The Sea Wolves: A History of the Vikings by Lars Brownworth

Author:Lars Brownworth [Brownworth, Lars]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Tags: Europe, Scandinavia, History, Expeditions & Discoveries
ISBN: 9781909979116
Publisher: Crux Publishing
Published: 2014-12-06T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

The Western Isles

“It is best to search while the trail is new.”

- Edda of Sæmund the Wise

The discovery of further islands to the northwest was a replay of the discovery of Iceland itself. Tradition holds that the first Viking to site fresh land was the Norwegian Gunnbjørn Ulfsson in the early ninth century. He was caught in a storm on a trip from Norway to Iceland and after a long journey, saw previously unknown rocky islands that he named after himself – Gunnbjørn’s skerries. He also caught sight of a much larger landmass to the west, but when he reported his findings, no one was interested since Iceland still had available land.

Nearly a century later, Iceland was becoming over populated – at least by Viking standards – and in 978, Snæbjörn Galti, decided to go and search for Gunnbjørn’s mysterious land and colonize it if he could. After putting together a crew, he sailed to Gunnbjørn’s skerries to gather information about what lay beyond. By this time the skerries were thinly populated with men who wanted to escape the crowds of Iceland, and they confirmed that there was indeed something to the west.107

Snæbjörn’s persistence paid off, and a few days sailing brought him to the eastern shore of Greenland, a massive volcanic island larger than all of Scandinavia put together. He set up his colony, but disaster struck almost immediately. The site he chose was a difficult one since the eastern coast of Greenland is largely not suitable for human habitation. More damaging, however, was the internal quarrelling which soon had the colonists at each other’s throats. Some violent argument erupted – the precise issue is unknown – both sides drew weapons, and Snæbjörn was killed in the fighting. Without its leader, the colony collapsed, and only two survivors returned to Iceland.

Although the attempt at the colonization of Greenland had been a spectacular failure, it had proved that the new land existed and could be reached from Iceland. Only four years later a second attempt succeeded. This time the expedition was led by a hotheaded Norwegian named Erik Thorvaldsson, better known as Erik the Red. Recklessness seemed to run in the family. His father, Thorvald, had been exiled from Norway for manslaughter, and Erik continued the family tradition a few years later, getting banished for the crime of ‘some killings‘. He fled to Iceland for refuge and claimed a farm on the northwest coast hoping to settle down.

Everywhere he went, however, trouble seemed to follow. At his first farmstead, two of his slaves inadvertently started a landslide and damaged some of his neighbor’s property. In the ensuing demands for payment, Erik killed a man – the delightfully named Eyjolf the Foul – and was forced to flee again. This time he settled on one of the islands off the coast of Iceland, safely out of reach of Eyjolf’s kinsmen.

His new farm was even less successful than the first. Within a short time he was again quarreling, this time killing

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