16 Journal of the North Atlantic Volume 1
The Nature of Contact between Native Greenlanders and Norse
Hans Christian Gulløv*
Abstract - Recent archaeology has introduced a new people into the scenario of 13th-century Greenland – the Dorset people
of the Paleo-Eskimo tradition. These people were encountered by Norse hunters who travelled northwards on their hunting
forays, as described in Historia Norvegiae, which recounts contact with the so-called Skrælíngja. The question of who these
Skrælíngja were has been discussed since the discovery of the source in the late 19th century. It has been proposed that they
were the Inuit of the Thule culture. We now know that three different cultures—Paleo-Eskimo, Inuit, and Europeans—impacted
on the development of Greenland’s history in the fi rst half of the second millennium AD. This paper addresses issues
of interactions between them.
*The Greenland Research Centre, National Museum of Denmark, Frederiksholms Kanal 12, DK-1220 Copenhagen K,
Denmark; hans.christian.gulloev@natmus.dk.
Norse Objects Farthest North
“I found, however, also objects which in the
beginning puzzled me, things which did not seem
to fi t into the context. They didn’t look like Eskimo
tools … But one day I found the clue to the mystery:
among all the blubber, a peculiar and ingeniously
made comb appeared; one that I recognized. There
was no doubt; it dated back to the old Norse. Norse
objects and Eskimo artistic masterpieces of carvings
as far north as humans have ever lived. What more
can an archaeologist ask for? And just imagine if we
had not found Avôrtúngiaq’s little lost island! The
mere thought of it made a cold shiver run down my
back. But the problem was by no means solved with
this surprising discovery, for how on earth did the
objects get here? Was I facing the dramatic event,
that the Norse themselves had travelled all the way
up to the Thule district, perhaps for bear hunting?
It was a captivating thought and not quite without
probability; but to substantiate it I should also like to
fi nd the ship that had brought them here. An archaeologist
had better keep both feet on the ground, and
there was also the more trite possibility that the Eskimos
themselves had brought or bought the exotic
objects from more southern regions in Greenland.
For the time being I took this to be the most probable
explanation, even if it required some effort; but
my work in this remote and desolate corner of the
world had nevertheless found a wider perspective”
(Holtved 1942:170–171; H.C. Gulløv translation).
It took the eskimologist Erik Holtved by surprise
when, in 1936, he excavated six ruins on Ruin Island
off the coast of Inglefi eld Land, and found Norse objects
more than 2000 kilometres north of the Western
Settlement of Greenland. The investigations on the
small island, which Avôrtúngiaq had found in 1917
as a member of Knud Rasmussen’s Second Thule
Expedition and had mentioned to Holtved, added a
new chapter to the prehistory of Greenland. Around
1300 AD, the island had been settled by Eskimo
whalers, and among the hunting equipment found
there were objects similar to types from the Punuk
culture—a Neo-Eskimo culture existing around the
Bering Strait in the period 500 to 1500 AD. From
here, the culture’s elements spread eastwards with
the new settlers to the Smith Sound region, where it
is now known as the Ruin Island phase of the Thule
culture (Holtved 1944, II:149–156).
Holtved’s discovery raised the question of
whether the Norse had been this far north. He himself
believed the possibility, but without any traces
of ships, he had to conclude that the Norse objects
(Fig. 1) had been brought to the Thule district from
southerly regions by the Eskimos themselves. Holtved
continued his investigations in the subsequent decade,
and his new fi ndings of remains from the Ruin Island
phase increased their geographical distribution to
cover the whole district. However the extensive material
recovered provided no further evidence to renew
discussions of the Norse presence (Holtved 1954).
Three decades later, Canadian archaeologists
again raised the question. This renewed interest occurred
in connection with major fi eld campaigns on
Figure 1. Comb, spoon case, draughtsman, and chessman.
Norse objects from the Thule District. Length of spoon
case = 26.5 cm.
2008 Journal of the North Atlantic 1:16–24
2008 H.C. Gulløv 17
the west coast of Smith Sound, where several house
ruins of the Ruin Island type were excavated and
dated to the 13th and 14th centuries. Several Norse
objects were found in these sites, and the remains on
Holtved’s isolated Ruin Island off the northern coast
of the Thule district could now be connected with the
settlements on Ellesmere Island (McCullough 1989).
The recovery of iron rivets, interpreted as ship rivets,
led the Canadian archaeologists to advance the
theory that one or more ships had been icebound in
High Arctic waters and had supplied local natives
with metal and other exotic objects. Among fi nds
of Norse origin were fragments of woolen cloth, of
which similar pieces were also found on Ruin Island,
which could be the remains of sails.
Holtved’s Ruin Island phase now comprises an
archaeological assemblage that represents an early
period of the Thule culture in High Arctic Canada
and Greenland. Canadian archaeologists name the
humans of the period The Ruin Islanders, assuming
they represent early Thule culture pioneers.
It is these newcomers that both Holtved and later
researchers consider when focusing on possible
contact between Norse and Native Greenlanders.
However, it is striking that many objects from the
Ruin Island phase exist in an almost unchanged
form from their distant prototypes around the Bering
Strait; further, lamps and pots made of clay,
a material that in the Eastern Arctic is unsuitable
for pottery, were transported all the way eastward
unbroken. These circumstances suggest that the
journey from Alaska through the Canadian archipelago
took place during a short period, and that
rumors of the availability of metals in the eastern
Arctic provided the motive for the initial eastward
movement of the so-called ancestral Inuit pioneers
(Gulløv and McGhee 2006:56).
New Agents
Thus arose the theory of a third agent who
could have prepared the way for the Neo-Eskimo
pioneers, and researchers now turned their attention
to the Paleo-Eskimo population in the Central
and Eastern Arctic (Gulløv and McGhee 2006;
McGhee 2000; Park 2008; Sutherland 2000, 2005).
These people belonged to the so-called Dorset
culture, the latest among the long line of Paleo-
Eskimo cultures well known from the Smith Sound
region, where dwellings from the terminal phase
of the Dorset culture have been excavated. On the
Greenland side of the sound, investigations carried
out in the 1990s showed that a winter site, dating
to the latest phase of the culture, consisted of five
to six dwellings with a quadratic ground plan. The
site also included a nearby rectangular megalithic
structure with walls constructed of boulders, and
with a row of hearths through its mid-axis, which
is interpreted as a building constructed for shamanistic
purposes. Today, three such megalithic structures
have been identified in Greenland, where
they seem to have been used up to 1200 AD, while
some of the dwellings were still inhabited around
1300 AD (Appelt and Gulløv 1999).
Table 1. Radiocarbon dates associated with Late Dorset and Early Thule components from 11 sites in the Smith Sound region, including
Melville Bay and Washington Land, calibrated using OxCal v3.4 (Ramsey 2001, Stuiver et al. 1998) and shown with 1 st. dev. (cf. Gulløv
and McGhee 2006:57).
C14 age 1 σ range,
Lab. No. Locality Component and culture Material years BP years AD
AAR-7466 Washington Land, Torvegade Fjord Structure 2, Late Dorset, 1st episode Muskox bone 820 ± 40 1225–1280
AAR-7467 Washington Land, Torvegade Fjord Structure 2, Late Dorset, 2nd episode Muskox bone 654 ± 36 1295–1390
K-4256 Washington Land, Cape Buddington Dwelling, Late Dorset Arctic hare bone 690 ± 65 1270–1400
AAR-3219 Inglefi eld Land, Qeqertaaraq Structure 4, House, Late Dorset Arctic hare bone 770 ± 40 1220–1285
KIA-17726 Inglefi eld Land, Qeqertaaraq Structure 4, House, Late Dorset; Antler 891 ± 29 1040–1220
Arrowhead, Early Thule
K-6708 Inglefi eld Land, Qeqertaaraq Structure 161, House, Late Dorset Charcoal, Salix sp. 711 ± 43 1260–1390
KIA-16942 Inglefi eld Land, Cape Kent House 4, Early Thule Muskox horn 892 ± 36 1040–1210
K-4469 Inglefi eld Land, Cape Kent House 2, Early Thule Antler 640 ± 50 1295–1395
K-1489 Inglefi eld Land, Ruin Island House 6, Ruin Island phase; Cloth, Woollen cloth 680 ± 100 1260–1410
Norse culture
AAR-3233 Inglefi eld Land, Qeqertaaraq Structure 294, House, Early Thule Caribou bone 640 ± 50 1295–1395
AAR-7370 Inglefi eld Land, Inuarfi ssuaq House 8, Post Ruin Island Antler 431 ± 38 1430–1485
KIA-16936 Steensby Land, Nuulliit House 29, Ruin Island phase Muskox horn 884 ± 25 1060–1090
KIA-16941 Steensby Land, Nuulliit House 29, Ruin Island phase Muskox horn 724 ± 20 1277–1293
KIA-16938 Melville Bay, Cape Seddon House 11, Ruin Island phase Antler 558 ± 38 1320–1425
GSC-3003 Ellesmere Island, Skraeling Island House 22, Ruin Island phase Heather 830 ± 50 1160–1410
GSC-3156 Ellesmere Island, Skraeling Island House 21, Ruin Island phase Heather 660 ± 60 1280–1400
GSC-3059 Ellesmere Island, Skraeling Island House 15, Ruin Island phase Heather 580 ± 50 1300–1410
GSC-3038 Ellesmere Island, Skraeling Island House 15, Ruin Island phase; Cloth, Woolen cloth 700 ± 50 1260–1400
Norse culture
GSC-3396 Ellesmere Island, Eskimo Site House 25, Ruin Island phase Heather 760 ± 70 1190–1300
GSC-3561 Ellesmere Island, Sverdrup Site House 6, Ruin Island phase Heather 620 ± 50 1300–1400
18 Journal of the North Atlantic Volume 1
Among the abundant artifact materials, including
delicate and diminutive Dorset carvings in walrus
ivory, were considerable amounts of meteoric iron
derived from the source near Cape York, approximately
400 kilometres further south. Finally, a fragment
of a brass pot of Norse origin was found, of a
type produced in Northern Europe before 1300 AD.
Thule culture objects were also found, including an
antler arrowhead found in one of the excavated ruins
and dated to the 12th century (Table 1).
From the archaeological
material described, three
ethnic groups have now been
identified in the High Arctic
Smith Sound region: the Neo-
Eskimo Thule culture that
appeared in the second half of
the 12th century as the Ruin
Islanders; the Paleo-Eskimo
Dorset culture, still apparently
present in the 14th century;
and the Norse, represented by
objects from the 13th and 14th
centuries and found in the remains
of dwellings from both
Native cultures.
Greenland Resources
The Norse objects alone
cannot support the inference
that the Norse were present
in this far northern region
(Fig. 2). Further evidence must
be sought in the archaeological
evidence, and particularly that
which relates to the Dorset
culture since these people
were present in the region
long before the other ethnic
groups appeared. The Dorset
people seem to have lacked
the complex dog traction
technology that characterized
later Eskimo cultures, and
are consequently presumed to
have been less mobile. As Late
Dorset sites have not yet been
found in West Greenland, we
may assume that Norse objects
from Dorset winter dwellings,
including the fragment of a
brass pot, are evidence that
direct contact occurred in the
far north at least once during
the 13th century.
Fox bones make up more
than one third of the terrestrial
faunal material identifi ed from these Dorset sites
(Bendix 2000), stressing the importance of fox as a
valued resource. As many as 500 years would pass
before a similar importance of foxes was reported in
association with European demand for fox skins in
the 18th century (Gulløv 1997:404). The importance
of fox skins in Dorset technology is not known,
but the high proportion of fox bones indicates that
they were valued by the Dorset people at these
sites. Walrus bones make up just under one third of
Figure 2. Eskimo sites with Norse objects. Red circles are 13th- and 14th-century sites.
Black circles are 15th- and 16th-century sites.Norse topographical names are mentioned.
2008 H.C. Gulløv 19
the identifi ed mammalian faunal material, and are
assumed to represent a large amount of meat (Bendix
2000:78–80). It is therefore probable that, as in other
areas of the Eastern Arctic, walrus was an important,
and perhaps the most important, prey for the Dorset
people (Murray 1999).
Arctic ivory was much coveted in Norse society,
and the more prosperous Greenlandic farmers
organized hunting expeditions north of the settlements
in order to obtain a share of this resource. Walrus were
found in two populations (Muus et al. 1981:407): one
on the central west coast around 67º N, where the
West Ice from Canada reached the Greenland coast
and where the Neo-Eskimos fi rst settled in the 14th
century; and the second north of Melville Bay, which
was apparently not crossed by the Natives of the Smith
Sound region until the 13th century.
More that 250 years passed between the Norse
landnám and the fi rst report that hunters met other
peoples in western Greenland. However, it is possible
that before this time the Norse may have discovered
the rich hunting grounds of the far northern Thule
district. Evidence in support of this possibility may
be derived from identifying the contemporaneous
Paleo-Eskimo Dorset people and the Neo-Eskimos
who arrived around 1200 AD, as active agents in
engagement with the Norse.
Trade and Exchange
The archaeological material from the 13th and 14th
centuries, including Norse objects found in Eskimo
ruins and Eskimo objects found in Norse farms, represents
closer or more frequent contact between the
two ethnic groups. The question of where and how
such a relationship occurred is linked to a well-founded
assumption that contact formed the basis for some
sort of exchange profi table to both parties. To get a
better understanding of this question, I fi rst evaluate
the character of the objects found and then look at the
ethnic groups in their geographical contexts.
It is obvious that the meaning of an object changes
its character when forming a part of a new cultural
context different from its original one. The Norse
chessmen found in the Neo-Eskimo Ruin Island phase
(Fig. 1) can be mentioned as an example, as chess has
never existed among prehistoric Arctic cultures; another
example is the side prong of a Neo-Eskimo bird
dart found in a farm in the Norse Eastern Settlement
(Fig. 3), in a culture that never used such a hunting implement
(Gulløv 2004:284, 317). On such occasions,
the meaning of the object changes from utility value
to symbolic value, a fact that is documented in written
sources from 17th- and 18th-century West Greenland,
when European whalers and merchants appeared
and became involved in the activities of traditional
internal Eskimo trading partnerships. The meaning
of trade goods, such as copper pots which were soon
realized to be useless compared with soapstone pots,
subsequently changed to become objects expressing
prestige. Thus, trading partnerships became part of an
economic institution suitable for a direct analogy to
the situation 300 years earlier (Gulløv 1997:402).
The contact between Native Greenlanders and
Norse society can be described primarily in economic
terms, including the exchange of goods
of both symbolic value and utility value. Items of
symbolic value serve to confirm the trading partnership,
and can subsequently serve as amulets. We
have an example of that kind of use in the piece of
13th-century Norse oak inserted in the gunwale of a
15th-century umiaq found in Peary land. The use of
amulets in vessels to secure against capsizing has
analogies in ethnography from both West and East
Greenland (Gulløv 1997:433).
The second value may relate to the direct
use of the objects exchanged, in particular when
metals were in demand, metals are often to be found
Figure 3. Side prong of antler for a bird dart. Length = 14 cm. From a Norse farm in the Eastern Settlement. Marlin spike
of walrus tusk. Length = 17.5 cm. From a Norse farm in the Western Settlement. Both dated to the 14th century.
20 Journal of the North Atlantic Volume 1
among Norse objects in Eskimo contexts (cf. Gulløv
1997:429). Meteoric iron was also included in the exchange,
and a weapon point made from this material
was found in a Norse farm in the Western Settlement
dated to the 14th century (Buchwald 2001:59).
Other fi nds of Eskimo origin found in the settlement
include a marline spike of walrus tusk ornamented
in Neo-Eskimo style, but with the suspension hole
cut in Paleo-Eskimo style (Fig. 3). Finds with mixed
cultural characteristics were also excavated in the
Smith Sound region where the two Native cultures
coexisted for a period of approximately 150 years,
providing an opportunity for the acculturation seen
in tools and hunting implements (Gulløv 1997:448,
2004:294).
Metals of Norse origin—i.e., iron, copper, and
brass—have been found at several sites in the Eastern
Arctic, but the greatest number are from Eskimo
sites on the western side of Greenland and northwards
to Smith Sound and Ellesmere Island. The
regional distribution shows a signifi cant occurrence
in the north, but a larger amount in South Greenland,
where it derives from post-Norse Inuit settlements
when the picking or digging up of objects from
abandoned Norse farms constituted the basis for an
interregional trade in metals, including bell metal
(Table 2).
The regional distribution of Norse materials in
Early Thule culture sites, including those of the Ruin
Island phase, that is during the period 1200–1400
AD when the Norse settlements still existed, supports
the assumption of an early interest in metals
brought northwards to the Smith Sound region.
Although the numerous metal pieces found may be
fragments, which have not all been analysed, they
make up a considerable number (Table 3).
These fi nds may be compared with those from
17th-and 18th-century Inuit ruins in the Nuuk district
when contact with Europeans was very prominent,
especially after the Danish-Norwegian colonization
in 1721. The Nuuk sites yielded 956 objects of
European origin, among which metals make up 218
objects or 22%. The number of European objects
from Early Thule sites give us a reason to presume
that the same amount of European contact might
have taken place further north 400 years earlier (cf.
Gulløv 1997:429).
Long-Distance Journeys
In the farthest north and in the southernmost
part of 13th-and 14th-century Greenland, two different
ethnic groups were present: the Norse and the
Native Greenlanders. Encounters between the two
may have taken place either through mutual visits
at home settlements, at locations mid-way between
their settlements, or at both. The presence of the
Norse north of Melville Bay has been discussed since
the fi rst fi nds of Norse origin from the Ruin Island
phase appeared in the 1930s. Today, the Norse objects
found in structures used by the semi-sedentary
Dorset people provide strong evidence to support
the possibility that the Norse did travel to the north
of Melville Bay. Furthermore, recent excaminations
of the pieces of woven woolen cloth, originally
fragments of sails, found in the ruins of the Ruin
Island phase (see Table 1), stress the importance of
discarded sails used for tent covers (Østergård 2003:
118). Norse hunters, during their long journeys two
thousand nautical miles north of the settlements, had
to camp for shorter or longer periods depending on
weather, wind, and the loading of supplies.
In the 14th century, the Neo-Eskimos expanded
their winter sites into West Greenland and reached
Disko Bay, a region rich in resources that was also
in the Norse sphere of interest and well known according
to a Norse topographical report. This report
describes the localities north of the settlements, and
the place names of several localities can be identifi ed
(Fig. 2). Greipar is the coast around 67º N where the
walrus came on land; Karlsbðir was also located in
that area. Bjarney, known today as Disko Island, was
situated further north. Króksfjörðr, i.e., the crooked
fjord, may be Vaigat Sound between Disko Bay and
the open sea. On both sides of Vaigat, one fi nds the
landscape Króksfjarðarheiði, i.e., the fl at and waste
heath by the crooked fjord, which describes the fl attopped
mountains of horizontally bedded rock on
Disko Island and Vaigat Sound to the north. Here
lies Eysunes, which means the glowing or smouldering
peninsula. This name refers to the coal- and
Table 2. Norse objects (total and metals, with bell metal in parenthesis)
found in a Neo-Eskimo context on the western side of
Greenland, including both sides of Smith Sound. In addition, the
distribution of the so-called Norse dolls is shown, i.e., carvings
made by Neo-Eskimos (cf. Gulløv 1997:427–429).
# of Norse objects Percent Norse
Region Total Metals metals dolls
South Greenland 57 33 (10) 58 -
South West Greenland 38 14 (11) 37 1
Disko Bay 17 7 41 1
North West Greenland 5 3 (3) 60 6
Melville Bay 5 5 100 -
Thule District 30 19 63 1
Ellesmere Island 93 86 93 -
Total region 245 167 (24) 68 9
Table 3. Norse objects from the early Thule culture including the
Ruin Island phase, i.e., 1200–1400 AD (Gulløv 1997).
# of Norse objects Percent
Region Total Metals metals
Sermermiut, Disko Bay 7 2 29
Melville Bay 5 5 100
Thule District, Ruin Island phase 12 8 67
Ellesmere Island, Ruin Island phase 87 81 93
Total region 111 96 87
2008 H.C. Gulløv 21
oil-bearing slate strata on the Nuussuaq Peninsula,
which combust when there are rock-falls. From Disko
Bay, where the Norse hunters had their booths or
huts, the hunting trips headed north to Norðrsetur,
i.e., the northern hunting grounds, passing Snæfelli
near Svartenhuk and continuing into the Hafsbotn,
or Melville Bay (Gulløv 1997:432, 2000a, b).
The northern hunting grounds and Disko Bay
were the most plausible localities at which the
Norse met the Native Greenlanders. Eskimo fi gurines,
representing the Norse in their characteristic
garments, were found in this region (see Table 2),
and some of these are rendered in so much detail
that they may have been carved from live observation
(Fig. 4). Among those are fi gurines representing
Norse women, whom the Native Greenlanders may
have met during visits further south, as it is unlikely
that they had seen them so far north. From recent excavations
carried out in the Herjólfsnes region in the
southernmost part of the Eastern Settlement, we now
know that such visits took place. Eskimo summer
dwellings are found on some sites, one even close to
and in front of a large farm, and dates for both the
Eskimo and Norse structures demonstrates their use
in the second half of the 14th century. These dates
also indicate that the Herjólfsnes graveyard was still
in use during the fi rst half of the 15th century (Arneborg
1996a, Gulløv 2004:316).
Today, we can maintain that contacts between the
different ethnic groups may have taken place at various
localities along the western coasts of Greenland,
from where objects had been carried home to both
Eskimo and Norse settlements. Among the Eskimo
objects found in Norse farms, some date to the Ruin
Island phase. These were either taken to the farms by
the hunters from Disko Bay or Norðrsetur, or could
also be goods from Inuit visits in the Norse homeland
during summer trips.
It is assumed that the purpose of contact was
the direct exchange of metals for walrus tusks and
narwhal teeth, and that
this primarily occurred
in the far north where
the Norse had long been
active. Here we fi nd the
so-called Bear Trap, a
solid stone construction
on the western point
of Nuussuaq Peninsula
marking the beginning
of Norðrsetur, and which
has been convincingly
interpreted as a Norse
storehouse erected in the
13th century for walrus
tusks and narwhal teeth
(Meldgaard 1995).
Confl ict or Peaceable
Coexistence?
No instance of the
exchange of goods, for
which we have evidence
in archaeology, exists
in the few written
sources preserved. On
the contrary, the note in
Historia Norvegiae of
an encounter with the
Skrælíngja in the far
north, reports that when
they were hit with Norse
weapons their wounds
became white and didn’t
start bleeding until they
were dead, and that they
Figure 4. Some of about a dozen Greenland
Eskimo-made wooden fi gurines representing
Norse. a. A man with separate headgear from
Aasiaat, Disko Bay, 5.8 cm. b. A person, presumed
to be a woman, with separate headgear
(hair?), collar, and long suit, from Upernavik,
5.5 cm. c. Portrait of a Norseman from Upernavik
with pronounced features, perhaps with
headgear, and the pupils indicated with small
pieces of black baleen, 6.3 cm.
22 Journal of the North Atlantic Volume 1
lacked iron. The observation, probably written in the
12th century, gives us good reason to assume that the
Skrælíngja mentioned may have been Paleo-Eskimo
Dorset people. The next encounter noted is an attack
of Skrælíngja, mentioned in the Icelandic Annals
from the year 1379, when 18 Norsemen were killed
and two boys enslaved. In this particular case, the
Skrælíngja are Neo-Eskimos related to the Ruin Island
phase (Arneborg 2004:273–275).
However, there might be a specifi c reason that
these two episodes are mentioned, as no similar
ones are mentioned in the intervening centuries during
which time the exchanged objects originated.
There are several examples of episodes emphasizing
confl ict in historical sources from the 16th, 17th, and
18th centuries when Europeans again appeared along
the Greenland coasts The reason then was often concerning
the enrichment of one party at the expense
of the other, i.e., theft. This kind of contact often led
to murder or violent confl ict, and in such cases, we
have several direct analogies to the episodes involving
the Norse (Arneborg 1996b, Gulløv 1997).
Even though contact between the two ethnic
groups is evidenced in archaeological material, and
even though certain Norse types of objects—e.g.,
spoons, tub staves, and writing implements or socalled
styli—became incorporated in Greenland’s
Thule culture, nothing indicates an economic dependence
between the two peoples. The contact never
became formalized, as it did for example between
Norse society and the Samian communities in Scandinavia
(Arneborg 1996b, Gulløv 2004).
Economic interdependence was precluded by the
fact that the economies of the two types of societies
were incompatible. All of the institutions of Norse
farming society were imported from Iceland, including
the placing of the church apart, and thus it was
economically dependent on the North Atlantic connection.
On the other hand, animistic Eskimo hunting
communities were integrated parts of the Arctic
environment and had an economy controlled by the
right to use living and non-living resources and the
establishing of trading partnerships, as can be read
into the 17th- and 18th-century sources describing
European barter (Arneborg 2004, Gulløv 2004).
It was only through one convention that contact
between the two quite different societies could have
taken place, that is by establishing trading partnerships
that included the exchange of both gifts and
goods. From the types of exchanged objects represented
in the archaeological fi nd material from the
13th and 14th centuries, a generalized and a balanced
reciprocity can be faintly seen in the occurrence of
gifts and goods, respectively.
As far as different views of the rights of use are
concerned, potential confl ict arises from the maintenance
of prescriptive rights to hunting grounds
common to both parties. In the Norse world view, a
clear differentiation existed between the socialized
“inside” and the wild “outside,” between the inhabited
and uninhabited, between controlled society and
unconstrained nature. To the Norse, the Skrælíngja
belonged to the uninhabited, wild nature, and were
not subject to “the law of payment for homicide
including murder committed in the settlements or
in the northern hunting grounds beneath the North
Star (i.e., allt nor›r undir stjörnuna) ... where the sun
no longer shines” (Arneborg 1997:45, 2004:266).
This differentiation between society and nature was
non-existent in the Eskimo hunting society, in which
social structure and technology were integrated parts
of the Arctic environment and were made known
through established social relationships and contracts
(Ingold 2000:290).
The archaeology shows that Eskimo winter
sites were established in Norse settlement areas
only after the Norse settlements were abandoned,
when Eskimos gained traditional rights of use of
these areas.
The Old Christian and Kalaallit
The reasons why the Greenland Norse era ended
and the settlements were abandoned arose from the
interaction of several circumstances. Conditions in
the local environment, in the surrounding world, and
in the connection with other North Atlantic communities,
changed to such an extent that the social and
economic structure of the society could no longer
be maintained. Those that remained chose to leave
the country, and the fi nal decisions might have fi tted
with both Norse and Inuit philosophies of life (Arneborg
1997).
The social institutions of Norse society did not
seem capable of handling encounters with the native
Greenlanders, while Inuit communities, on the
other hand, had rules for contacts with other groups.
Therefore, the only possibility of a formalized intercourse
was barter based on partnerships. This
relationship explains the quantitative distribution
of objects brought home, where in Inuit communities,
they subsequently attained a new social and
religious meaning and prestige value, while for the
Norse priority was given to securing coveted commodities,
primarily ivory.
The theory that contacts, estimated from the
quantity of excavated objects, were sporadic and
opportunistic (cf. McGhee 1984:21) should not be
presumed. Compared with the relatively modest
amount of European objects in 18th-century Inuit
contexts, when a wide-ranging barter took place, we
can assume that a similar formalized economic intercourse
between Norse and Native Greenlanders in the
13th and 14th centuries existed to a certain extent.
In this connection, we may refer to the convincing
linguistic arguments for the memory of
2008 H.C. Gulløv 23
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past intercourse, which are still extant in West
Greenlandic. Here we find the old designation of a
Greenlander, kalaaleq, which from an etymological
point of view cannot be of Greenlandic origin, but
is supposed to be derived from the Norse klæðast,
i.e., those who wear (skin) clothing (Gulløv
2000b), and “they told that this designation was introduced
by the old Christian, who earlier lived in
their country” (Egede 1750:68). Today, the country
is named Kalaallit Nunaat, which stands for “Land
of the Kalaaleqs.”
Acknowledgments
I thank Jette Arneborg, National Museum of Denmark
and Thomas H. McGovern, CUNY for reading the manuscript,
and Patricia Sutherland, Canadian Museum of Civilization,
and two anonymous reviewers for their comments.
Thanks to Aoife Daly, Roskilde University, for linguistic
comments. I thank photographer John Lee for fi gures 1
and 3, and Niels Algreen Møller for the map in fi gure 2,
both with the National Museum of Denmark. The drawings
shown in fi gure 4a–c are my own.
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