IN NORTHERN MISTS 



Alfred and in Adam of Bremen, and show how much ignorance 

 could still prevail in learned quarters on many points connected 

 with these regions. The " Geographia " speaks of " Gothia," 

 or lower Scythia, as a province of Europe, but obviously 

 confuses Sweden (the land of the Gotar) and Eastern Germania 

 (the land of the Goths). Norway ("Norwegia") was very 

 large, far in the north, almost surrounded by the ocean; it 

 bordered on the land of the Goths (Gotar), and was separated 

 from Gothia (Sweden) on the south and east by the river Albia 

 (the Gota river). The inhabitants live by fishing and hunting 

 more than by bread; crops are few on account of the severity 

 of the cold. There are many wild beasts, such as white 

 bears, etc. There are springs that turn hides, wood, etc., into 

 stone; there is midnight sun and corresponding winter dark- 

 ness. Corn, wine, and oil are wanting, unless imported. The 

 inhabitants are tall, powerful, and handsome, and are great 

 pirates. " Dacia " ^ was divided into many islands and 

 provinces bordering on Germania. Its inhabitants were de- 

 scended from the Goths (Gotar (?) cf. Jordanes, Vol. I, p. 135), 

 were numerous and finely grown, wild and warlike, etc. 

 " Svecia " (the land of the Svear) is also mentioned. That 

 part of it which lay between the kingdoms of the Danes and of 

 the Norwegians was called Gothia. Svecia had the Baltic Sea 

 on the east and the British Ocean on the west, the mountains 

 and people of Norway on the north, and the Danes on the 

 south. They had rich pastures, metals, and silver mines. The 

 people were very strong and warlike, they once ruled over the 

 greater part of Asia and Europe. 



" ' Winlandia ' is a country along the mountains of Norway on the east, ex- 

 tending on the shore of the ocean; it is not very fertile except in grass and 

 forest; the people are barbarously savage and ugly, and practise magical arts, 

 therefore they offer for sale and sell wind to those who sail along their coasts, 

 or who are becalmed among them. They make balls of thread and tie various 



1 The name of " Dacia " for Denmark, which frequently occurs on maps of 

 the Middle Ages, arose through a confusion of the name of the Roman prov- 

 ince of the Danube with " Dania." 

 190 



