31 ms·
Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021
- heikkilevanto 5y agoWhat I find most amazing in the article is the technology of radiocarbon dating individual year rings in a piece of wood, correlate that to known cosmic radiation events, and get the precise year when the tree was felled.
- NelsonMinar 5y agoYeah that was the most interesting part to me too; we already knew about Vikings in Greenland, but now they have a specific year to pin it too. The science that enables that is described in this paper: https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms2783 https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms2783
- olvy0 5y agoTangentially related: Kim Stanley Robinson's early story Vinland The Dream, in which an archeologist discovers that those very remnants here were actually planted there as an elaborate hoax 100 years ago.
- mkrazzledazzle 5y agoSo what? This news reads to the rest of the world as.. Europeans squabbling between each other as to who amongst them first visited a continent they'd previously not known about, already brimming with other populations of humans. End of story. It's 2021 folks, no one cares about eurocentric land grab claims.
- culi 5y agoIt truly is bizarre. The amount of effort and research into this very difficult to answer, and ultimately not all that useful, question is insane. Even the anthropologists arguing about the Polynesian sailors (~1200AD), the Chinese boats(~1421AD), or even the African sailors (~400AD). The overall point is somewhat useful. We know there's clearly been points of contact between all sorts of people from Afroeurasia and the Americas. But this inane squabbling over who was technically first is honestly kinda cringey
- bigyikes 5y agoCouldn’t you say that about any piece of history you’re not interested in? This comment is needlessly dismissive.
- ncmncm 5y agoThe evidence for collapsing agriculture in the Amazon basin a couple of centuries before Columbus hints at disease spreading from contact there, such as from a (historically attested, well equipped) African expedition in 1311 that might not have returned. The Amazon has proof positive of tree domestication 10000 years ago. The coincidence of collapse right about then seems hard to account for without contact. But we may never know.
- sharmin123 5y agoHow to Protect Your Privacy And Personal Data from Hackers?: https://www.hackerslist.co/how-to-protect-your-privacy-and-personal-data-from-hackersfrom-hackers-protect-personal-data/ https://www.hackerslist.co/how-to-protect-your-privacy-and-p...
- 0xBABAD00C 5y agoThere's a fun wikipedia article [1] on various theories of pre-columbian contact with the Americas. Some of these are very dubious, of course, but the Roman fruit bowl from 2000 years ago does look like it contains an actual pineapple, which is an American fruit [2]. There is also evidence of nicotine and other substances found in Egyptian mummies from even longer ago, which could indicate at least some sort of indirect trade/contact across the ocean. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_contact_theories https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_co... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_contact_theories#/media/File:0_Mosaico_pavimentale_%E2%80%93_Grotte_Celloni_%E2%80%93_Pal._Massimo.JPG https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_co...
- jjallen 5y agoI hope someone else noted that this is not new evidence. What they did is reanalyzed existing wood samples and determined an exact year that they were definitely in Newfoundland. They did through dating of tree rings based on known cosmic radiation events from the year 993 (if I recall the year correctly). Very interesting paper to read.
- tim333 5y agoI was curious how the solar storm giving radiocarbon works. It seems approx: In the storm the sun chucks out hydrogen and helium ions. >It is not uncommon for [these] to collide with an atom in the atmosphere, creating a secondary cosmic ray in the form of an energetic neutron, and for these energetic neutrons to collide with nitrogen atoms. When the neutron collides, a nitrogen-14 (seven protons, seven neutrons) atom turns into a carbon-14 atom (six protons, eight neutrons) and a hydrogen atom (one proton, zero neutrons).
- bryanrasmussen 5y agoMarckalada: The First Mention of America in the Mediterranean Area (c. 1340) https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epub/10.1080/00822884.2021.1943792 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epub/10.1080/00822884.2021.1...
- pradn 5y agoOne remarkable person from this time period is Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir, who had the first European child in the Americas (outside Greenland) and then made a pilgrimage to Rome. She's probably the most well-travelled woman of the 11th century. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gudrid_Thorbjarnard%C3%B3ttir https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gudrid_Thorbjarnard%C3%B3ttir
- chalcolithic 5y agoI can't quite recall who eloquently described this discovery as "Christopher Columbus was the last person to discover America"
- stuff4ben 5y agoIt begs the question then of what happened to them? Did they integrate with existing Native Americans? Or did they just die out? Are there stories from Native Americans in the area that report Norsemen in the area?
- belval 5y agoI wonder if they could check the DNA of the natives that were originally from that area for any "old" Europeans markers or if there was too much mixing from the colonization for such a thing to work.
- mig39 5y agoUnfortunately, the aboriginal population of Newfoundland didn't survive contact with subsequent European settlers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beothuk https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beothuk
- BurningFrog 5y agoYou can still get DNA from their bones.
- amackera 5y agoThey sailed home to Greenland, presumably, and wrote about their adventures in sagas. Unfortunately the indigenous peoples of Newfoundland (the Beothuk) were forced into starvation by the encroachment of European fishermen, so we don't have a lot of knowledge of their folklore or oral traditions.
- fullstop 5y ago> Did they integrate with existing Native Americans? According to the article, no: "The Icelandic sagas suggest that the Norse engaged in cultural exchanges with the Indigenous groups of North America. If these encounters indeed occurred, they may have had inadvertent outcomes, such as pathogen transmission, the introduction of foreign flora and fauna species, or even the exchange of human genetic information. Recent data from the Norse Greenlandic population, however, show no evidence of the last of these. It is a matter for future research how the year AD 1021 relates to overall transatlantic activity by the Norse. Nonetheless, our findings provide a chronological anchor for further investigations into the consequences of their westernmost expansion." edit: re-reading this, they may have if they never returned to Greenland
- bcaulfield 5y agoStrange to think this discovery was made at the apex of the Byzantime Empire under Basil II. The Roman Empire was still somewhat of a thing.
- davidw 5y agoIt's interesting to contemplate some of these overlaps that don't normally come to mind. The Republic of Venice, for instance, was still a going concern, albeit on its last legs, when the United States was founded.
- sb057 5y agoEven more interesting to consider is the imperial Varangian Guard, comprised of Norse recruits. It's entirely possible that one of these Viking explorers in North America (or their descendants) later resided at court in Constantinople.
- datameta 5y agoAnd it is also possible that a Varangian that visited North America ended up as a chief or advisor of a slavic tribe.
- ilamont 5y agoThe Icelandic sagas suggest that the Norse engaged in cultural exchanges with the Indigenous groups of North America34. If these encounters indeed occurred, they may have had inadvertent outcomes, such as pathogen transmission7, the introduction of foreign flora and fauna species, or even the exchange of human genetic information. Recent data from the Norse Greenlandic population, however, show no evidence of the last of these. Is it possible the Vikings were not in that location long enough for populations to mix? Or they were so remote (physically, culturally, and linguistically) that limited opportunities arose? Or something else?
- bjornsing 5y ago“Inadvertent exchange of human genetic information”… :)
- hprotagonist 5y agoI think the consensus has been for some time that they showed up, caught some fish, logged a few trees, decided it sucked, and left, all in probably less than a decade.
- simonklitj 5y agoI love that idea. "Man, this is just like back home, let's go boys."
- Apocryphon 5y agoNewiceland
- daveslash 5y agoNiceland.
- philwelch 5y agoAccording to some sources, one factor is that Newfoundland was so heavily populated with indigenous people that there wasn’t enough room for a Norse colony to grow. By the time the English made it back to Newfoundland, smallpox and other epidemics had devastated the indigenous population.
- 0000011111 5y ago"These sudden increases were caused by cosmic radiation events, and appear synchronously in dendrochronological records all around the world" #### That is a pretty interesting method for dating historical sites. I wonder how much it will change the records as future research is done globally.
- AlotOfReading 5y agoIt's neat, but practically speaking it's an incremental improvement over what already exists. Dendrochronology is already capable of dating the felling year (which may be years or decades removed from the actual construction date). This allows you to date certain fellings to a particular season under ideal circumstances, and to start local dendrochronological records from a different fixed point.
- efa 5y agoI thought this has been known for awhile. I visited the site in Newfoundland like 15 years ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L'Anse_aux_Meadows https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L'Anse_aux_Meadows
- jonny_eh 5y ago> I thought this has been known for awhile What, in particular, are you referring to?
- Afforess 5y agoLeif Erikson? Popularized by Spongebob, no less.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- sleavey 5y agoAnyone else learn about the Viking landings on North America from Age of Empires 2 (1999)?
- roywiggins 5y agoThe research is about pinning the date down.
- thereddaikon 5y ago
- privatdozent 5y agoScandinavians are pretty proud of this fact. Look up Leif Erikson, supposedly the first European to set foot in America, 500 years before Columbus.
- broof 5y agoI still would say that Columbus was the first to "discover" America, in the sense that Leif Erikson showed up, left, and didn't really make a big deal out of it. which to be fair, makes sense if you look on google earth and zoom in and follow from Iceland up to northern Canada. It just all feels more or less the same, so eventually they turned around and left.
- capableweb 5y agoIs "making noise about it" what we consider discovery now? I'd say the first person finding and visiting the place is indeed the discoverer of that place. Maybe Columbus popularised it rather.
- throwaway894345 5y agoIf a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound? If someone discovers something and nothing really comes of it, is it really a more significant discovery than one which changes the world profoundly, immediately, and forevermore?
- kypro 5y agoWhen I was a kid I remember seeing weird bugs in the garden and wondering if I was the first person to find that bug. I’m sure I wasn’t, but in theory I could have “discovered” loads of new species - but would it even matter if I wasn’t aware enough of my own discovery to share it? Did the Vikings even realise they were on a new continent? My understanding is that they “settled” a tiny area and may have thought it was just an island off of Greenland or something.
- burkaman 5y ago
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- lifeisstillgood 5y agoAn interesting counter-factual that comes to mind - if the Norse Greenlanders had brought smallpox or other diseases with them, then Native Americans would have had 500 years to recover (and keep immunity?) - The conquistadors would have faced millions of not-dying-natives. A much different world would have resulted.
- eurusd 5y agoIt is exactly one of the starting points of this uchrony, Civilizations from Laurent Binet (in french, i believe not translated to english), where native get sick during first venue of Vikings then when Colombus appears they just don't get sick at all + kill him and get to Portugal back on their boats and then travel in Europe, meet Luther, Erasme & Charles Quint, convert people to Sun god religion and create an Empire in Europe. Good book btw
- saiya-jin 5y agomaybe that 1/few ships just happened to didn't carry smallpox and other nasties aboard
- sillyquiet 5y agoyeah, unfortunately (I guess??!) smallpox didn't reach Europe until the Crusades.
- BurningFrog 5y agoThat's really interesting! Of course, if the native population died off around them, the Vikings would probably have expanded their settlements and perhaps ruled North America instead.
- Symmetry 5y agoI dunno, the Norse settlers were apparently getting a lot out of trading red died cloth for native produce and if it hadn't been for the altercation that somehow grew up around that cow or bull the possibility of trade might have drawn a lot more Norse in, the way the fur trade did in French North America. But then again farming populations can expand really fast with low population pressure. The 13 colonies were seeing their populations double every generation just from natural fertility even before immigration.
- wly_cdgr 5y agoMisread "1021" as "2021" and got excited
- mseepgood 5y agoI misread it as "1024" and got excited, too.
- beschizza 5y agoThis was the era of the Anglo-Scandinavian Empire, formed in Britain and Scandinavia under the king of England, Canute, a Danish prince. It didn't outlast him by long (and Norway was independent until the 1020s) but the coincidence of political consolidation in northern europe with brief settlement in north America is interesting.
- sleepyhead 5y agoNorway was independent until 1397.
- beschizza 5y agoIt was part of Canute's empire (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Sea_Empire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Sea_Empire) for a few years in the early 11th century, until his death.
- zw123456 5y agoApparently there is some evidence about Vikings bringing Native Americans back to Iceland. https://phys.org/news/2010-11-vikings-brought-amerindian-iceland-years.html https://phys.org/news/2010-11-vikings-brought-amerindian-ice...
- bingohbangoh 5y agoI've never understood the significance of this. The vikings were in North America for a few years and then went back to Europe. They brought back (almost?) nothing, left a few scattered settlements, and completely forgot about it. So what.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- wnscooke 5y agoThere are some who think that if the First Nations weren’t “the first”, that diminishes modern day claims and grievances, making it easier for modern day Canada and the USA to ignore legitimate claims, and treat us as they’ve always wanted to treat us. So, this sort of research is important for many.
- s1artibartfast 5y agoWeird take. I have never read any claims that Europeans were in N America before the indigenous. Even with visiting in 1000 AD, the "indians" have 10-20,000 year lead.
- cmrdporcupine 5y agoThere's all the nonsense that happened around Kennewick man and all the controversies around it. Various bits of bad physical anthropology that tried to identify the skull as "Caucasoid", some dispute over the control over the remains, and in the end DNA testing showed continuity with today's indigenous populations; but white nationalists tried to seize on its initial description as "Caucasoid" as some evidence of "Caucasian" presence in the new world long ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennewick_Man#Race_factor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennewick_Man#Race_factor 'The New York Times reported "White supremacist groups are among those who used Kennewick Man to claim that Caucasians came to America well before Native Americans." Additionally, Asatru Folk Assembly, a racialist neopagan organization, sued to have the bones genetically tested before it was adjudicated that Kennewick Man was an ancestor of present-day Native Americans.' Also the whole "Solutrean hypothesis", also disproven/discredited, but living on among the conspirational and often racist.
- chestertn 5y agoThere are plenty of valid claims that many other civilizations contacted America: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_contact_theories https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_co... But it is meaningless since they did not write about it nor they stablished commerce. The fact is that before 1492, most civilizations in Africa/Asia/Europe did not know that America existed and that other humans lived there. After 1492, that changed forever.
- nashashmi 5y agoThis brings up a good point about what does discover mean. People lived in north America but they did not write about it to Europeans so they had to be discovered. Why does my understanding of history seem to revolve around what Europeans did and did not do/know?
- warkdarrior 5y agoFor better or for worse, different civilizations took different approaches to keeping written records. The Chinese, many European people, the Arabs, the Persians, the Indians, the Mayans, the Aztecs, many African people all had detailed written records. So we tend to tell history from their point of view, since this is the info we have. Do we have written info from the Native Americans who met the Vikings or from the Caribbean peoples about Columbus? Not that I know of. We have the Vikings view of things and Columbus' view, so we tend to rely on them.
- soylentnewsorg 5y agoI think there's also a point everyone who talks about other "discoveries" of America purposely ignores. This is about the discovery of it not for Europe the continent. This is about its discovery for what was the civilized nations in Europe. So if we look at Iceland - a place that's essentially a standalone island already half way to America - where a bunch of vikings lived who at the time weren't hanging out with people from places like Spain or Italy or France - it's an apples to oranges comparison.
- 5y ago
- runjake 5y agoThe debate on whether Vikings were in Pre-Columbus America is starting to sound a lot like the back and forth of "$food is (good|bad) for you".
- Thrymr 5y agoI do not think this has been in serious dispute in the last 50 years. This paper just puts a more precise date on the settlement in Newfoundland that was already well known.
- moksly 5y agoAs a Danish person it’s sort of interesting to see how much focus this particular area gets in comparison to other Norse history, but no, it hasn’t really been disputed in any serious manner for a while. A lot of the evidence doesn’t really prove anything. The map turned out to be a forgery, and wood having been worked by metal tools could have happened through trade. L’anse aux Meadows is a Norse settlement similar to those found in Greenland, however, and that’s sort of the evidence you need. This is the only settlement found however, and it may never have had contact with the indigenous people considering how isolated it was. The “vikings” weren’t there to raid, they were there to find some decent farmland, and if that’s what they found, they could have died out without anyone knowing about it until a thousand years later. But what they actually did is anyones guess.
- goto11 5y agoThere is no doubt Vikings were in Pre-Columbus America.
- e0m 5y agoHappy 1000th anniversary Vikings!
- justinzollars 5y agoThis is so cool. So much earlier than I could have imagined!
- newfriend 5y agoThe media is really pushing this (and related) story hard this year. Anything to delegitimize Columbus.
- anthk 5y agoColumbus was a bastard by himself, and I say this as Spaniard. The local Castillian-Aragonese kingdom (proto-Spain maybe) punished Columbus because of his overseas behaviour.
- arduinomancer 5y agoWhat is wrong with that? Don't you prefer accurate history?
- mandmandam 5y ago... Good. Listening to the story in school it was obvious there was some stuff being glossed over; like, how did he discover America if there were people there already? ... And those people just gave their land to Europeans because ... ? And, in the years since grade school, the answer to those questions have led to darker questions, with dark answers. And oh shit, we're actually still pulling this shit. So again - good. Fuck that guy, and fuck his fake myth.
- CountDrewku 5y agoOk then fuck the Vikings too. Do you realize how much violence and destruction they wrought? At least keep your shit logically cohesive. While you're at it do a little research on "indigenous" culture and how they treated each other. I assure you it wasn't butterflies and kisses before Columbus got here. > how did he discover America if there were people there already He discovered it in relation to Europeans who didn't know of its existence. This is one of the dumbest things I've read today. Your take would mean literally nothing could be discovered.
- mandmandam 5y agoDo people credit the Vikings for discovering Ireland? The fuck they do. And I don't know why the fuck you're putting "indigenous" in quotes but man it looks kinda racist. As does the idea that "discovering things" is by default actually "discovered in relation to Europeans".
- cheaprentalyeti 5y agoI was hoping they'd have found out more about other settlements in Newfoundland besides L'anse aux Meadows. Did they ever find out more about that possible settlement in SW Newfoundland?
- ytdytvhxgydvhh 5y agoApparently no evidence of Norse activity there: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_Rosee https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point_Rosee
- fijiaarone 5y agoLiterally the article states that they know exactly when and where Norse vikings were because of "cosmic rays"
- nixpulvis 5y ago"Our new date lays down a marker for European cognisance of the Americas" Is "cognisance" really the right term here? I didn't really follow the whole article and it seemed mostly unrelated to my question anyway, so sorry if I missed something. It just seems to me that for there to be any European awareness, there would have to be proof of a return voyage, no? Is this not really just talking about "European presence"? I'm being highly pedantic, I'm well aware.
- CRConrad 5y agoThe existence of Grönländinga Saga -- specifically, the bits in it about Vinland and Markland and Helluland -- is in itself proof of European cognisance of the Americas. And yes, obviously at least some of them must have made it back, or their exploits would never have been recorded in the saga(s?). There's a couple of timelines in the article, reconstructing the sequence of events both from the artefacts and from the sagas; ISTR the fact-based one also mentions the return trips. I think what they mean by "lays down a marker" is that this finding marks that already-established-as-existing cognisance in time, since they established the exact year those trees were felled and the Viking settlement built. (And, nice coincidence -- or did they sit on it for a while to make it so? -- it's apparently exactly a millennium ago.) OK, since the Vikings then had to winter in their in their new-built settlement before returning in the spring, and if you want to count "Europeans know of it" as pertaining to at least Icelanders in general[1], you could argue that the specific marker for "European cognisance" goes a year or two later. But that's academic -- literally, as in, let the academics discuss it. But now they have a starting year to hange their discussion on, so this finding marks not only the age of the settlement and discovery of North America, but ultimately also of Europeans' consciousness thereof. ___ [1]: Not just the also rather precarious settlement on Greenland, which I suppose could have died out after the return of the Vinlanders but before anyone went from there to Iceland, so without ever getting word back to Europe at large.
- nixpulvis 5y agoThank you for the very informative reply. I think that basically resolves my confusion about this.
- Teknoman117 5y agoA few of the other comments had me curious, but while it's widely known that diseases brought over from Europe were devastating to the native populations of the Americas, are there any notable examples of transfer in the other direction - i.e. new diseases the Europeans encountered in the Americas that got brought back to Europe?
- cogman10 5y agoSyphilis is thought to be a new world disease. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_syphilis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_syphilis
- staticfloat 5y agoAha! A chance to plug one of my favorite CGP Grey videos that explores this very question: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEYh5WACqEk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEYh5WACqEk
- Teknoman117 5y agoThat's a super interesting video. Thanks!
- tschwimmer 5y agoSyphilis was thought to have been carried from the Americas to Europe by Columbus' crewmen.[0] [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syphilis#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syphilis#History
- bcaulfield 5y agoA millennia from now, I think people may well be kind of shocked to learn that we got to the moon in 1969 if a collapse, global recession or some other calamity derails the latest efforts to get back there within the next few years.