Vinland sagas
As Vinland -Sagas two are sagas that Grænlendinga saga ( The Saga of the Greenlanders ) and Saga of Erik the Red ( The Saga of Erik the Red ), respectively.
The saga of Erik the Red ( Eirík saga rauđa ), probably originated in the 13th century, has survived today in two versions, some of which differ considerably. It has been handed down in the 14th century hauksbók and the skálholtsbók written down a century later . The action takes place in Iceland at the beginning of the 11th century and deals with the story of Erik the Red and his direct and indirect family.
The creation of the second Vinland saga, the saga of the Greenlanders ( Grænlendinga saga ) is also dated to the 13th century. However, it is only preserved in one manuscript, namely the Flateyjarbók written in the late 14th century .
Icelandic sagas are conceived openly, which means that they could be changed by copyists. This explains the similar material, but the different emphasis and elaboration of the two Vinlandsagas.
The sagas provide the most fully preserved information on the Scandinavian colonization of America . The partly contradicting sagas were written at the earliest 200 years after the journeys they describe. Despite the contradictions, historians regard them as the basis of knowledge about the Scandinavian colonization of North America.
In the 1960s, a Scandinavian settlement was excavated in L'Anse aux Meadows on Newfoundland by the couple Anne-Stine and Helge Ingstad , which means that the journeys described in the sagas were regarded as proven.
literature
- Else Ebel (Editor): The Vínlandsagas. Selected texts on the discovery of America by the Vikings. Niemeyer, Tübingen 1973.
- Magnus Magnusson (translator): The Vinland Sagas: The Norse Discovery of America. Penguin Books, Baltimore 1965.