Leif Ericsson
We have no accurate dates for the birth and death of Leif "the Lucky" Ericsson (also spelled Ericson or Erikson; in Norwegian, Leiv Eriksson den Hepne; in Old Norse, Leifr Eriksson), but we do know that around the year 1000 C.E. he made a historic journey to North America.
The second son of Erik the Red, as a young man Leif Ericsson visited Norway, where he converted to Christianity. He was charged with returning to Greenland and converting others there, but instead he sailed further west and is believed to have landed somewhere in Nova Scotia. It was once thought that he accidentally sailed off course, but Leif was more likely deliberately seeking the land that Bjarni Herjulfsson had spotted some years earlier. He spent a year in North America before returning home to Greenland, where he served as governor and preached Christianity.
Leif is often referred to as a Viking, but it's interesting to note that he lived at a time when the Viking Age was drawing to a close, and he was a devout Christian rather than a follower of the Norse pagan gods. However, he certainly displayed the Viking spirit of adventure and exploration.
The adventures of Leif Ericsson in America are chronicled in 13th- and 14th-century Icelandic sagas, including the Groenlendinga saga (the Greenlanders' Saga) and Eiriks saga (Erik's Saga). For years scholars viewed the sagas, which are marvelous literary works, as less than historically accurate, and they dismissed the idea that Leif had actually landed near the American continent. The discovery in 1960 of evidence supporting a Scandinavian settlement in L'Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland, altered this view and sparked new interest in the possibility of Vikings in America.
While Leif's expedition is undoubtedly interesting and important as the first known encounter between Europeans and the Americas, nothing further came of this contact. The western continents remained closed to European exploration, expansion and exploitation until the voyages of Columbus nearly 500 years later.
Important Dates
Leif Ericsson Day: Oct. 9 (declared by President Johnson in 1964)
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Related Resources
Exploration, Expansion & Discovery
Resources for the study of early European explorations, Viking expansion, trade between East and West, and the Age of Discovery that is sometimes considered the end of the medieval era.Vikings and Scandinavian History
Runes, runestones, sagas, and general websites covering Scandinavian history and the Vikings.
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