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Swedish Press N Y A
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Vikings in Vinland
P R E S S E N
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May 2019 Vol 90:04 $5.95
04 2019
Vinland Sagas Interview with Runes Expert Henrik Williams Vikingaliv
Where Did the Vikings Go in Vinland?
L’ANSE AUX MEADOWS AND VINLAND By Birgitta Linderoth Wallace
d Birgitta Linderoth Wallace is a Swedish – Canadian archaeologist specialising in Norse archaeology in North America. She spent most of her career as an archaeologist with Parks Canada and is best known for her work on L’Anse aux Meadows, currently the only widely-accepted Norse site in North America. She received a Smith-Wintemberg Award from the Canadian Archaeological Association in 2015 for her contributions to Canadian archaeology, and an Honorary Doctorate from Memorial University in 2018.
The Vinland Sagas
The Vinland sagas tell of Norse voyages from Greenland to North America around the year 1000. Originally told around the fire in chieftains’ halls, they were written down in the early 13th century and preserved among the many medieval manuscripts of Iceland. There are two versions, The Greenlanders’ Saga and Erik the Red’s Saga. They record the same events but differ in details. According to the Greenlanders’ Saga, Bjarni Herjolfsson accidentally discovered unknown land on a voyage to the newly established Norse colony in Greenland. In the following years, four
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The author apparently was attempting to elevate Karlsefni’s importance for the benefit of his descendants. Leif‘s role has been reduced to that of accidental discoverer.
Straumfjord, Hóp, and Leifsbúðir Summer in the Greenland Coast Circa Year 1000 by Jens Erik Carl Rasmussen (1841–1893)
expeditions set out to explore this new world. The first was led by Leif Eriksson, son of Erik the Red, Chief of Greenland. Others followed, led by members of his family, including the Icelandic aristocrat Thorfinn Karlsefni who had married Leif’s widowed sister-in-law Gudrid. Erik’s Saga describes the same events but all four expeditions have been rolled into one single expedition led by Thorfinn Karlsefni and Gudrid.
The sagas tell of voyages to three lands, Helluland (Land of Stone Slabs). Markland (Land of Forests), and Vinland (Land of Wine). It was in Vinland that the Norse saw potential value. Erik’s Saga describes two settlements: one is Straumfjord, a couple of days’ sail from Markland (most researchers identify the Hamilton Inlet area of Labrador as Markland), and Hóp somewhere south of Straumfjord. Straumfjord (Current Fjord) is the winter base from which explorations are launched in several directions in the summer.
It derives its name from the turbulent currents surrounding an offshore island. Hóp (Tidal Lagoon) is an area rich in resources: fine lumber, salmon, halibut, self-sown wheat and, not least, wild grapes. Its name refers to the presence of warm lagoons affected by the tide. This is where a large portion of the crew go in summer to collect these riches and to bring them back to Straumfjord in the fall for ultimate transfer back to Greenland. It is an area where they run into large parties of native people. They also come across native people en route to Straumfjord and to the north of there, but there are no other people at Straumfjord itself. In the Greenlanders’ Saga, Straumfjord and Hóp have been conflated into one site called Leifsbúðir (Leif’s Camp). Leifsbúðir is both a winter base and a summer resource camp, and its physical description is a mixture of those given for Straumfjord and Hóp.
What Do the Vinland Sagas Really Tell Us about the Settlements?
The Vinland voyages were not about colonization. Everyone expected to return to Greenland. Their purpose was to scout out the unknown land for resources that could be useful for the new settlement in Greenland, and to bring back valuable cargo, such as lumber, furs and grapes. The participants were primarily male work crews hired for a particular voyage, with a few women coming along to handle domestic chores.
The shore lands around the Gulf of St. Lawrence form the natural route south from L’Anse aux Meadows. Five hundred years later the French explorer Jacques Cartier took the same route into Canada. Credit: Vis-à-Vis Graphics, St. John’s, NL
The Discovery of L’Anse aux Meadows
In 1960 Helge Ingstad discovered intriguing ruins near the fishing village of L’Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland. Excavations by his wife, Anne Stine Ingstad, between 1961 and 1968 clearly showed that this was a Norse site dating back to the early 11th century. Nonetheless, there was little evidence to connect it with the Vinland sagas. Subsequent excavations by Parks Canada in 1973 through 1976, led first by the Swedish Viking specialist Bengt Schönbäck and later by the author, added significantly to the evidence. We can now say that L’Anse aux Meadows is the key to the Vinland sagas.
foundland’s Northern Peninsula. It is on a shallow bay on the shore of the Strait of Belle Isle facing west to Labrador. There are three large halls on a terrace encircling a bog, all typical of late 10th to early 11thcentury Icelandic-Greenland architecture. Smaller huts flank the halls. On the other side of a brook running through the site is a hut that contained remains of a small furnace for smelting iron. The large halls are of a size only chieftains and highstatus people could afford. They were solidly built, with walls 1.5 m to over 2 m wide, and with heavy interior posts to carry the large roofs. The construction tells us that the people who built them intended to spend the winter on the site over a number of years. There were large storage rooms and rooms for special activities such as iron smithing, carpentry, and boat repair. The huts are small and of the kind used by working people. Altogether the buildings could accommodate 70 – 90 people.
Activities on the Site
At some time, a boat was repaired on the site. Old nails and rivets were removed and discarded. Iron was produced from local bog ore,
The Site
The site is located on the northern tip of New-
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[Lifestyle]
Top Sju
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“Tunnbrödets dag” (the day of flat bread) takes place on May 11 in Sweden. Baking tunnbröd is an old Swedish tradition and often considered a northern specialty. The bread was traditionally made exclusively from barley – a grain grown and available in the northern part of Sweden – and baked into thin, unleavened breads. Today, tunnbröd can be enjoyed crisp or soft and is often eaten with surströmming (fermented herring) or (if soft) as a wrap filled with mashed potatoes and roasted herring.
Kristi himmelsfärdsdag (Ascension Day) takes place on May 30. The Christian event, which has been celebrated since the mid300s and commemorates the moment when Jesus Christ left the Earth and ascended to Heaven, falls on the 40th day of Easter. Kristi himmelsfärdsdag was traditionally considered the first day of summer in large parts of Sweden and marked the start of the fishing season. Because Kristi himmelsfärdsdag always falls on a Thursday, Swedes often take Friday off for a nice long weekend.
14 Scandinavian drama film “Føniks” premieres in Swedish movie theaters on May 31. The film, which features actors Maria Bonnevie, Sverrir Gudnason and Ylva Bjørkaas Thedin, tells the story of a young girl named Jill, who struggles with a host of challenges. Jill battles to keep her family (including her mentally ill, alcoholic mother) together and is faced with a new dynamic when her absentee father shows up on her 14th birthday. Camilla Strøm Henriksen directs this story about love and courage.
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Le nozze di Figaro. Photo: Mats Bäcker/Göteborgs Operan
1786 Opera lovers take note. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Comic Opera classic The Marriage of Figaro, which first premiered in Vienna on May 1, 1786, will be showing live at The Gothenburg Opera House’s big stage May 16 through May 26. The classic tale about love and intrigue involving servants Figaro and Susanna will be performed in Italian with Swedish subtitles.
2221 The majority of Stockholm County’s residents aren’t fans of electric kick scooters (elsparkcyklar). A new survey by the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce (Stockholms Handelskammare), involving 2221 Stockholm County residents, showed that 41 percent of residents take a positive view on electric kick scooters on Stockholm’s streets, while 54 percent do not. Naysayers’ complaint, the survey discovered, was simply that people using electric kick
scooters are careless about where they park them once the ride is over. Andreas Hatzigeorgiou, CEO of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce, said a way to encourage scooter users to park better might be to introduce a “carrot,” such as lower fees.
8 IKEA asked eight prominent artists and fashiondesigners to design a rug for its annual IKEA Art Event. “These are rugs that will become exclamation marks in the home, whether you walk all over them, hang them on a wall or make them your own any other way,” said Henrik Most, organizer for the upcoming collection. Rug creators for the 2019 art event are Supakitch, France; Chiaozza, USA; Noah Lyon, USA; Craig Green, UK; Seulgi Lee, Korea; Virgil Abloh, USA; Misaki Kawai, Japan; and Filip Pagowski, Poland. These unique rugs can be seen at IKEA stores in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö starting in the beginning of May.
1,500,000 1.5 million viewers (including the Swedish royal family, who are said to be fans) tuned in to watch “Antikrundan” (the Swedish Antiques Road Show) this spring. For those who wish to have their valuables appraised for the upcoming season, Antikrundan has released a list of the cities and towns where the show will be filming this summer: Östersund August 22, Nora August 24, Karlsborg August 26, Söderköping August 28, Höör September 1, and Ronneby September 3.
[Lifestyle] Culture A Bit of History in the Making… By Dorothy Carlson
T
he development of British Columbia was shaped by the immigrants who settled the province and the country. Scandinavians flocked here when they found that the scenery in British Columbia reminded them of home. Many of the Swedes who came took positions in the logging camps to get a start. Everyone accepted whatever work they could find to make a home in this province. Part of making a home was becoming involved in the industry and politics that created the fabric of the province. Some of this history is recorded, but the personal experiences of the Swedes who came to BC are slipping away. One lady with a passion for history who has experienced the transition from Swedish-born to Swedish-Canadian recognized this loss. In her determination to amend this loss of history, she developed her idea and started talking to other people about it. They agreed that something should be done. The group formed an organization called Swedish Heritage in British Columbia.
The intent of this group is to record individual and family histories, and also to preserve documents, pictures and artifacts that families brought with them. Of course, the documents and artifacts would have a story attached to them that would be recorded. But where could this happen? The group set out to find a home for their archival information and found it at the Swedish Canadian Manor in North Burnaby (Vancouver area) under the umbrella of the Swedish Canadian Village and the Swedish Canadian Residents Foundation. A space has been converted from an unused activity room to a well-sized ‘archives’ room. The renovations were undertaken with the help of the Swedish Canadian Rest Home Association and donations from believers in the project. Generous donations from the established clubs – Swedish Cultural Society, Runeberg Social Club and Sweden House Society at the Scandinavian Community Centre – got things under way. Many people, members and non-members alike, made kind donations to help with the project. Corporate help came in the form of flooring from
the Tarkett representative in BC, Erv Parent Ltd. IKEA came to the rescue as well with cabinets and all the fittings for a small kitchenette for coffee making – of course! And now there are display cabinets waiting for placement and filling with artifacts. There is a lot of work still to be done to assemble the collections, archive the histories – and so much to learn along the way. We have been fortunate to have the support of a curator from another museum in the lower mainland, as well as a retired curator. We are grateful to so many people for their generous donations and hours of volunteer work to make this happen. So, we are having a small celebration to show off the premises. The Swedish Heritage in British Columbia Opening is on June 9th, 2019 at 1:00 pm and will be held at 1812 Duthie Street in Burnaby. We are inviting dignitaries to mark the occasion and will have a story to share about the event. After this, the exciting work can begin! Contact swedishheritagebc@ gmail.com for more information.
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