L'Anse aux Meadows
Replica of a Norse long house at Parks Canada National Historic Site
L’Anse aux Meadows is the only proven site of a Viking or Norse habitation in North America and, as such, is celebrated as the epicenter of First Contact between this continent's aboriginal people and the first Europeans to make landfall in the Western Hemisphere around 1000 AD. Archeologists have determined that this site, including several longhouses, storage sheds and workshops, was a waystation for the Viking's exploration of more distant lands to the west and south. Today this Viking site at L’Anse aux Meadows is situated on a large grassy plain, but in the year 1000, it was a wooded area with a sizable creek flowing from an inland pond. Nearby bogs provided material for smelting iron.
The builder of L'Anse aux Meadows, Leif Erikson, led an expedition that sailed from a West Viking settlement in Greenland to the coast of Labrador and south to Newfoundland. Known for both their trading and their raiding, these Nordic adventurers were searching for resources they could use in their own settlements and could also trade for high prices in Europe. Wood was a valuable find as there was little of it in Greenland. Along with animal furs and walrus ivory, it was a valuable commoditiy that could also be traded in Europe. As the leader, Erikson chose the L'Anse aux Meadows site for a substantial, if not permanent, settlement where his crews could repair their boats, collect food and water, and overwinter before heading back to Greenland. By comparing the L'Anse aux Meadows site with that of similar sites inhabited by the Norse, researchers have concluded that it could have housed almost 100 people. There is no way of telling how many people actually lived there at one time, but the settlement was probably not utilized for more that a decade before being abandoned for good.
Artefacts found at L’Anse aux Meadows have led archeologists to believe the Vikings explored lands all around the Gulf of St. Lawrence during the summer months. According to the Norse sagas, it was not long beforer the Viking sailors saw evidence of other people living in the region, most likely aboriginal ancestors of the Mi'kmaq and Beothuk. The cultural divide between North America’s aboriginal peoples and the Norse, competition for resources, territorial control, and possibly individual personalities led to misunderstanding and warfare in most of the interactions described in the sagas.
After only a few years of intermittent habitation at L’Anse aux Meadows, the Vikings, being significantly outnumbered by the natives whom they feared and distrusted, left the settlement for good. Greenland mariners continued to make periodic visits to the Labrador coast and arctic regions in search of raw materials, but there is no evidence they ever again attempted to establish a station as substantial as L’Anse aux Meadows. It would be another 500 years before Europeans would return to North America and the Strait of Belle Isle.
Today, in honour of its significance to world history, L’Anse aux Meadows has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site as well as a national park managed by Parks Canada.There is an excellent interpretation centre housing important archeological finds and full-sized replicas of the Norse buildings that stood on the site.
L'Anse aux Meadows Photos : ( Click each for full size )
A costumed interpreter explains the Viking site to visitors.
Replica of a small Norse rowboat at L' Anse aux Meadows
L'Anse aux Meadows : The Discovery of the Viking Site
In 1961 Norwegian historian Helge Instad and his wife Anne Stine Ingstad traveled the North American coast, from New England to Newfoundland and Labrador, in search of the remains of an early Norse settlement. During his trip to northern Newfoundland, Ingstad met local fisherman, George Decker, who confirmed that just beyond the outport of L’Anse aux Meadows, there were mysterious rectangular ridges that locals assumed were aboriginal burials or lodge remains. Starting in the summer of 1961, the Ingstads directed an archeological dig to uncover the grass-covered formations and prove that this place was indeed a bonafide early Viking or Norse settlement. For the next 7 years, along with archeologists from several countries, they excavated the site, finding the remains of structures resembling Norse buildings from the 11th century. However, it was not until 1964 when a Norse spindle whorl was uncovered at the site that the Ingstads could be certain they had indeed found an historic Viking settlement, possibly part of the place called Vinland in the Norse sagas.
The Vikings and the Native Peoples
If the Norse sagas are to be believed, Leif Erikson never actually met aboriginal people when he explored the coast of North America although he glimpsed their encampments. During the next expedition, let by Leif’s brother Thorvald, there was a tragic confrontation, which might be seen as setting a symbolic precedent in relations between North America’s First Nations and Europeans. According to one saga, as Thorvald sailed the Labrador coast on a summer day, his ship stopped on shore to fix the boat keel. Soon after, the sailors came upon a group of aboriginal people they called skraelings watching them from under skin boats. During the ensuing melee, the Vikings killed all but one skraeling, but Leif’s brother was also killed. Archeologists do not know whether these skraelings were Inuit or Amerindian hunters. The death of Thorvald marked a growing uneasiness for Viking explorers considering permanent settlement.
It was Leif’s sister-in-law, Gudrid, who organized the next voyage. During a sailing trip to explore the country south of Newfoundland, the Vikings came to blows with the native inhabitants after an initially peaceful trade exchange. Gudrid and her husband Karlsefni, along with their newborn son Snorri, the first European born in North America, decided to return to their home in Iceland. Eventually the Greenland Norse attempts to settle or even sojourn in North America ended for good as they felt continually threatened by aboriginal people who greatly outnumbered them.
Since the excavations at L’Anse au Meadows, archeologists have found evidence, in the form of small artefacts, of later trade between the Greenland Norse and aboriginal people farther north in Labrador and Baffin Island. No location besides L'Anse aux Meadows has yet been found of any early Norse settlement in North America
Photos : ( Click each for full size )
A section of the French Shore Tapestry depicts the Vikings leaving Newfoundland after the death of Thorvald.