•28o A. D. 1000 or looi. 



find that a bifhop went from Greenland in the year 1 1 2 1 to convert the 

 colonifts of Winland to the Chriftian religion. After that time there 

 is no further certain account of the colony, and the connexion between 

 •Iceland and Winland feems to have been entirely dropt *. But if there 

 is, as has been alTerted, a tribe of people in the interior part of New- 

 foundland who differ in perfon and manners from the Efkimaux of the 

 north end of the ifland, they may not improbably be fuppofed the re- 

 mains of the Icelandic colony -)-. 



Winland was evidently fome part of the continent at the mouth of 

 the River St. Laurence, or Newfoundland, more probably the later ; and 

 the vagrant natives, called by the Icelanders Skrelingur, were apparent- 

 ly the Eflvimaux. 



The accidental difcoverer of this weflern land was Biorn, the fon of 

 Heriolf ; and Lief, the fon of Erik Raud, fitted out the firft veflel whicli 

 failed purpofely for it. Snorro, the fon of Torfin, was the firft perfon 

 of European parentage born on the weft fide of the Atlantic ocean ; and 

 from him defcended a family, which long flourifhed, and probably fl;ill 

 flourifhes, in Iceland. 



As the difcovery of Ar.iERicA by the Icelanders, though an event ex- 

 tremely curious and interefling in the hiftory of mankind, is not fo ge- 

 nerally known as it ought to be (even fome of thofe who have profefl- 

 edly written upon the difcovery of that continent being ignorant of it), 

 it is proper to obferve, that it is moft unqueftionably authenticated by 

 the teflimony of contemporary authors, and others who lived foon after ; 

 all of them long before the generally-fuppofed firft difcovery by Colon, 

 or Columbus J. Therefor, without detrad:ing in the fmalleft degree 

 from the merit of that illuftrious navigator, who fet out upon fcientific 

 principles, and with fome previous afllirances colleded from the acci- 

 dental difcoveries of preceding navigators, to fearch for a weftern route 



• According to Doftor Foifter's expofition of as. IC98: he flourifhed about i\\o.~-SnorroSiur- 



the geography of Zeno's royage, Winland vvas af- lefrm, ti'tfl. Ohifi Trygv. cc. 105-11 1 : he was the 



terwards called Ellotlland, and it was in a flourifli- earlicfl gtneial liKlorian of the North, and was rc- 



ing condition in the fourteenth century. See For- pcatedly cliitf magiftrate of Iceland, A. D. 1215- 



Jier's Difcoveries in the North, pp. 188, 203, Engl. 1232. — The Flaleyan vianufcript in the ting of Den- 



tranjl. and below under the year 1360. mark's library, which was finiflud in 1394. — 1 fay 



+ Whether thofe people are of Norwegian or!- nothing of Arngrim Jonas, Torfacus, and other 



gin or not, may be very eafily afcertaincd by their northern writers, who have flourifhed after the age 



lant^uage, which to a proper judge muft appear, of Columbus. 



through all the tluffuations of eight centuries, to Forller in his Uijlory of Voyages, tf}c. in the 



be radically Norwegian, if tliey are the remains of North, and Mallet in his Introdudion to the hifiory 



a Norwegian colony, though they may have loft of Denmark, have given accounts at fome length 



;ill traditional knowlegc of their ancellors, if any of the difcovery and colonization of Winland : yet 



perfon in Newfoundland, properly qualified, would though Englifh tranflations of both thefe works 



take the trouble to make the inquiry. Such an have been publinicd, it is furpriling how many 



inquiry I have myfelf fet on foot, but hitherto people there are, even among thofe of general 



without fucccfs. reading, who believe that no European CTer fet a 



X Ailiwi Bremen/is defitu Danid, p. 36, ed. 1629 : foot in America before Columbus, 

 h* died in 1076. — Orderici Vitalis Hiji. tctUf. ad 



