Thorfinn Karlsefni

Thorfinn Karlsefnis expedition to Vinland 1 = Norway , 2 = Iceland , 3 = Eastern settlement ( Greenland ), 4 = Western settlement ( Greenland ), 5 = Helluland ( Baffinland ), 6 = Markland ( Labrador ) 7 = Bjarney ( Newfoundland ), 8 = Vinland ( Gulf of Saint Lawrence )

Thorfinn Karlsefni ( Old Icelandic : Þorfinnr Karlsefni ) was an Icelandic seafarer and trader who set out for Vinland around 1010 with 160 settlers on three Viking ships. Among the settlers were his wife Guðríður Þorbjarnardóttir , Freydis Eriksdóttir and Thorvald Eiriksson , the half-sister and brother of Leif Eriksson .

origin

As the saga of Erik the Red tells, he was born on Skagafjörður in the north of Iceland in the village of Reynines as the son of Thórdar Hesthöfðar (horse head) and his wife Thorunn. Exact dates of his life are not known. It can be assumed that he was born around 980 and probably died around 1035. The family is described as very rich and influential. The long-distance journeys of the Icelandic merchant family must even have extended to the German North Sea coast, as there is evidence that they were doing business with local merchants in Bremen . Around 1009 Thorfinn traveled with his ship's crew to the court of Erik the Red in Greenland , where he married the widow of Erik's son, Þórsteinn Eiríksson , the Icelander Guðríður .

In Vinland

In the year after the wedding, he and Snorri Thorbrandsson decided to go to Vinland with several ships and 140 men. According to the saga, the small Viking fleet landed on the island of Bjarney, southeast of Markland . There the men watched bears and named the island after them. The voyage from Greenland had taken two days and two nights. After another 2 days they sighted a cape on a portless coastline, on which they found a ship's keel, and named the headland Kjalarnes (Kiel Peninsula). The description of the elongated coast is strongly reminiscent of the Magdalene Islands in the St. Lawrence Gulf , an archipelago on which there are many shipwrecks from the last centuries. The shape of the islands also resembles a ship's keel from the Viking Age.

Furðustrandir - The north coast of Prince Edward Island near Cavendish

On the southward route, Thorfinn sailed eastward along a long sandy beach, starboard in the saga . It was only interrupted by a few large creeks and they called this landscape "Furðustrandir", in German Wonder Beach , because it was as long as it does not otherwise exist on the shores of the North Atlantic.

The land was explored in the east of the island, and a suitable place was sought for the cattle they had brought with them and food for themselves for the coming winter. They named the inlet Straumsfjorður and the island Straumsey in the middle, also because of the strong tidal currents.

Hóp

Here one spent the winter. Thorfinn decided to find a more suitable position to set up a branch in order to stay in Vinland for several years. Others wanted to go back to the "Furðustrandir", and so the ship of Thorhall separated from the rest. He was thrown east, came to Ireland, where he was killed. Next spring they sailed along the south coast.

The restigouche at the exit of the lake with Campbellton

They sailed until they reached a river that flowed from land into a lake and then into the sea. There were big islands in the river mouth and you couldn't get into the river, unless it was at the time of the highest tide . Thorfinn sailed with his people to the estuary and named the land Hóp . There they found fields of wild wheat (which cannot be) wherever the land was flat, and wine grew where the ground began to get rougher. All the streams were full of fish, and they dug trenches in the shallow beach areas, waited for the tide to come in and when the tide was out they found halibut in the holes. In addition, the forest offered a large number of wild animals. They built their settlement above the lake.

Skraelinger

Tribal area and sub-peoples of the Mi'kmaq in the 18th century

Thorfinn's people stayed in Hóp for three years and explored the spacious surroundings by ship during these years. According to the saga, the people cultivated the land around the lake in several village-like settlements. Contacts with the indigenous people came about in the first summer.

Thorfinn's contact with the Skraelingers became more difficult from year to year. In the first summer, after initial communication problems, barter was peaceful. In the next year, the natives were so terrified by an aggressive bull disturbed by Thorfinn that they fled the trading place. The third summer was warlike from the start. The Northmen received the Indians in a foresighted manner in order of battle, and a fight ensued. Two Greenlanders and four Indians were killed and the Skraelingers put to flight. In this dispute, Freydis , the daughter of Erik the Red, also excelled .

Return journey

Thorfinn and his people decided that although the country had excellent opportunities for permanent settlement, the conflict with the Skraelingians would not end and that the number of Northmen was too small for this. Preparations have now been made for the return trip to Greenland and Iceland. The ships were also loaded with goods that were not available to the settlers on Greenland and Iceland - hardwood, Vinland wine and furs.

The ships arrived safely in Greenland and Iceland. Thorfinn's family settled in Iceland near his hometown Reynines and built an estate in Glaumbær . The newly acquired goods from Vinland continued to be traded, which made the family wealthy and influential. It is not known when the Icelanders' voyages to Vinland and Greenland stopped. The family descended from some of the first bishops in Iceland and at the beginning of the 12th century a second Icelandic bishopric was established in remote Hólar . In the 18th century there is also talk of a family of officials from Reynines , the Reinisstad family .

Rating

The famous Swedish polar explorer Freiherr Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld praised the great achievements of the Icelandic and Greenland Vikings as explorers, especially Thorfinn Karlsefnis : "With the bold discoveries of the Normans, the framework of the Ptolemaic worldview was broken for the first time by a map drawing based on real observation. the belief in the infallibility of the Alexandrian scholar is shaken and the enthusiasm for new discoveries aroused. What is certain is that those 160 people under the leadership of Thorfinn Karlsefnis who set out for America in 1006 wrote their deed in the book of the conquest of the earth by man in unforgettable letters have entered " (quoted P. Herrmann 1936, p. 58).

Sources and literature

• “The story of Erich the Red.” In: Greenland and Faroese stories. Transferred by Felix Niedner. Darmstadt 1965, pp. 23-48.
• "The story of the Greenlanders." In: Greenlanders and Faroese stories. Transferred by Felix Niedner. Darmstadt 1965, pp. 49-85.
• Bernd Gottschling (arrangement): Vinland Sagas . From old Icelandic. Afterword by Else Ebel . Hattingen: Verlag Dr. Bernd Kretschmer 1982.
• Paul Hermann: The big risk. 6000 fight for the globe . Berlin 1936
• Lutz Mohr , Robert Liese: Vikings between Pomerania and the Arctic Circle. Truth or sagas . Horn-Bad Meinberg: Leo-Verlag Robert Liese 1997, 2nd edit. Edition 2000, ISBN 3-9805594-0-8 .
• Lutz Mohr: Icelandic legends and its relations with Germany. In: ICELAND. Journal of the German-Isländische Gesellschaft eV Cologne and the Society of Friends of Islands eV Hamburg, vol. 2, issue 2, Cologne / Hamburg 1992, pp. 24–30, ISSN  0535-7209
• Harald Steinert: A Thousand Years of New World. On the trail of the Vikings in Greenland and America . Darmstadt: Deutsche Verlagsanstalt 1982.
• THULE: Old Norse Poetry and Prose, Volume 13: Greenland and Faroese stories . Edited and translated by Felix Niedner . New edition. With afterword by Siegfried Beyschlag . Düsseldorf / Cologne: Eugen Diederichs Verlag 1965
• Kurt Welker: The forgotten continent. The Normans' voyages of discovery to Greenland and North America . Leipzig: FA Brockhaus 1970.
• Farley Mowat, West Viking: The Ancient Norse in Greenland and North America 1965, ISBN 978-0-7710-6692-4 .

Web links

• Saga of Erik the Red, chapters 7-14 (English, Icelandic, Norwegian and Old Norse)
• Thorfinn Karlsefni . In: Dictionary of Canadian Biography . 24 volumes, 1966–2018. University of Toronto Press, Toronto ( English , French ).

Individual evidence

1. ↑ See L. Mohr 1996, p. 27.

Note: Icelanders are referred to by their first name or first and last name, but not just their surname. Further information can be found under Icelandic personal name .