30 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 10/ 



in Greenland when it was first settled but living Eskimo were not 

 encountered until about 200 years later, and the other inhabitants 

 of America were first revealed by this expedition. 



Rupture of relations between the colonists and natives as the result 

 of the slaughter of a Skrelling is more likely than that the bellowing 

 of a bull should have caused it, though one writer has suggested that 

 bovine animosity to the color red might have brought it about, since 

 the Skrellings used the cloth they purchased largely to tie around their 

 heads. On the other hand, since chroniclers normally prefer to record 

 victories rather than defeats, the initial rout of the Norse in the 

 final battle may perhaps indicate that the account of it in the Saga 

 is more accurate, except for the direction from which the enemy 

 approached. 



The time of year when these events took place seems to be given 

 more correctly in the Saga, judging by what we know of Indian cus- 

 toms. It places the first appearance of the Skrellings in the latter part 

 of the summer in which the Norse came to Wineland or in the fall 

 succeeding. They reappeared "when spring opened," and the attack 

 was 3 weeks later. The Flat Island Book agrees that the aborigines 

 put in their first appearance in summer, but this was "the summer 

 succeeding the first winter" the white men spent in that country. 

 Their second visit was made, however, shortly afterward "in the 

 early part of the second winter," and the fight took place only a little 

 later. If the third tradition is correct and Karlsefni and Snorri were 

 in Wineland only 2 months, all this has to be enormously compressed. 

 Finally it should be said that the differences in these narratives are 

 the strongest points in their favor. They are factual but show no 

 evidence of copying. 



The Saga continues : 



It now seemed clear to Karlsefni and his people that, although the country 

 thereabouts was attractive, their life would be one of constant dread and turmoil 

 by reason of the [hostility of the] inhabitants of the country, so they forthwith 

 prepared to leave, and determined to return to tlieir own country. They sailed 

 to the northward off the coast, and found five Skrellings, clad in skin-doublets, 

 lying asleep near the sea. There were vessels beside them, containing animal 

 marrow, mixed with blood. Karlsefni and his company concluded that they must 

 have been banished from their own land. They put them to death. 



Students do not seem to have discovered that a duplicate but much 

 distorted account of this adventure has been inserted farther on in 

 the Saga. It reads as follows : 



When they sailed away from Wineland, they had a southerly wind, and so 

 came upon Markland, where they found five Skrellings, of whom one was 



