TROIA, IRLANDA...

Ho trovato questa curiosità. Che può essere indicativo di quanto l'identità nazionale riesca ad obnubilare il cervello di schiere di persone - talvolta anche brillanti - e a modificare la percezione della Storia. In particolare: la Battaglia di Clontarf, che circa mille anni fa marcò l'incontro tra gli Irlandesi ed i Vichinghi e dette agli Irlandesi la loro identità nazionale, è  sempre stata raccontata - si scopre adesso - traendo spunto dall'Iliade. Pertanto si tratterebbe più di Letteratura che non di Storia.

Medieval account of Irish battle borrowed from the Iliad 


ArchaeoHeritage, Archaeology, Breakingnews, Europe, Ireland, UK, Western Europe 


 As Ireland marks the millennium of the Battle of Clontarf – portrayed as a heroic encounter between Irish and Vikings which defined the nation’s identity - new research argues that our main source for what happened may be more literary history than historical fact. 

An 1826 painting of the Battle of Clontarf by the Irish artist, Hugh Frazer

 [Credit: Isaacs Art Centre/Wikimedia Commons] 

The standard account of the Battle of Clontarf – a defining moment in Irish history which happened 1,000 years ago this week – was partly a “pseudo-history” borrowed from the tale of Troy, new research suggests. 
The findings, which are to be published in a forthcoming book about the intellectual culture of medieval Ireland, coincide with extensive celebrations in Dublin marking the millennium of Clontarf, which was fought on Good Friday, April 23, 1014. 
In popular history, the battle has been characterised as an epic and violent clash between the army of the Christian Irish High King, Brian Boru, and a combined force led by the rebel king of the territory of Leinster, Máel Mórda, and Sitric, leader of the Dublin-based Vikings. 
The disputed outcome saw the Vikings beaten off, but at huge cost. 
Brian himself was killed, and became an iconic figure and Irish martyr. 
According to the new study, however, much of what we know about Clontarf may be rooted not in historical fact, but a brilliant work of historical literature which modelled sections of its text on an earlier account of the siege of Troy. 
Rather than a trustworthy description of the battle itself, this account – Cogadh Gáedhel re Gallaibh (“The War Of The Irish Against The Foreigners”) – was really a rhetorical masterpiece designed to place Ireland’s legendary past in the context of a grand, classical tradition, stretching back to the works of Homer and classical philosophy. 
The study argues that this in itself should be seen as evidence that the cultural achievements of Brian Boru’s successors in medieval Ireland were complex, highly sophisticated, and the equal of anywhere else in Europe. 
It also means, however, that despite the widespread portrayal of Clontarf as a heroic, quasi-national conflict in which the lives of Brian and others were sacrificed in the Irish cause, the historical truth is unknown. 
While the advent of the battle itself and its significance is beyond question, the details of what happened are likely to remain a mystery. 
The research was carried out by Dr Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, a Reader in medieval literature and history at St John’s College, University of Cambridge.
 It will appear in a new book called Classical Literature and Learning in Medieval Irish Narrative, published in Boydell and Brewer’s ‘Studies in Celtic History’ series and edited by Ralph O’Connor. 
“The casting of Clontarf as a national struggle in which the aged, holy Brian was martyred still defines what most people know about the battle, and it has probably endured because that was what numerous generations of Irish men and women wanted to read,” Dr Ní Mhaonaigh said. 
“Academics have long accepted that Cogadh couldn’t be taken as reliable evidence but that hasn’t stopped some of them from continuing to draw on it to portray the encounter. 

What this research shows is that its account of the battle was crafted, at least in part, to create a version of events that was the equivalent of Troy. 

This was more than a literary flourish, it was a work of a superb, sophisticated and learned author.” 
Another reason that the story may have endured is a lack of physical evidence for the battle. No archaeological remains have been found, and the precise location, presumed to be somewhere around the modern Dublin suburb of Clontarf, is disputed. 
Compared with the very basic information in contemporary chronicles, Cogadh provides by far the most comprehensive account of what happened. 
It was, however, written about a century later, probably at the behest of Brian’s great-grandson. 
Historians have rightly treated it as partial, but also as the written version of oral accounts that had been passed on from those who witnessed the battle itself. 
The new research suggests that this pivotal source was even more of a cultivated fabrication than previously thought. 
Through a close study of the text, Dr Ní Mhaonaigh found that the imagery, terminology and ideas draw inspiration from a range of earlier sources – in particular Togail Troí (The Destruction of Troy), an eleventh-century translation of a fifth-century account of the battle for Troy. 
In particular, the unknown author explicitly cast Brian’s son, who it is believed led a large part of his father’s army at Clontarf, as an Irish Hector, whom he describes as “the last man who had true valour in Ireland”. 
Tellingly, Togail Troí is also found in the same manuscript as Cogadh  – suggesting that the author had this to hand when describing the battle. 
Rather than pouring cold water on the millennial celebrations by showing the main account of Clontarf to have been an elaborate piece of story-telling, however, the study points out that the work bears witness to the cultural achievements of Brian’s successors. 
The parallel between Murchad and Hector in particular was in fact part of a complex and deeply scholarly analogy which drew on the recurring classical motif of the “Six Ages of the World” and “Six Ages of Man”. 
It shows that whoever wrote it was not simply describing a battle, but crafting a brilliant work of art. 
“Whoever wrote this was operating as part of larger, learned European tradition,” Dr Ní Mhaonaigh added. 
“People should not see the fact that it is a fabricated narrative as somehow a slur against Brian, because what it really shows is that his descendants were operating at a cultural level of the highest complexity and order.”

Source: University of Cambridge [April 23, 2014]

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Decodificato un Codice Runico!

Mysterious code in Viking runes is cracked 


Why did Vikings sometimes use codes when they wrote in runes? 
Were the messages secret, or did they have other reasons for encrypting their runic texts?

 Researchers still don’t know for sure. 

A rather forthright message written in code: “Kiss me” is etched into a piece of bone found in Sigtuna in Sweden, dating to the 12th or 13th century. The code is in cipher runes, the most common code known from medieval Scandinavia. 

This variety is called ice runes [Credit: Jonas Nordby] 

But Runologist K. Jonas Nordby thinks he has made progress toward an answer. He has managed to crack a code called jötunvillur, which has baffled linguists and historians for years. His discovery can help researchers understand the purpose behind the mystery codes. “It’s like solving a riddle,” says Nordby. “After a while I started to see a pattern in what appeared to be meaningless combinations of runes,” he says.

 Codes in frequent use 

Ancient codes prompt associations with treasure hunts and conspiracies as depicted in The Da Vinci Code. But mysterious codes are not just the stuff of fiction and films. Real-life Vikings and medieval Norse people carved runic codes onto sticks of wood, stones and other objects. 

Two men, Sigurd and Lavrans, carved their names both in code and in standard runes on this stick, dated from the 13th century and found at the Bergen Wharf. This helped researcher Jonas Nordby crack the jötunvillur code [Credit: Aslak Liestøl/Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo] 

The codes are found in many forms and contexts. They have turned up all over Scandinavia, the British Isles and other places where runes were used. “It was very common to use codes. Much of the population mastered them. That’s why I think they were something people picked up at the same time they learned the runic alphabet. If you had learned to read and write, you had also learned codes,” says Nordby. The use of the code as a tool in learning is not as odd as it might seem. There were no rune schools then but knowledge of this alphabet could be transferred from generation to generation by linking it to games, poetry, drills and codes,  Nordby says. He is working on his doctorate in runes. Nordby is the first person to study all the findings of runic codes in Northern Europe, around 80 inscriptions. His PhD research has taken him to several countries to analyse runic inscriptions dating back as far as 800 AD. 

Imaginative use 

The use of runic codes was imaginative, but not mysterious enough for a Hollywood blockbuster. A rune stick from the Wharf in Bergen testifies to a mischievous use of runic writing. 

The lines in the beards of these men comprise a message, written in cipher runes [Credit: Aslak Liestøl/ Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo] 

“Many think the Vikings used cryptography to conceal secret messages. But I think the codes were used in play and for learning runes, rather than to communicate,” says Nordby. One of the reasons for his claim is that the jötunvillur code is written in a way that makes the interpretation ambiguous. 
“Jötunvillur can only be written, not read. It would be pointless to use it for messages,” says Nordby. This is why he has considered other possible uses for the code.  Nordby thinks the Vikings memorised rune names with the help of the jötunvillur code. All runes have names, and the jötunvillur code works by exchanging the rune sign with the last sound in the rune’s name. For example, the rune for the letter U is called “urr” so it is encoded with the rune for R. The problem is that many runes end in the same sound. This makes it hard to figure out which runic letter the code refers to. The rune codes were not just used for learning. Nordby thinks the use also indicates a whimsical use of runes in the Viking Era and the Middle Ages. “These runes were carved by the most rune-literate man west of the sea,” bragged the author of this text. The inscription is in cipher runes and in regular runes. It was found in a burial chamber from the early Stone Age that Scandinavians broke into in the 1100s on the Orkney Islands. 

“A typical bunch of male adolescents were fooling around and wrote tall tales about treasures and their own sexual prowess,” says Runologist Jonas Nordby [Credit: Bengt A. Lundberg/Riksantikvarieämbetet] 

“We have little reason to believe the runic codes were used to conceal sensitive information. People often wrote short, routine messages,” says Nordby. Coded declarations such as “Kiss me” demonstrate that the use of code was not limited to issues of political significance. Many of the messages in runic codes included a challenge to the reader to crack the code. The inscription “Interpret these runes” was common. “People challenged one another with codes. It was a kind of competition in the art of rune making. This testifies to a playfulness with writing that we don’t see today,” says Nordby. Nine of the 80 or so coded runic writings that Nordby has investigated are written in the jötunvillur code. The others are written in coded runes with the aid of the Caesar cipher, a system involving a shift to letters a few places away in the alphabet. This and another code have been understood by researchers for some time. 

The recipient of this small altar in ivory got a challenge written in runic code on the side of the altar: 'Pauline, my sister, interpret this'. Code is Cæsarchifferet, the system of the Roman emperor Caesar used to communicate with his generals [Credit: Jonas Nordby] 

Bragging about literacy and sex 

Being good at writing and breaking codes ensured a certain amount of status, and people bragged about their proficiencies. On the Orkney Islands, for instance, someone wrote in code:  “These runes were carved by the most rune-literate man west of the sea”. Runic codes drawn as figures also show that Vikings played with writing. A window of understanding Henrik Williams, a professor at Uppsala University’s Department of Scandinavian Languages and a Swedish expert on runes, says that Nordby’s discovery is important. 

Digit code is a system that divides the runic alphabet in three parts. 

Number of lines on the left side of the sign showing which part of the runic alphabet they should look for it in.  

The bars on the right tells the exact position within one of the three parts

 [Credit: Jonas Nordby] 

“Above all, it helps us understand that there were more codes than we were aware of. Each runic inscription we interpret raises our hopes of soon being able to read more. This is pure detective work and each new method improves our chances,” says Williams. He agrees that the codes could have been used as a tool for learning runes. But he is uncertain how big a role this would have played in the learning process. In any case, Williams thinks the codes were used for much more than communication. “They challenged the reader, demonstrated skills, and testify to a joy in reading and writing.” What can the codes say about society at the time they were used? “They tell us much about people’s playfulness and innovation. We come closer to the thoughts of people living at the time through understanding their codes. Nordby has made an important discovery by breaking the code,” says Williams. “But personally I think jötunvillur is an idiotic code, because whoever made it chose a system that is so hard to interpret. It’s irritating not being able to read it.” 

Author: Ida Kvittingen.

 | Source: Science Nordic [February 05, 2014]

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Saccheggiavano l'Ovest, compravano seta dalla Persia (e forse Cina)

Norwegian Vikings 

purchased silk from Persia

The Vikings did not only go West to pillage and plunder. Most of the silk found in the Oseberg ship may have been purchased by honest means from Persia.

Silk textiles from the Persian region were found in the Oseberg ship. Among the motifs, we can see parts of special birds associated with Persian mythology, combined with clover-leaf axes, a Zoroastrian symbol taken from the Zodiac. The textiles have been cut into thin strips and used for adornment on clothing. Similar strips have also been found in other Viking Age burial sites [Credit: KHM- UiO]

The Norwegian Vikings were more oriented towards the East than we have previously assumed, says Marianne Vedeler, Associate Professor at the Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo in Norway. After four years of in-depth investigation of the silk trade of the Viking Age, she may change our perceptions of the history of the Norwegian Vikings. The silk trade was far more comprehensive than we have hitherto assumed.

The Norwegian Vikings maintained trade connections with Persia and the Byzantine Empire. A network of traders from a variety of places and cultures brought the silk to the Nordic countries. Her details are presented in the book “Silk for the Vikings”, to be published by Oxbow publishers this winter, but in this article you can glimpse some of her key findings.

In the Oseberg ship, which was excavated nearly a hundred years ago, more than one hundred small silk fragments were found. This is the oldest find of Viking Age silk in Norway.

At the time when the Oseberg silk was discovered, nobody conceived that it could have been imported from Persia. It was generally believed that most of it had been looted from churches and monasteries in England and Ireland.
Lots of Viking silk

Since the Oseberg excavation, silk from the Viking Age has been found in several locations in the Nordic countries. The last finding was made two years ago at Ness in Hamaroy municipality, Nordland county. Other Norwegian findings of silk from the Viking Age include Gokstad in Vestfold county, Sandanger in the Sunnmore district and Nedre Haugen in Ostfold county.

The highest number of burial sites containing silk from the Viking Age have been found at Birka in the Uppland region, a few miles west of Stockholm.

– Even though Birka has the highest number of burial sites containing silk, there are no other places where so much and such varied silk has been found in a single burial site as in Oseberg, says Marianne Vedeler to the research magazine Apollon.

In Oseberg alone, silk from fifteen different textiles, as well as embroideries and tablet-woven silk and wool bands were discovered. Many of the silk pieces had been cut into thin strips and used for articles of clothing. The textiles had been imported, while the tablet-woven bands most likely were made locally from imported silk thread.

Marianne Vedeler has collected information on silk and its trade in the Nordic countries. She has also studied manuscripts on silk production and trade along the Russian rivers as well as in Byzantium and Persia.

– When seeing it all in its totality, it’s more logical to assume that most of the silk was purchased in the East, rather than being looted from the British Isles.
Waterways

Vedeler believes that in the Viking Age, silk was imported from two main areas. One was Byzantium, meaning in and around Constantinople, or Miklagard, which was the Vikings’ name for present-day Istanbul. The other large core area was Persia.

The silk may have been brought northwards along different routes.

– One possibility is from the South through Central Europe and onwards to Norway, but I believe that most of the silk came by way of the Russian rivers Dnepr and Volga.

The Dnepr was the main route to Constantinople, while the Volga leads to the Caspian Sea. The river trade routes were extremely dangerous and difficult. One of the sources describes the laborious journey along the Dnepr to Constantinople.

– A band of traders joined up in Kiev. Along the river they were attacked by dangerous tribesmen. They needed to pass through rapids and cataracts. Then, slaves had to carry their boat.
Persian patterns

On the basis of the silk that has been found, there are indications that more silk came to Norway from Persia than from Constantinople.

– Large amounts of the Oseberg silk have patterns from the Persian Empire. This silk is woven using a technique called samitum, a sophisticated Oriental weaving method. Many of the silk motifs can be linked to religious motifs from Central Asia.

Another pattern depicts a shahrokh, a bird that has a very specific meaning in Persian mythology; it represents a royal blessing. In the Persian myth, the shahrokh bird is the messenger that brings the blessing to a selected prince. In a dream, the bird visits the prince holding a tiara, a tall head adornment, in its beak. The prince then wakes up and knows that he is the chosen one. The image of the imperial bird was popular not only in silk weaving, but also in other art forms in Persia. The motif gained widespread popularity in Persian art.

– It’s an amusing paradox that silk textiles with such religious and mythological images were highly prized and used in heathen burial sites in the Nordic countries as well as in European churches.
Exclusive

In the Orient, silk was essential for symbolizing power and strength. There was an entire hierarchy of different silk qualities and patterns reserved for civil servants and royalty.

Even though silk was a prominent status symbol for the Vikings, they failed to get their hands on the best silk.

– Most likely, the bulk of the silk imported to Scandinavia was of medium or below-medium quality.

In Byzantium, major restrictions were imposed on the sale of silk to foreign lands. The punishment for illegal sale of silk was draconian. The Persian lands also imposed strict restrictions on the sale and production of silk.

In Byzantium, it was illegal to buy more silk than what could be bought for the price of a horse. A foreign trader was allowed to buy silk for ten numismata, while the price of a horse was twelve numismata.

– However, several trade agreements that have been preserved show that traders from the North nevertheless had special trade privileges in Byzantium.

Silk was not only a trade commodity. Certain types of silk were reserved for diplomatic gifts to foreign countries, as described in Byzantine as well as Persian sources. In Europe, silk became especially popular for wrapping sacred relics in churches.

– Some of the silk found in Norway may be gifts or spoils of war, but archaeological as well as written sources indicate that silk was traded in the Nordic countries.
– So the Vikings were more honest than has been assumed?

– We may safely assume that the Vikings engaged in trade, plunder, exchange of gifts and diplomatic relations in equal measure.

A possible example of loot found in the Oseberg ship is a piece of silk with an image of a cross.

– This was long before the introduction of Christianity. The silk piece may have been sewn locally, but it is also highly likely that it was purloined from an Irish church.
Possibly China

At Gokstad, thin strips of hammered gold wrapped around silk threads were among the findings.

– These threads are highly exclusive. We do not know their origin, but we suspect that they may have come from even further east, in the direction of China, says Vedeler, who will now travel to China to find out more.

As yet, Vedeler must draw conclusions regarding the origin of the silk by investigating weaving technologies and patterns. With time, she wishes to make use of a new method which is being developed at the University of Copenhagen and which will be able to reveal the geographic origin of artefacts.

Author: Yngve Vogt | Source: University of Oslo [November 01, 2013]

VERITa' e VICHINGHI al BRITISH MUSEUM

British Museum launches The BP Exhibition Vikings: life and legend

In March 2014 the British Museum will open the Sainsbury Exhibitions Gallery with a major exhibition on the Vikings, supported by BP. The exhibition has been developed with the National Museum of Denmark and the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (National Museums in Berlin) and focuses on the core period of the Viking Age from the late 8th century to the early 11th century. 

The extraordinary Viking expansion from the Scandinavian homelands during this era created a cultural network with contacts from the Caspian Sea to the North Atlantic, and from the Arctic Circle to the Mediterranean. The Vikings will be viewed in a global context that will highlight the multi-faceted influences arising from extensive cultural contacts. The exhibition will capitalise on new research and thousands of recent discoveries by both archaeologists and metal-detectorists, to set the developments of the Viking Age in context. These new finds have changed our understanding of the nature of Viking identity, trade, magic and belief and the role of the warrior in Viking society. Above all, it was the maritime character of Viking society and their extraordinary shipbuilding skills that were key to their achievements. At the centre of the exhibition will be the surviving timbers of a 37-metre-long Viking warship, the longest ever found and never seen before in the UK. Due to its scale and fragility it would not have been possible to display this ship at the British Museum without the new facilities of the Sainsbury Exhibitions Gallery.

Sword, late 8th–early 9th century. Kalundborg or Holbæk, Zealand, Denmark [Credit::  © The National Museum of Denmark]

The ship, known as Roskilde 6, was excavated from the banks of Roskilde fjord in Denmark during the course of work undertaken to develop the Roskilde Viking Ship Museum in 1997. Since the excavation, the timbers have been painstakingly conserved and analysed by the National Museum of Denmark. The surviving timbers – approximately 20% of the original ship - have now been re-assembled for display in a specially made stainless steel frame that reconstructs the full size and shape of the original ship. The construction of the ship has been dated to around AD 1025, the high point of the Viking Age when England, Denmark, Norway and possibly parts of Sweden were united under the rule of Cnut the Great. The size of the ship and the amount of resources required to build it suggest that it was almost certainly a royal warship, possibly connected with the wars fought by Cnut to assert his authority over this short-lived North Sea Empire.

Silver-inlaid axehead in the Mammen style, AD 900s. Bjerringhøj, Mammen, Jutland, Denmark. Iron, silver, brass. L 17.5 cm. [Credit: © The National Museum of Denmark]

Weapons and looted treasures demonstrate the central role of warfare to the identity of the Vikings. Recently excavated skeletons from a mass grave of executed Vikings near Weymouth in Dorset, will provide a close-up encounter with ‘real’ Vikings and illustrate what happened when things went wrong for Viking warriors on British soil.

1) Odin or völva figure (800-1050, Lejre, Zealand, Denmark). Silver with niello [Credit: © Roskilde Museum/Ole Malling]; 2) Brooch shaped like a ship (800-1050, Tjørnehøj II, Fyn, Denmark). Copper alloy [Credit: © The National Museum of Denmark]; 3) Penny of Anlaf Guthfrithsson of Northumbria (939–41, England). Silver [Credit: © The Trustees of the British Museum]; 4) The Vale of York hoard (AD 900s, North Yorkshire, England). Silver-gilt, gold, silver [Credit: © The Trustees of the British Museum]

The Vale of York Hoard will be shown in its entirety at the British Museum for the first time since it was discovered by metal detectorists near Harrogate in 2007 and jointly acquired by the British Museum and York Museums Trust. Consisting of 617 coins, 6 arm rings and a quantity of bullion and hack-silver the Vale of York Hoard is the largest and most important Viking hoard since the Cuerdale Hoard was found in Lancashire in 1840, part of which will also be included in the exhibition. With coins and silver from places as far removed as Ireland and Uzbekistan, the hoards reveal the true extent of the Viking global network. The silver cup in which the Vale of York Hoard was buried predates the burial by a century and was probably made for use in a Frankish church. It may well represent treasure stolen in a Viking raid. The Vale of York hoard includes objects coming from as far apart as Afghanistan in the East and Ireland in the West, as well as Russia, Scandinavia and continental Europe. Represented in the hoard are three belief systems (Islam, Christianity and the worship of Thor) and peoples who spoke at least seven languages.

Ostentatious jewellery of gold and silver will demonstrate how status was vividly displayed by Viking men and women. These include a stunning silver hoard from Gnezdovo in Russia, never previously seen in the UK, which will highlight the combination of Scandinavian, Slavic and Middle Eastern influences which contributed to the development of the early Russian state in the Viking Age.

Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum said “The reach and cultural connections of the Viking Age make it a remarkable story shared by many countries, not least here in the British Isles. New discoveries and research have led to a wealth of new information about the Vikings so it is a perfect moment to look again at this critical era. Temporary exhibitions of this nature are only possible thanks to external support so I am hugely grateful to BP for their longstanding and ongoing commitment to the British Museum.”

Source: British Museum [September 27, 2013]

Archeologia Sperimentale: nave vichinga

Replica Viking ship takes to the water

A group of history enthusiasts from across the north west have successfully rowed the biggest replica Viking ship in the world.

Replica Viking ship [Credit: ITV]

Despite many of them being novices, the group managed to get the 70-ton Dragon Harald Fairhair up to a respectable 3 knots on the fjords near Karmoy island in Western Norway.It's hoped the ship, which is named after the king who united the country more than 1,000 years ago, will retrace the route of the Vikings and visit Merseyside and the Isle of Man next year.

Trials are currently underway near the town of Haugesund where she was built. If they are successful, the vessel will embark on a major international voyage that could see her sail as far as New York.The ship was funded by a local businessman to learn more about ancient boat-building techniques and the Vikings themselves. It has been designed using a combination of archaeological evidence, details from folklore and local knowledge handed down over the generations.While it is mainly wind power that will get the Dragon between destinations, organisers need volunteers to row her in to and out of port.

A "navy" of more than 50 volunteers have been trained by the Liverpool Victoria Rowing Club in Wallasey. Some of them travelled to the annual Viking festival at Avaldsnes at the weekend to see the ship for the first time.

The idea is the brainchild of Prof Steve Harding, a Viking expert who was brought up in Wirral. The scientist was awarded with the 1st Class of the Royal Norwegian Order of Merit by the current king of Norway last year. This is the highest honour for a foreign national who is not a Head of State for "outstanding service" to the country.

Source: ITV [June 12, 2013]

Vichinghi in America

Scoperto un nuovo viaggio dei Vichinghi in Nord

America.

Some 1,000 years ago, the Vikings set off on a voyage to Notre Dame Bay in modern-day Newfoundland, Canada, new evidence suggests.

This jasper fire starter was found in 2008 only 33 feet (10 meters) away from a Norse hall at L’Anse aux Meadows, the only Norse settlement in the New World [Credit: Kevin Smith]

The journey would have taken the Vikings, also called the Norse, from L'Anse aux Meadows on the northern tip of the same island to a densely populated part of Newfoundland and may have led to the first contact between Europeans and the indigenous people of the New World.
"This area of Notre Dame Bay was as good a candidate as any for that first contact between the Old World and the New World, and that's kind of an exciting thing," said Kevin Smith, deputy director and chief curator of the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology at Brown University. 
Evidence of the voyage was discovered by a combination of archaeological excavation and chemical analysis of two jasper artifacts that the Norse used to light fires. The analysis, presented at the annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology in Honolulu, suggests the jasper used in the artifacts came from the area of Notre Dame Bay.
The jasper artifacts were found L'Anse aux Meadows and the Norse explorers likely set out from that outpost. They would've headed due south, traveling some 143 miles (230 kilometers) to Notre Dame Bay. When they reached their destination Norse would have set foot in an area of Newfoundland that modern-day researchers know was well inhabited.
"This area of Notre Dame Bay [is] archaeologically the area of densest settlement on Newfoundland, at that time, of indigenous people, the ancestors of the Beothuk," a people who, at the time, lived as hunter-gatherers, Smith told LiveScience.
Aside from likely encountering the ancestral Beothuk, the Norse would probably have been impressed by the landscape itself. The coastline had fjords, inlets and offshore islands, with lots of forests. Birds, sea mammals and fish also would have been plentiful.
"For anyone coming from the nearly treeless islands of the North Atlantic, this would have potentially been a very interesting zone," Smith said. "There are a lot of trees; there's a lot of opportunities for cutting things down; it's a bit warmer; it's an interesting mix of resources," Smith said.
For any Norse voyagers who had been to Norway, it would have been familiar. It still would have made an impression though, since the lands the Norse had occupied in their journey across the North Atlantic tended to be more barren.
Researchers don't know the specifics about the contact between the Norse and the ancestral Beothuk on this voyage, presuming it actually happened. It could have been a peaceful encounter, although the Norse sagas also tell of hostile meetings with people in the New World. Also, while the possible meeting likely would have been one of the earliest Old World-New World encounters, researchers don't know if it was the very first. 
Norse matches
The two jasper artifacts were key pieces of evidence that helped the researchers unravel the existence of the voyage.
The larger, and more recently excavated of the two, was found in 2008, only 33 feet (10 meters) away from an ancient Norse hall. The discovery was made by Priscilla Renouf, a professor at Memorial University in Newfoundland, and Todd Kristensen, who is now a graduate student at the University of Alberta.
"You can think of these almost as the matches of the Vikings," Smith said. The Norse would have struck them against a steel fire starter to make sparks to start a fire, he explained. As time passed, and after being struck against steel repeatedly, the jasper fire starters wore down and were thrown out.
The chemical composition of jasper varies depending on where it was obtained. To figure out where the larger jasper fire starter came from, Smith, Thomas Urban of Oxford University, and Susan Herringer of Brown University's Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World looked for the outcrops in the New (or Old) World chemically matched it. They compared the fire starter with geological samples using a handheld X-ray florescence device that can detect the chemical signature of jasper.
The results suggested the jasper originated from the area of Notre Dame Bay, somewhere along a 44-mile-long (71 km) stretch of the coast. The closest chemical match was to a geological sample from modern-day Fortune Harbor.
The second, smaller jasper piece was unearthed in the 1960s in excavations carried out by Helge and Anne Stine Ingstad, who discovered L'Anse aux Meadows. Different tests run on this piece suggested in 1999 that it also came from the Notre Dame Bay area. At the time Smith couldn’t prove it was used as a fire starter, but now believes it likely is.
Exploring the New World
Ever since the discovery of L'Anse aux Meadows nearly 50 years ago, archaeologists and historians have been trying to uncover the story of Norse exploration in the New World.
Previous research has revealed the presence of butternut seeds at L'Anse aux Meadows, indicating the Norse made a trip to the Gulf of St. Lawrence or possibly even a bit beyond. Additionally, Norse artifacts (and possibly a structure) have been discovered in the Canadian Arctic, indicating a trading relationship with the indigenous people there that might have lasted for centuries.
However, the Norse exploration outpost at L'Anse aux Meadows was in operation for no more than 10 to 25 years, archaeological evidence suggests. In fact, according to medieval Norse stories, the outpost may have been in use for just two to three years, and perhaps only seasonally, before being abandoned.
The new research, Smith said, has demonstrated there is still much to learn about Norse exploration in the New World.
"It's provocative," he said. "It's interesting to think about where this goes."

Author: Owen Jarus | Source: LiveScience [June 05, 2013]