Posted on 10/20/2021 12:59:46 PM PDT by Theoria
By studying tree rings and using a dash of astrophysics, researchers have pinned down a precise year that settlers from Europe were on land that would come to be known as Newfoundland.
Six decades ago, a husband-and-wife team of archaeologists discovered the remains of a settlement on the windswept northern tip of Newfoundland. The site’s eight timber-framed structures resemble Viking buildings in Greenland, and archaeological artifacts found there — including a bronze cloak pin — are decidedly Norse in style.
Scientists now believe that this site, known as L’Anse aux Meadows, was inhabited by Vikings who came from Greenland. To this day, it remains the only conclusively identified Viking site in the Americas outside of Greenland.
But many questions remain about L’Anse aux Meadows: Who exactly settled it? Why? And, perhaps most importantly, when was the site occupied? Pinning down the settlement’s age has been a challenge — radiocarbon measurements of artifacts from L’Anse aux Meadows span the entire Viking Age, from the late eighth through the 11th centuries.
But in results published Wednesday in Nature, scientists presented what they think are new answers to this mystery. By analyzing the imprint of a rare solar storm in tree rings from wood found at the Canadian site, scientists have decisively pinned down when Norse explorers were in Newfoundland: the year A.D. 1021, or exactly 1,000 years ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
But did they colonize??? Answer? No.
PINGGG!..................
It’s Canada. Can you blame them?...............
One of my acquaintances is a Swedish National. He did one of those 23-and-me tests and found out he has a fraction of Native American blood. Apparently the Vikings stayed for a little while.
It’s only been Canada since 1928. Prior to that New Foundland was an independent country, eh?
So 500 years later Christopher Columbus was not so bad after all......
Apparently, they did little more than stumble across it, and then they told a few people about it who talked about it as lore. Nobody followed them.
What’s up with that?
Completely off topic, but — I knew a guy who married a woman from Russia. She basically spoke no English at all. Could not have a conversation with her, she would just shake her head.
However, it was challenging to speak with him as well. As far as I could tell, he had been in the US for a long time, but his English was awful, his accent was about as bad as hers. I felt like I understood about 10% of what he said.
Turns out he was a Canadian from Newfoundland. I thought he was Russian, like his wife. Nope. But she was strictly mail-order and left him before long.
I am waiting for the PC crowd to demand the Minnesota Vikings change their mascot. The Vikings were marauders who specialized in kidnapping foreign women.
First is first, but although the Norse came and didn’t colonize, which Columbus really didn’t either... that came later, the Berbers were great sailers trading from Tarshish north to the Britains, south down and atound Africa... and indications are that the Americas were visited as well.
While the development of trade and entities plying their wares, were much less developed 1000years ago and 500 years before Columbus, first is still first EXCEPT studies are showing that the oceans were not an obstacle to early explorers and traders, but is now considered a super-highway.
My Aunt served in the RCAF during WWII. Part of her enlistment was served in Newfoundland. At the time it was considered overseas duty. Newfoundland became Canada's 10th province in 1949.
— radiocarbon measurements of artifacts from L’Anse aux Meadows span the entire Viking Age, from the late eighth through the 11th centuries.
***Hence, there’s no way it could have been only an 8th century-only site. They were trying to figure out the latest date it could have been. With this new approach, they figured out when the 3 trees themselves were felled. That’s significant.
Interesting. I participated in a couple of ASW exercises out of Argentia Newfoundland in the mid-’80s. The USN had dets there into the early ‘90s, i think. Didn’t know about the Viking settlement then. We were far too busy flying patrols or drinking in our off time.
They tried to, but they got kicked out of Greenland by the combination of double-sized Innuit ‘armies’ and the little ice age.
Vikings were fierce warriors but could be defeated in battle with superior numbers. Their main advantage was their very fast ships, no one could catch them. On land, they were formidable but beatable.
Sounds like a blast. Almost the same thing the vikings did.
Good grief. Now we’ll have to cancel them, too.
Colonization may have been attempted but it lasted less time that that of Greenland Norse Settlements. However, that doesn’t mean that there weren’t frequent trips.
A scientist has been using satellites with ground mapping radar to look along the coast of North America for other evidence of Viking sites and it appears that she has found one... Point Rosse.
https://www.livescience.com/54276-viking-discovery-newfoundland.html
It looks like it was an improvised shipyard which housed a forge for converting bog iron into nails. When you think about the Norse clinker built hulls hogging in the North Atlantic swells you realize that they’d have to replace a lot of nails and re-caulk the hulls. So she was looking for shelter coves where boats could be hauled up onto the beach, but also within walking distance of a stream where the bog iron could be found.
Eric the Red know rain dear
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