The Flora of Greenland and its Origin. > 15 



extremity of Greenland to abt. 61°30' N. Lat. on the West 

 Coast, especially the inner fjord-districls. The northern 

 colony (Vestri byggd) was mainly at Ameralik and Godthaab 

 Fjord, abt. 64°— 64°50' N. Lat. (see fig. 1). Between these 

 two, practically no ruins have been found, This colonisation 

 was undoubtedly of great importance to the composition 

 of the flora in these parts of Greenland, and it will, there- 

 fore, be interesting to endeavour to ascertain which species 

 of the present flora of Greenland may be assumed to have 

 been introduced througli the medium of these ancient 

 colonists. 



The old sagas are remarkably deficient in details as to 

 what the ancient sailors (vikings) took with them on their 

 ships as food for man and beast. We do know, how^ever, 

 that the voyagers had live cattle and sheep on board ; but 

 as Fridtjof Nansen in his book "Nord i Tåkeheimen" 

 (1911) rightly says, we known very little as to how they 

 provisioned themselves for their long voyages. They had 

 probably corn (flour), salt meat, and the live cattle and 

 sheep to furnish milk and meat. These animals would 

 naturally have to be fed themselves with hay, whence we 

 may conclude that the ships would carry considerable 

 quantities of this. When the ships arrived at their desti- 

 nation, they would probably be taken ashore for the 

 winter and cleaned, and the refuse of the hay fodder might 

 then find its way to land. This again involves the possi- 

 bility of seeds being carried to some place where they 

 miglit germinate and grow. Moreover, this liay refuse must 

 be regarded as consisting of very mixed material, since 

 fieids were not then sown with one or a few species of 

 grass for hay, — in Iceland, and some parts of Norway, it 

 is liardly done even to this day. And it was these two 



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