1910] Fernald,— Plants of Wineland the Good 25 
"they prepare from them also by fermentation an esteemed spirit, 
known under the name of Steinbeeren-Wasser.” ! 
From the facts here stated it is apparent, that there is no ground for 
supposing that the “vinber” of the early Norsemen was the true Grape; 
but that the name “vinber” long has been and still is the colloquial 
name for the Currant in both Norway and Sweden, and its equivalent, 
* Wine-berry," is still used for Currants in northern England and 
Scotland. Furthermore, the name **Wine-berry " was still in use at the 
last of the 16th and the first of the 17th centuries for the Mountain 
Cranberry (Vaccinium V itis-Idaea), though the name in that sense 
soon disappeared from botanical writings. Currants and Rock or 
Mountain Cranberries were both confused by the most learned early 
botanical writers of northern Europe with the true Grape (Vitis) of 
southern Europe, and were generally supposed to be varieties or 
species of the Grape, because from both Currants and Mountain 
Cranberries the Norse as well as many other northern peoples made 
wine. Without question, then, the “vínber” of the early Norse was 
either the Red or Black Currant or the Mountain Cranberry; but 
before entering further upon that problem or discussing the fruits, on 
the Atlantic coast of North America, which the early Norsemen would 
have identified with their own familiar “vínber” and which they gath- 
ered to take back to Greenland, we may well attempt to determine 
some of the other plants mentioned by them, and especially to find 
what in Norway and Iceland they knew as “hveiti” (wheat) and as 
"mosurr" wood. 
The *self-sown wheat" was long interpreted as Indian Corn, but 
in recent years the theory advanced by Schiibeler ? has been generally 
adopted, that the Wheat (“hveiti”) seen by the Norsemen in Vínland 
was the American Wild Rice (Zizania). Following this interpretation 
Reeves remarks: “there can be little doubt that this ' self-sown wheat’ 
was wild rice. The habit of this plant, its growth in low ground as 
here described, and the head, which has a certain resemblance to that 
of cultivated small grain, especially oats, seem clearly to confirm this 
potus gratus acidus, leviter inebrians producitur.— Georgi, Reisen, t. i. p. 208. 
Monticolae nostrates auf dem Kaltenbrunn ex baccis contusis fermentatis spiritum 
gratum fortem limpidissimum destillant, quem sub nomine Steinbeeren-Geist, Steinbeeren - 
Wasser vendunt." — Gmelin, Flora Badensis, ii. 151 (1806). 
1 “Dans le Schwarzwald...on en prépare aussi par fermentation une eau-de-vie 
estimée, connue sous le nom de Steinbeeren-Wasser.” ` 
Kirschleger, Flore d’Alsace i. 388 (1852). 
2 Schübeler in Forhandlinger i Videnskabsselskabet i Christiania 1858, 21-30 (1859). 
