CHAPTER XII 



EXPEDITIONS OF THE NORWEGIANS TO THE 



WHITE SEA, VOYAGES IN THE POLAR 



SEA, WHALING AND SEALING 



EXPEDITIONS TO THE WHITE SEA 



EVEN if Ottar was perhaps not the first Norwegian to 

 reach the White Sea, his voyage is, in any case, a 

 remarkable exploring expedition, whereby both the North 

 Cape and the White Sea became known, even in the literature 

 of Europe, nearly seven hundred years before Richard 

 Chancellor reached the Dvina in the ship " Edward Buona- 

 ventura " in 1553, from which time the discovery of this 

 sea has usually been reckoned. 



In Ottar's time, or soon after, the Norwegian king asserted 

 his sovereignty over all the Lapps as far as the White Sea, 

 and in the " Historia Norvegiae " it is said that Halogaland 

 reached to Bjarmeland. The headland Vegistafr is men- 

 tioned in the " Historia Norvegiae," in the laws, and elsewhere, 

 as the boundary of the kingdom of Norway towards the 

 Bjarmas (Beormas). This may have been on the south side 

 of the Kola peninsula by the river Varzuga, already mentioned, 



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