UNSOLVED PROBLEMS IN ARCTIC PLANT 

 GEOGRAPHY 



John W. Harshberger 



As a phytogeographer, I have been asked the question, What 

 are the unsolved problems of Arctic plant geography which the 

 botanist, ecologist, and phytogeographer who contemplates joining an 

 Arctic expedition might attempt to solve? 



Botanical Evidence Bearing on the Viking Landfalls 



First, we may consider the problem of the Viking landfalls in 

 America. The botanical evidence has been presented admirably by 

 M. L. Fernald,^ who, in a study of the distribution of those plants 

 that have been most depended upon to locate Wineland the Good, 

 viz. "vinber," "hveit," and "mosurr" wood, instead of being (i) 

 the grape, (2) maize or wild rice, and (3) the maple (some of which 

 species, by their known distribution, exclude from consideration all 

 coastal regions north of the Maritime Provinces of Canada) has 

 determined that they are in reality respectively (i) the mountain 

 cranberry {Vaccinium Vitis-Idaea) or possibly one of the native 

 currants, (2) the strand wheat (Elymus arenarius), and (3) the canoe 

 birch {Betiila papyrifera) . This conclusion removes the discrepancies 

 which have been considered to be insurmountable in locating Wine- 

 land the Good by the aid of the plants mentioned in the sagas. 



There is another line of approach which ought to be considered 

 by botanists, the time for which is now ripe, and that is to study the 

 botanical aspects of the archeological investigations of the ruins, 

 known to their ancestors, which the Eskimos attribute to white men. 

 The remarkable discoveries of costumes in Viking cofhns at Herjolfs- 

 nes,^ at the southern extremity of Greenland, with wooden crosses 

 laid on the breasts of the dead, together with the ruins of buildings 

 near which are found the seeds and fruits of plants used by the early 

 followers of Eric the Red, suggest that similar objects may be found 

 among the ruins of the American coast nearest to the early settlements 

 in Greenland. We know that cereals and fruits were carried about 

 in ships of the Viking age from the plant remains found in the Oseberg 



1 M. L. Fernald: Notes on the Plants of Wineland the Good, Rhodora, Vol. 12, 1910, pp. 17-38. 



2 Poul Norlund: Buried Norsemen at Herjolfsnes: An Archaeological and Historical Study, 

 Meddelelser om Gr0nland, Vol. 67, 1924, pp. 1-270; idem: The First Scandinavian Settlers in Green- 

 land, Amer. Scand. Rev., Vol. 11, 1923, pp. 547-553. See also William Hovgaard: The Norsemen 

 in Greenland: Recent Discoveries at Herjolfsnes, Geogr. Rev., Vol. 15, 1925, pp. 605-616. 



