The Viking farm under the sand in Greenland

Express News ^ | 2004 | Teresa Brasen

[Spruce]

...'cuz of all the liberals...
Hehe. Actually many around these parts figure it was the Ojibwe that made the Vikings turn tail.

[Burkeman1]

The viking settlements and expansion were not financed by anyone. They were totally entrepenurial ventures. If they were successful they all were successful. If they failed- they all failed. No king or power backed the raids and exploration of the Vikings. Columbus was backed by the Crown of Spain itself! His sailors and soldiers and Priests and monks were in the pay of the Crown. It was not just a mission for a small group of settlers. It was a mission of State! There is a difference.

[Burkeman1]

LOL!

[Fedora]

GO!! PACK!! GO!!

A Vikings-Packers game in Iceland would give a new meaning to the term "Frozen Tundra" :) BTW I recently saw a documentary on an Alaska high school football team that plays on a field sitting on glacial-deposited topsoil, so that rocks regularly surface on the field and have to be removed before every practice. For obvious reasons no other team wants to play them at home. When I heard that I said to myself, that's gotta be the only field in the world tougher than Lambeau :)

[VOA]

bump

[Cool Guy]

BUMP! Warmer Climate in Greenland's Past ??

[Spruce]

Back in the days, when the Vikings played outdoors, the old Met stadium used to have steam pipes that ran down the hash lines. Bud Grant designed offensive plays inside the pipes to stay on the somewhat thawed turf and designed the defense to push the opposing offense to the outside, in the cold frozen slab of land outside the heat. Unfortunately the SuperBowl is played indoors, or in warm weather.

[marsh2]

I lived in Iceland for two years on the NATO base at Keflavik in the early 1970s. It is news to me that their stock was from Norway. I know that they thought their ancestors came from Denmark.

There is such a thing as a celtic viking. The islands off the immediate south coast of Iceland were populated by escaped slaves taken from raids on the coasts of Ireland and Scotland.

[Spruce]

Indeed, there are celtic Vikings. Just as ther are french, Latin, cyrillic, welsh, germanic, and even some medditerranian. Where better to launch a raid from then the closest port. I bet there's more than a few "native Americans" with Viking blood.

Never heard of an Asian Viking, though.

[Varda]

This article is a little confusing. Inuit means "people" and the Thule are the ancestors of todays Inuit but the Thule are latecomers to North America. The Dorset were in Greenland before the Norse. The Thule were from Asia and weren't descended either from the Vikings or the Dorset.

[blam]

"He believed the Vikings and northern aboriginal people intermarried to produce the unique Thule people, ancestors of the modern Eskimo. "

I read a report recently about a DNA study done on the Thule. It 100% ruled out the 'inter-marriage' theory.

[breakem]

I don't think the Vikings established Kiev. Harold the Viking king tried to model the groth of the village of Oslo after Kiev because he liked the market economy there. Here's an excerpt from the internet.

The beginning of the Russian - Scandinavian relationship dated from the 9th century is described in the Russian Primary Chronicle written by Orthodox monks. At that time, different Slav tribes lived in the North - West of Russia along the Neva and the Volkhov rivers as well as around the lakes Ladoga and Ilmen. The great Russian plain covered with forest and grassland was ideal for hunting, fishery and agriculture. Also it represented real trade crossroads between Northern Europe and Byzantine Empire. That was one of the reasons to build there the town of Novgorod which was a capital of the Old Northern Russia and an important commercial centre.

In 862 the Slavs, exhausted by uninterrupted inter-tribal wars, made the following proposal to the Rus (a name borrowed from the Finns to designate the Swedes): "Our country is rich and immense, but it is rent by disorder. Come and govern us and reign over us".

Three Swedish Vikings responded and came to Russia. Rurik became governor of Novgorod, Sineus settled down in Beloozerg and Truvor in Izborsk. Two years later Sineus and Truvor both died and Rurik extended his rule over the whole country. Later two of his lieutenants went down to Kiev, nearly six hundred miles away, and conquered it. In 882 Oleg, Rurik's successor, came to Kiev in his turn. Having established his own leadership over numerous towns and tribes Oleg strengthened considerably the new Russian State and became its master. The new capital, Kiev, little by little became one of the richest towns in Europe.

Rurik's successors became a ruling dynasty in Russia for more than 700 years.

[blam]

"There are some who say that a group of NorseScots discovered North America and what is now the New England Coast long before Columbus sailed the Ocean blue."

It's was a lot earlier than that...a few thousand years earlier.

The Red Paint People of the northeasten US have recently and definately linked with the same people in Norway.

[blam]

"There are some who say that a group of NorseScots discovered North America and what is now the New England Coast long before Columbus sailed the Ocean blue."

It's was a lot earlier than that...a few thousand years earlier.

The Red Paint People of the northeasten US have recently and definately linked with the same people in Norway.

[ODC-GIRL]

Please add me to your ping list. Thanks!

[blam]

"The stone currently resides in the Runestone Museum in Alexandria, Minnesota, the seat of the county in which the stone was found."

The Kensington Runestone is presently in Sweden for a serious analysis. Click here.

"To address this mystery, the National Historical Museum of Sweden will tomorrow convene a conference of experts who will examine the stone and its history. The conference take place in this hall, and will feature presentations not only by Swedish runologists, geologists, archaeologists and historians, but also by three American speakers who have travelled from Minnesota to be with us tonight: Mrs. LuAnn Patton, Executive Director of the Kensington Runestone Museum in Alexandria, Minnesota; geologist Scott Wolter; and historical linguist Richard Nielsen. I hope that you will join me in welcoming them to Stockholm."

[farmfriend]

Consider yourself added. If you ever change your mind, or I get you on the wrong list, just let me know.

[A. Pole]

Cross-sections of the GUS soil show the Vikings began their settlement by burning off birch brush to form a meadow. Over the next 300 to 400 years, the meadow soil steadily improved its nutritional qualities, showing that the Greenland Vikings weren't poor farmers, as McGovern and others have suggested. "At GUS, the amount of organic matter and the quality of soil increased and sustained farming for 400 years," said Schweger.

Hey, this is the proof that global warming was more advanced when Greenland was still a green land.

[blam]

Viking Graves Pskov, North-West Russia

[blam]

"Never heard of an Asian Viking, though."

How about some pre-Viking, Viking?

The Curse Of The Red-Headed Mummy (China)