Evidence of Viking Outpost Found in Canada

National Geographic News ^ | October 19, 2012 | Heather Pringle

[Engraved-on-His-hands]

For the past 50 years—since the discovery of a thousand-year-old Viking way station in Newfoundland—archaeologists and amateur historians have combed North America's east coast searching for traces of Viking visitors.

It has been a long, fruitless quest, littered with bizarre claims and embarrassing failures. But at a conference in Canada earlier this month, archaeologist Patricia Sutherland announced new evidence that points strongly to the discovery of the second Viking outpost ever discovered in the Americas.

[beethovenfan]

Who was the coach?

[Ciexyz]

Way cool.

[muawiyah]

There are actually large stones scattered around the country (in a rather uniform pattern) that bear runic letters.

If you try to read them in medieval Norwegian they come up with bizarre tales. If, on the other hand, you read them in 1600s Gothic (Swedish) they reveal themselves to be survey marks on the order of BENCHMARKs.

The reason they are written in a runic alphabet is the surveyors were from Sweden, and they were employed by Spain.

Due to a severe plague in the 1400/1500 period most of the folks in Sweden who could write in runic alphabets were killed leaving few teachers for students in the late 1500/1600 period. Consequently, the runic forms are not up to the standards of the that time frame and are easily mistaken for older forms used in the 1100/1200 period.

The furthest North this survey went was 55 degrees.

The greater part of the survey lines obviously match the descriptions given in the Treaty of London(1604)

Later surveys follow these lines to an uncanny degree, although there are variations in meridians inasmuch as it wasn't until the late 1700s that they could be surveyed with precision in untracked wilderness.

I think there are signs of some EARLIER surveys done to provide a couple of parallels and 3 meridians ~ with landmarks ~ just for basic orienteering for folks seeking to identify potentially profitable places to create internal colonization.

Most of the stones are worked only a little ~ the surveyors used native stone that coincided pretty much with the standard boundary marker stones used in Spain at the time. Some of the benchmarks are HUGE though.

It's probably worth discovering all of them to protect them from further depredation ~ the one in Kensington, Minnesota was actually dug up and put in a local museum.

The Norse never made it that far.

[Flavius]

So what’s Viking word for America

[kaehurowing]

What’s in your wallet?

[prisoner6]

It’s obvious scandannavians were here. Look at a map.

What amazes me is that the Great North is basically uninhabited. Similar latitude to scandanavia but of course no warming gulf stream.

Even so beautiful if brutal part of the world.

[prisoner6]

It’s obvious scandannavians were here. Look at a map.

What amazes me is that the Great North is basically uninhabited. Similar latitude to scandanavia but of course no warming gulf stream.

Even so beautiful if brutal part of the world.

[SunkenCiv]

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[SeminoleCounty]

WOW!

I have been to the Viking site at L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, and seen the work they have done with the research and excavation there. Really interesting...worth the very long trip!

So...I am really geeked up over this discovery!

I would not be surprised that the Vikings also had encampments and settlements in other places around North America

Also, there was a program I saw a few months ago on History Channel, in which they were discussing the possibility of Viking settlers making their way as far as the Mississippi River...there is evidence that the Indians met Vikings thru some of the oral histories provided by the various tribes....reporting seeing “white men” about 1000 years ago.

More and more, I believe we will find that Vikings and Norsemen were in North America in much larger numbers than believed.

With today’s “Political Correctness” with Columbus and the New World...and how Mestizo/Mulatto/Indigenous peoples blame Columbus for their “misery, racism, and other problems”...wonder if they would be so willing to accept the Vikings as the first Europeans...or will their Spanish ethno-centricity be more welcoming of Columbus discovering the “New World”?

[SeminoleCounty]

damn Danes! Always causing trouble

---

LOL...actually these Vikings from this article most likely came from Norway...as the settlers in Iceland and Greenland (where the Viking explorers left to go to No America) came from Norway

[SeminoleCounty]

Yeah, I think there was far more traveling going on but not a lot of written history being kept. Written history and record keeping was mostly a southern European thing.

---

Great point.

At that time, the only ones who knew how to read and write were monks, nuns, and priests. Very few people outside of the church were literate...even the royalty.

So, more than likely these Viking explorers and settlers had no education, and did not record their travels as they went along....We just have the ancient Norse Sagas that were written from oral histories

[Engraved-on-His-hands]

Here is a picture of a Viking church building at Hvalsey in Greenland. This one dates from the 14th century.

[SeminoleCounty]

Hey...apologize for kinda repeating what another FReeper already described in better detail....about the “possibility of Vikings meeting up with natives”

My bad.

Just find the Vikings and the Nordic peoples very interesting

[SunkenCiv]

MichaelW Travels...: Jumping by the Old Stone Mill- Newport, Rhode Island

[Bringbackthedraft]

I wonder if they will ever find a sword and a battle ax in an Indian Burial mound. Or maybe a Viking sailing ship on the bottom of one of the great lakes. The Iroquois and Huron had long huts similar to the Viking long houses. Makes me wonder just how long ago the Vikings explored our continent.

[cripplecreek]

I personally believe that there was once a much greater population in North America than what we found when we began settling. There are some massive prehistoric earthworks in north America that weren't created by tribes with a few dozen individuals. They were created by thousands of settled people. Things like Cahokia weren't built by a few dozen hunter gatherers.



Diseases brought by much earlier visitors could explain the destruction of much larger societies just like the black death set Europe back by many years.

[Just mythoughts]

http://www.exploresouthernhistory.com/heavener1.html

A Relic of Vikings in Oklahoma?

[LukeSW]

Funny posts here. On a serious note, there is strong evidence of Viking settlements in Oklahoma. I know, sounds wild. But there are some 3 or 4 sites with proven Rune writings in Oklahoma. The best known is the Heavener Rune. Stopped there a couple of weeks ago. Very interesting place.

[LukeSW]

Funny posts here. On a serious note, there is strong evidence of Viking settlements in Oklahoma. I know, sounds wild. But there are some 3 or 4 sites with proven Rune writings in Oklahoma. The best known is the Heavener Rune. Stopped there a couple of weeks ago. Very interesting place.