June 14, 1858.] 
ADDITIONAL NOTICES, 
373 
brought with them from their Scandinavian mother-lands. Iceland was there- 
fore the cradle of an historical literature of immense value. 
The situation of the island and the relationship of the colony to foreign 
countries in its earlier period, compelled its inhabitants to exercise and deve- 
lope their hereditary maritime skill and thirst for new discoveries across the 
great ocean. As early as the year 877 Gunnbiorn saw for the first time the 
mountainous coast of Greenland. But this land was first visited by Erik 
the Bed, in 983, who three years afterwards, in 986, by means of Icelandic 
emigrants, established the first colony on its south-western shore, where after- 
wards, in 1124, the bishop’s see of Gardar was founded, which subsisted for 
upwards of 300 years. The head firths, or bays, were named after the chiefs 
of the expedition. Erik the Red settled in Eriks-firth, Einar, Rafn, and Ketil 
in the firths called after them, and Heriulf on Heriulfsnes. On a voyage from 
Iceland to Greenland this same year (986), Biarne, the son of the latter, was 
driven far out to sea towards the south-west, and for the first time beheld the 
coasts of the American lands, afterwards visited and named by his country- 
men. In order to examine these countries more narrowly, Leif the Fortunate, 
son of Erik the Red, undertook a voyage of discovery thither in the year 
1000. He landed on the shores described by Biarne, detailed the character of 
these lands more exactly, and gave them names according to their appearance : 
Helluland (Newfoundland) was so called from its flat stones, Markland (Nova 
Scotia) from its woods, and Yineland (New England) from its vines. Here 
he remained for some time, and constructed large houses, called after him 
Leifsbudir (Leif ’s Booths) . A German named Tyrker, who accompanied Leif 
on this voyage, was the man who found the wild vines, which he recognised 
from having seen them in his own land, and Leif gave the country its name 
from this circumstance. Two years afterwards Leif’s brother, Thorwald, 
repaired thither, and in 1003 caused an expedition to be undertaken to the 
south, along the shore, but he was killed in the summer of 1004 on a voyage 
northwards, in a skirmish with the natives. 
The most distinguished, however, of all the first American discoverers is 
Thorfinn Karlsefne, an Icelander, whose genealogy is carried back in the 
Old-Northern annals to Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Scottish, and Irish ances- 
tors, some of them of royal blood. In 1006 this chief, on a merchant-voyage, 
visited Greenland and there married Gudrid, the widow of Thorstein (son of 
Erik the Red), who had died the year before in an unsuccessful expedition to 
Yineland. Accompanied by his wife, who encouraged him to this voyage, and 
by a crew of 160 men on board three vessels, he repaired in the spring of 
1007 to Yineland, where he remained for three years, and had many com- 
munications with the aborigines. Here his wife Gudrid bore him a son, 
Snorre, who became the founder of an illustrious family in Iceland, which 
gave that island several of its first bishops. His daughter’s son was the 
celebrated Bishop Thorlak Runolfson, who published the first Christian code 
of Iceland. In 1121 Bishop Erik sailed to Yineland from Greenland, doubt- 
less for the purpose of strengthening his countrymen in the Christian faith. 
The notices given by the old Icelandic voyage-chroniclers respecting the 
climate, the soil, and the productions of this new country are very character- 
istic. Nay, we have even a statement of this kind as old as the eleventh cen- 
tury from a writer, not a Northman, Adam of Bremen. He states, on the 
authority of Svein Estridson, the King of Denmark, a nephew of Canute the 
Great, that the country got its name from the vine growing wild there. It is 
a remarkable coincidence in this respect that its English re-discoverers, for the 
same reason, name the large island which is close off the coast Martha’s 
Yineyard. Spontaneously growing, wheat (maize or Indian corn) was also 
found in this country. 
The total result of the nautical, geographical, and astronomical evidences in 
