Edmund F. Slafter

“ And there are, probably, twenty other less important rivers on our coast, where the same conditions may likewise be found. What sagacious student of history, what experienced navigator, or what learned geographer has the audacity to say that he is able to tell us near which of these rivers the Northmen constructed their habitations, and made their temporary abode! The identification is plainly impossible. Nothing is more certain than the uncertainty that enters into all the local descriptions contained in the Icelandic sagas. ”

“ It is the office and duty of the historian to seek out facts, to distinguish the true from the false, to sift the wheat from the chaff, to preserve the one and to relegate the other to the oblivion to which it belongs. ”

“ Tested by the canons that the most judicious scholars have adopted in the investigation of all early history, we cannot doubt that the Northmen made four or five voyages to the coast of America in the last part of the tenth and the first part of the eleventh centuries; that they returned to Greenland with cargoes of grapes and timber, the latter a very valuable commodity in the markets both of Greenland and Iceland; that their abode on our shores was temporary; that they were mostly occupied in explorations, and made no preparations for establishing any permanent colony ”

“ The writers of these sagas had no information derived from other sources on which to build up the fabric of their story. To believe that the agreement of the narratives in their general outlines with the facts as we now know them was accidental, a mere matter of chance, is impossible. The coincidences are so many, and the events so far removed from anything that the authors had themselves ever seen, or of which they had any knowledge, that it becomes easier and more reasonable to accept the narratives in their general features than to deny the authenticity of the records. ”

“ They identify nothing. When they speak of an island, a cape, a river, or a bay, they do not give us any clue to the locality where the said island, or cape, or river, or bay is situated. The whole coast of New England and of the English Provinces farther east is serrated with capes and bays and river-inlets, and is likewise studded with some hundreds of islands. It would be exceedingly interesting, indeed a great achievement, if we could clearly fix or identify the land-fall of Leif, the Scandinavian explorer, and point out the exact spot where he erected his houses and passed the winter. ”

“ As soon, however, as their ship was lifted by the rising tide, they floated it into the river, and from thence into a lake, or an expansion of the river above its mouth. Here they landed and constructed temporary dwellings, but having decided to pass the winter, they proceeded to erect buildings for their more ample accommodation. They found abundance of fish in the waters, the climate mild, and the nature of the country such that they thought cattle would not even require feeding or shelter in winter. They observed that day and night were more equal than in Greenland or Iceland. ”

“ It is easy to see how difficult, how impossible, it is to identify the landing-place and temporary abode of the Northmen on our coast from this loose and indefinite description of the sagas.
In the nearly nine hundred years which have passed since the discovery of this continent by these northern explorers, it would be unreasonable not to suppose that very great changes have taken place at the mouth of the rivers and tidal bays along our Atlantic coast. ”

“ Half a century has now elapsed since the sagas have been accessible to the English reader in his own language. No labor has been spared by the most careful, painstaking, and conscientious historians in seeking for remains which can be reasonably identified as the work of the Northmen. None whatever have been found, and we may safely predict that none will be discovered, that can bear any better test of their genuineness than those to which we have just alluded. ”

“ About the year 985, a young, enterprising, and prosperous navigator, who had been accustomed to carry on a trade between Iceland and Norway, on returning from the latter in the summer of the year, found that his father had left Iceland some time before his arrival, to join a new colony which had been then recently planted in Greenland. This young merchant, who bore the name of Bjarni, disappointed at not finding his father in Iceland, determined to proceed on and pass the coming winter with him at the new colony in Greenland. ”

“ Credulity has seized upon several comparatively antique works, whose origin half a century ago was not clearly understood, and has blindly referred them to the Northmen. Foremost among them were, first, the stone structure of arched mason-work in Newport, Rhode Island; second, a famous rock, bearing inscriptions, lying in the tide-water near the town of Dighton, in Massachusetts; and, third, the "skeleton in armor" found at Fall River, in the same state. No others have been put forward on any evidence that challenges a critical examination. ”

“ In later times brass was in frequent, not to say common, use among the Indians.
[9] There are in many parts of New England old walls and such like structures, apparently of very little importance when they were originally built, never made the subject of record, disused now for many generations, and consequently their origin and purpose have passed entirely from the memory of man. Such remains are not uncommon: they may be found all along our coast. ”

“ Its rhythm and its polished numbers may always please the ear and gratify the taste. But history, the stern and uncompromising arbiter of past events, will, we may be sure, never own the creations of the poet or the dreams of the enthusiast to be her legitimate offspring. ”

“ They belong to that select class of historians who are distinguished for an exuberance of imagination and a redundancy of faith. It is a very easy and simple thing for them to point out the land-fall of Leif, the river which he entered, the island at its mouth, the bay where they cast anchor, the shore where they built their temporary houses, the spot where Thorvald was buried, and where they set up crosses at his head and at his feet. ”

“ If we reject them, we must on the same principle reject the early history of all the civilized peoples of the earth, since that history has been obtained in all cases more or less directly from oral tradition. ”

“ The next voyage was made by Thorvald, a brother of Leif, probably in the year 1002. The same ship was employed, and [Pg 8] was manned with thirty men. They repaired at once to the booths or temporary houses constructed by Leif, where they passed three winters, subsisting chiefly upon fish, which they took in the waters near them. In the summers they explored the country in various directions to a considerable distance. They discovered no indications of human occupation except on an island, where they found a corn-shed constructed of wood. ”

“ Among the rest, Iceland, having been discovered a short time before, was colonized by them. This event occurred about the year 874. Notwithstanding the severity of the climate and the sterility of the soil, the colony rapidly increased in numbers and wealth, and an active commerce sprung up with the mother country, and was successfully maintained. At the end of a century, they had pushed their explorations still farther, and Greenland was discovered, and a colony was planted there, which continued to flourish for a long period. ”

“ We may state, therefore, without hesitation, that the narratives of the sagas are to be accepted only in their general outlines and prominent features. So far we find solid ground. If we advance farther we tread upon quicksands, and are not sure of our foothold.
The question here naturally arises, viz., If in minor particulars the sagas cannot be fully relied upon, to what extent can we identify the countries discovered, and the places visited by the Northmen? ”

“ In answer to this very proper inquiry, I observe that, according to the narrative of the sagas, and the interpretation of Scandinavian scholars, the first country that the explorers discovered after leaving Greenland answers in its general features to Newfoundland, with its sterile soil, its rocky surface, and its mountains in the back-ground. ”

“ These documents are pronounced by scholars qualified to judge of the character of ancient writings to be authentic, and were undoubtedly believed by the writers to be narratives of historical truth.
They describe with great distinctness the outlines of our eastern coast, including soil, products, and climate, beginning in the cold, sterile regions of the north and extending down to the warm and fruitful shores of the south. It is to be observed that there is no improbability that these alleged voyages should have been made. ”