
American Chemical Society
The Vinland Map shows its true colors; scientists say it's a confirmed forgery
For the first time in the controversial saga of the famous Vinland Map, scientists say they have shown with certainty that the supposed relic is actually a 20th-century forgery. The findings are reported in the July 31 print issue of Analytical Chemistry, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society.
The Vinland Map -- a drawing that suggests Norse explorers charted North America long before Columbus -- has given scientists and historians a fertile platform for debate throughout its contentious history. Several studies have questioned its authenticity, but disagreement about techniques and interpretations has left some adherents to the map's 15th-century origins unconvinced.
While other evidence has already established the pre-Columbian presence of the Vikings in North America, the map still serves as an important piece of history and has been valued by some at more than $20 million. It resides at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library of Yale University.
"The Vinland Map is arguably one of the most important maps in the world," said Robin Clark, D.Sc., Sir William Ramsay Professor of Chemistry at University College London. Clark and Katherine Brown, a doctoral candidate, used Raman microprobe spectroscopy to identify the chemical components in the inks on the Vinland Map.
In this technique, a laser beam is directed at an object; a small portion of the light scatters off the molecules as radiation with different colors. Every material has a unique scattering spectrum that acts as a fingerprint, allowing scientists to identify it.
The ink is made up of two parts: a yellowish line that adheres strongly to the parchment overlaid with a black line that appears to have flaked off.
The yellow line contains anatase -- the least common form of titanium dioxide found in nature. Some scientists have concluded that the map must be of 20th-century origin because anatase could not be synthesized until around 1923. Others have suggested that anatase could have been formed during the medieval production of iron-based inks.
The current study is the first to establish precisely where the anatase is located on the map. The Raman technique allowed the researchers to examine the entire map in place, as opposed to other methods that drew individual samples from the map. "Anatase was detected solely in the ink lines and not elsewhere on the parchment, so [it] must be an integral part of the yellow line," the authors assert in their paper.
Prior to the development of the printing press, manuscripts were generally written in either carbon-based inks or iron gallotannate inks. Erosion of the latter makes the parchment brittle and often leads to brown or yellow staining. "Knowing that such yellowing is a common feature of medieval manuscripts, a clever forger may seek to simulate this degradation by the inclusion of a yellow line in his rendering of the map," the researchers suggested.
The study shows, however, that the black ink is made from carbon, not iron gallotannate, which makes the natural occurrence of yellowing impossible. Also, the map has not grown brittle over the years, as would be expected with an iron gallotannate ink.
"The Raman results provide the first definitive proof that the map itself was drawn after 1923," Clark said. "The results demonstrate the great importance of modern analytical techniques in the study of items in our cultural heritage."
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— Jason Gorss
Map notwithstanding, it's certain that they were in Labrador by the 1200's. Icelandic sagar vividly recount Leif's voyage and subsequent colonization voyages. Remains of Viking settlements have been excavated in Anse aux Meadows in Labrador.
| The Kensington Runestone; verified as proof of Scandinavians in Minnesota in 1362 ^ |
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| Posted by vannrox On News/Activism ^ 07/22/2002 2:22:42 PM PDT · 34 replies · 39+ views Ripsaw News ^ | FR post 07-21-02 | By Jim Richardson and Allen Richardson Subject: The Kensington Runestone; verified as proof of Scandinavians inMinnesota in 1362 <http://www.ripsawnews.com/2001.08.15/co Verified at LastThe Strange and Terrible Storyof the Kensington RunestoneBy Jim Richardson andAllen Richardson The comfortable scientific and scholarly worlds of history, archeology,runology and Scandinavian linguistics have all been rocked by recentdevelopments surrounding a single stone in west centralMinnesota. The Kensington Runestone, thought for over 100 years to be a hoax, nowstands verified as a genuine artifact commemorating the deaths of 10medireview Scandinavians in Minnesota in the year 1362. A recent piece of linguistic scholarship by Dr. Richard Nielsen has hit thescene, which seems to demonstrate conclusively... |
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| Posted by SunkenCiv On General/Chat ^ 08/05/2004 11:19:14 PM PDT · 3 replies · 53+ views Straight Dope Science Advisory Board ^ | 29-Jun-1999 | SDSTAFF Jill One of the oldest breeds of cats in North America is the Maine Coon Cat, and some say 40% of the originals had extra toes. One article said it evolved as a "snowshoe foot" to help these cats walk in the snow. Cute story, but probably [expletive deleted] ...The breed closest to the Maine Coon Cat is the Norwegian Forest Cat which evolved in the same climate and lends credence to one theory that ancestors of the Coon Cat may have even come to the New World onboard Viking ships. I like that theory best. |
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| Posted by LibWhacker On News/Activism ^ 08/10/2003 11:38:14 PM PDT · 7 replies · 12+ views The Calgary Herald ^ | 8/10/03 | Dennis T. Avery The Medieval Warming and the Little Ice Age are historical realities, widely reported in Viking sagas. Neither can be explained by concentrations of greenhouse gases. Almost unnoticed outside the Washington Beltway, one of the capital's most eminent wise men suddenly has become the most prominent person denying a "scientific consensus" on global warming. James Schlesinger, the United States' first secretary of energy under former U.S. president Jimmy Carter, penned a reflective op-ed in The Washington Post on July 7 that ought to be required reading by the nation's science and environmental reporters who seem to have jumped en masse onto... |
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| Posted by blam On News/Activism ^ 09/02/2003 11:38:57 AM PDT · 33 replies · 26+ views Cnews Canada ^ | 9-2-2003 | Bob Weber DNA study to settle ancient mystery about mingling of Inuit, Vikings By BOB WEBER (CP) - A centuries-old Arctic mystery may be weeks away from resolution as an Icelandic anthropologist prepares to release his findings on the so-called "Blond Eskimos" of the Canadian North. "It's an old story," says Gisli Palsson of the University of Iceland in Reykjavik. "We want to try to throw new light on the history of the Inuit." Stories about Inuit with distinct European features - blue eyes, fair hair, beards - living in the central Arctic have their roots in ancient tales of Norse settlements... |
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| Posted by mhking On News/Activism ^ 10/22/2003 6:39:07 AM PDT · 53 replies · 10+ views Yahoo! News - AFP ^ | 10.22.03 STOCKHOLM (AFP) - Archeologists have already established that Viking explorers beat Christopher Columbus to America by about 500 years, but experts in Sweden now hope to determine whether another group of Scandinavians landed in the New World in 1362, 130 years before Columbus. A 90-kilo (200-pound) rune stone, a block of stone featuring symbolic engravings common during the Viking era, has been sent from the United States to Sweden's Museum of National Antiquities to establish whether it really dates from 1362, as its markings claim, or is just a hoax. If confirmed as an authentic relic, the so-called Kensington stone... |
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| The Viking farm under the sand in Greenland ^ |
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| Posted by Burkeman1 On News/Activism ^ 03/05/2004 4:06:31 PM PST · 54 replies · 11+ views Express News ^ | 2004 | Teresa Brasen The Viking farm under the sand in Greenland By Terese Brasen In 1991, two caribou hunters stumbled over a log on a snowy Greenland riverbank, an unusual event because Greenland is above the tree line. Closer investigation uncovered rock-hard sheep droppings. The hunters had stumbled on a 500-year-old Viking farm that lay hidden beneath the sand, gift-wrapped and preserved by nature for future archaeologists. GÂrden under Sandet or GUS, Danish for 'the farm under the sand,' would become the first major Viking find in Greenland since the 1920s. "GUS is beautifully preserved because, once it was buried, it was frozen,"... |
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| Study: New World Map Is a Forgery ^ |
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| Posted by Pharmboy On News/Activism ^ 07/29/2002 4:41:39 PM PDT · 35 replies · 55+ views AP ^ | 7-29-02 | DIANE SCARPONI NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) - Yale University's parchment map of the Vikings' travels to the New World, purportedly drawn by a 15th century scribe, is a clever 20th century forgery, according to a new study. The Vinland Map AP Photo The study is the latest development in a debate that began in the 1960s when the map was given to the university by benefactor Paul Mellon. Scholars who believe it is real have said it predates Christopher Columbus and proves he was not the first European to reach America. But researchers at University College in London who analyzed the ink... |
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| Study Says Medieval New World Map Is Real [Thank Leif Eriksson] ^ |
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| Posted by nwrep On News/Activism ^ 11/26/2003 6:19:59 PM PST · 33 replies · 14+ views AP ^ | November 27, 2003 | DIANE SCARPONI NEW HAVEN, Conn. - The latest scientific analysis of a disputed map of the medieval New World supports the theory that it was made 50 years before Christopher Columbus set sail. The study examined the ink used to draw the Vinland Map, which belongs to Yale University. The map is valued at $20 million ó if it is real and not a clever, modern-day forgery. A study last summer said the ink on the parchment map was made in the 20th century. But chemist Jacqueline Olin, a retired researcher with the Smithsonian Institution (news - web sites) in Washington, said... |
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| Vindication For Vinland Map: New Study Supports Authenticity ^ |
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| Posted by blam On News/Activism ^ 11/25/2003 10:05:18 AM PST · 19 replies · 8+ views Eureka Alert ^ | 11-24-2003 | Michael Bernstein Public release date: 24-Nov-2003 Contact: Michael Bernstein m_bernstein@acs.org 202-872-6042 American Chemical Society Vindication for Vinland map: New study supports authenticity Recent conclusions that the storied Vinland Map is merely a clever forgery are based on a flawed understanding of the evidence, according to a scientist at the Smithsonian Institution. Results from last year's study debunking the map's authenticity can also be construed to boost the validity of its medieval origins, the scientist claims. The report will appear in the Dec. 1 edition of Analytical Chemistry, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society. The Vinland... |
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| Archaeologists find legendary Icelandic home ^ |
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| Posted by SteveH On News/Activism ^ 09/16/2002 8:27:11 AM PDT · 31 replies · 13+ views Quad-City Times ^ | 9/15/2002 | Quad-City Times Wire Services Archaeologists find legendary Icelandic home By Times Wire Services A UCLA team has found the Iceland home of Snorri Thorfinnsson, the first person of European descent born in the New World. Icelandic sagas from the 13th century tell the story of how Snorriís parents led the first Scandinavian group that attempted to settle in Vinland ó on the Canadian coast ó around A.D. 1000. The attempt failed, and the family moved to Iceland, but Snorri was born while they were there. The ìVinland Sagas,î which also tell the story of Leif Ericson, are the earliest recorded history of the Scandinavian... |
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