The Vikings in North America: The History and Legacy of the Norse Settlements in Greenland and Vinland by Charles River Editors

Author:Charles River Editors
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Charles River Editors
Published: 2015-01-07T16:00:00+00:00

Christian Krohg’s painting, “Leiv Eiriksson discovers North America”

As with Bjarni, Leif’s tales of a new land excited considerable interest, and soon, Leif’s brother Thorvald decided to go on a trip there:

“Thorvald made ready for this voyage with thirty men, and took counsel with Leif his brother. They made their ship ready and put to sea. Nothing is told of their voyage until they came to Leif’s booths in Vinland. There they laid up their ship, and spent a pleasant winter, and caught fish for their support.

“In the spring, Thorvald said they should make ready the ship, and that some of the men should take the ship’s long boat round the western part of the land, and explore there during the summer. The land appeared fair and woody, and there was but a short distance between the wood and the sea, and white sands. There were many islands and much shallow water. They found neither dwellings of men nor beasts, except upon an island to the westward, where they found a wooden corn shed. They then returned to Leif’s booths in the autumn.

“The next summer, Thorvald went eastward with the ship, and round the land to the northward. Here came a heavy storm when they were off a promontory, so that they were driven on shore, and the keel broke off from the ship, and they remained here a long time to repair their ship.

“Then Thorvald said to his companions: ‘I want us to fix up the keel here upon the promontory, and call it Kjalarness (Keelness).’

“After that they sailed away round the eastern shores of the land, and into the mouths of the nearest firths and to a point of land which stretched out and was covered all over with wood. They came to with the ship, and shoved out a plank to the land, and Thorvald went up the country with all his companions. He said, ‘Here it is beautiful, and here would I like to raise my dwelling.’

“Then they went to the ship, and saw upon the sands within the promontory three elevations, and went to them and saw they were three skin boats with three men under each. They divided their people, and caught them all except one, who got away with his boat. They killed the other eight and then went back to the cape and saw some heights inside of the firth, and supposed that these were dwellings.

“After that, so great a drowsiness came upon them that they could not keep awake, and they all fell asleep. Then came a shout that awakened them all. It said, ‘Wake up, Thorvald, and all your companions! If you want to save your lives and return to your ship with all your men, leave the land without delay.’

“Then an innumerable crowd of skin boats rushed out from the interior of the firth, which headed towards them. Thorvald said, ‘We will put out the battle-screen and defend ourselves as well as we can, but fight little against them.’

“So they

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.