[Sca-cooks] Re: Rhachitis

[Nanna Rögnvaldardóttir]

>How many generations before they called it
> > quits- two? three? Maybe four?

More like fifteen or so. Greenland was settled from Iceland around AD 985;
contact was last made with the settlements there in the early 15th century,
IIRC. A century later, they had probably disappeared completely. And they
didn't call it quits, they stayed to the end, probably because they had
nowhere to go and no means to go anywhere.

> Yes, the smaller population on Greenland would
> have increased the problems compared to Iceland as well as problems
> with the land suitable for agriculture being much less.

Yes and no. The summers in Southern Greenland are actually warmer than the
Icelandic summers but the winters are colder. And there were more animals to
hunt.

> I'm surprised with that short of a settlement such remains as this
> dress were there to be found. But then the Norse settlement on
> North America was also short lived and even smaller.

As I said above, some of the settlements lasted over 400 years.

> > The genetic pool on Iceland was influenced by mainland Scandanavia (at
> > least if we are to trust the sagas, and I do) and some by northern
> > Scotland.
>
> Do you mean after the initial settlement? Nanna, how much interaction
> was there between Iceland and Scandanavia? Or was this something that
> perhaps dropped off with time as the climate worsened or political
> changes occurred?

With the genetic pool, it is probably best to trust genetic research. Which
has recently revealed that the sagas are more or less correct. The great
majority of the male settlers did come from Scandinavia, probably mostly
from Norway. Well over half of the women came from the British Isles, which
is rather more than people had thought earlier.

There was some interaction, of course, but I doubt it had much effect on the
genetic pool after the initial settlement period. Keep in mind that Iceland
was considered fully settled in around 930 so there would have been little
room for newcomers (there were no towns or villages for them to settle in
either); that the journey to Iceland was difficult and could take months or
years - medieval sources often mention that in a particular year, no ship
could make the journey to Iceland so there were no imported goods to be had.
>
> > But Greenland is another story entirely, given the length and
> > difficulty of the journey.

Maybe not another story entirely - more like a particularily difficult
chapter of the same story. Ships did sail to Greenland from Scandinavia and
from mainland Europe. Up until the 13th century (I think, don't have a book
at hand to look up dates) the Greenland trade was very lucrative - furs,
walrus teeth, etc., and merchants went there on a regular basis. Then the
trade dropped off - I can't remember why at the moment - and merchants lost
their interest in Greenland. So did everybody else, except maybe Icelanders,
who did consider the Greenlanders as their cousins. But by then we had no
ships left to risk on such a dangerous journey and any contact with the
settlements in Greenland after the mid-14th century or so was mostly
accidental. For instance, a ship that sailed from Norway to Iceland in the
summer of 1406 was blown off course to Greenland and the travellers were
unable to return to Norway until 1410; then it took them two or three
additional years to get home to Iceland. You can sail from Norway to Iceland
in a few days in the best of contitions; it could also take you six or seven
years. (I can't remember for sure just now but I think these travellers may
have been the last known to have visited the Nordic settlements in
Greenland.)

Nanna