Dating Viking Settlement in Nth America with wood scraps

[Ianab]

Vikings were in North America by 1021 CE | Ars Technica

Basically scientists have been able to pinpoint the occupation of a Viking settlement in Newfoundland to 1021. 

Method? It's known that there was a big solar flare in 992-3 AD, it was recorded at the time, and caused a spike in the Carbon 14 in the atmosphere. Any wood that was laid down in a tree in that year is slightly more radioactive than usual. This has been confirmed by looking at samples of old trees, that growth ring has a higher than expected C14 content, compared to the previous and later years. That is also one reason why C14 dating is not 100% accurate, as the C14 in the air varies slightly from year to year, but the spike in 993 is well documented. 

So they examined scraps of wood excavated around the settlement site, picking ones that have been cut with steel tools (so not Natives or natural), and had the cambium / bark layer attached. Then looking back though the growth rings they until the found the 993 growth ring. Counting back gave them the precise year the tree was cut down. All three samples were felled in 1021.  Doesn't say exactly when they arrived or left, just that they were working in that spot over 1021. Conventional carbon dating isn't that accurate, and put the samples between 1019 and 1024. 

So "Things you can learn from a little scrap of wood". 

[SwampDonkey]

Reminds me of an interview on a Joe Rogan podcast over a year ago with a sort of historian. The guest said, "why do we celebrate Columbus day? He never discovered a *DanG thing".

[Old Greenhorn]

Everybody should know that Colombus had a Norwegian map, but they still don't really teach that in schools as they should. This is great news and will keep me smiling all day today.  

I had always wanted to ask my relatives about this, but alas, they are all gone now, so things like this will have to do. I am glad carbon dating continues to evolve. This means the the Vikings were in NA 25 years before the Battle of Hastings, roughly 2 generations and at the height of their reach and influence. 1066 is when things started going downhill for them and fall apart, as I recall.

There is a local fella here who has spent the better part of 40 years woalking these hills and among other things, finding every peat bog in the catskills, mapping them, and probing samples from the bottom of each which he has had radio carbon dating done on the plant matter by species. From this he has built a picture of what the forest were comprised of going back many thousand years and how it developed over centuries looking at the different levels. Then he combined that with the other evidence of past burns, species shapes, densities, locations, habitat, elevations, etc. to fill out the picture. This is all organized in a book he wrote in 2001 called The Catskills; A History and is one of my most treasured volumes. In fact I am re-reading it now. The results of his nearly half century of walking these hills has also given him enough knowledge and material to produce several other books tracing the history of the various railroads and industries in our small mountain range. As well he is a fascinating guy (for me) to listen to. I have only met him once and chatted, but won't miss any public appearances again if I can help it.

But I digress, this is great news and I shall think about this all day. I always knew they had a settlement on these shores, what I always wondered about was why they left? Perhaps they knew, even then, that the taxes would get too high in a short time and the governments of the various subdivisions would be run by idiots?

[Tom King]

Being a sailor, I'm not surprised at all.  There's a pull to keep going, and I think it would be especially strong in aggressive ones, like the Vikings.  They were always looking for better ground, and willing to risk their lives for it.

Funny, just yesterday, a friend sent me this link:

Vinland Map Identified as 20th-Century Forgery | History | Smithsonian Magazine

[WV Sawmiller]

   I just remember it struck me odd to see all the different hair colors and facial features in Kristiansand Norway when I worked a project there 2007-2009. There were blondes, redheads, black hair, Asian eyes, European skin tones, etc. I assume the mixture was all due to successful Viking raids.

[Magicman]

what I always wondered about was why they left?

The answer to that question is simple enough......they ran out of toilet tissue.  

[Hilltop366]

It is believed that the Vikings had been in my area around the same time, there have been some artifacts found and markings a stone along the coast. The local high school teams are known as the Vikings.

[Sedgehammer]

It was known in Italy about the 'new world' long before 'Columbus' found it. Besides that, pretty sure those that were here already 'found' it. 

There's evidence that prior were here now over 24,000 years ago. That even a sea fairing people had found south America 1,000s of years before the vikings 'found' the west

Pretty cool either way

[WDH]

Yes, humans found the America’s many millennia before even the Vikings. Our history is very Euro-centric, another manifestation of the “Myth of Central Position”.  

[Tacotodd]

what I always wondered about was why they left?

The answer to that question is simple enough......they ran out of toilet tissue.  

Too funny 

[Don P]

History had to wait for the Spanish to bring the corncob north.

[Don P]

Of course Vikings, being yankees, couldn't abide grits so it took an Italian calling it polenta for it all to work out. Christopher Columbus was actually Italian, so there you go, follow the grits.

[GAB]

Dating Viking settlements using wood samples to food in 11 entries.
Is that a record?
GAB

[sawguy21]

@Don P now that is funny! I find this all quite fascinating, my mothers ancestors were from northern Germany near the Danish border my fathers from northern England yet Ancestry.com tells me I am mostly Norwegian with a smattering of Danish and Swedish thrown in so I have to assume I am a descendant of Viking raiders.
I suspect a small group of fishermen could not sustain themselves in such a harsh environment and without fresh young settlers including women to replenish the group they would simply die off. Also by that time the Scandinavians were converting to Christianity and taking up farming, the warrior way of life was disappearing.

[Don P]

Mine just got tired of commuting to Scotland every spring and set up housekeeping there. By the time they got here or shortly thereafter they had acquired an appreciation of grits and corncobs. So they stayed.

[barbender]

Everyone is trashing on Columbus these days. His discoveries were a huge event and there is no getting around that. The Vikings were here, but for whatever reason disappeared and prompted no further exploration. I'm of part Native ancestry, I probably come from this from a different angle. I get sick of hearing my relatives whining about Columbus and "genocide" he committed, "stealing" Native land blah blah. With current historical interpretation, if another tribe invaded, tortured, mutilated and killed most of the invaded except for women and children they kidnapped, that was merely "inter-tribal warfare". Europeans come in, make a treaty and displace a tribe and are vilified, even if they didn't kill anyone. I realize there was plenty of double dealing, broken promises, and atrocities aplenty but I really tire of the narrative of the peaceful natives who never had any impact on the earth living their idyllic in tune with nature lives until the big wasteful selfish white man came it ruined it. All that to say, I like Christopher Columbus😁

[barbender]

I was going to do one of the Ancestry.com DNA samples or something but I'm afraid I might overload their system. I've been described as having a "highly variable genetic background"😂

[WDH]

That means that you have a lot of “Hybrid Vigor” which is a highly valuable selective trait!!

[WV Sawmiller]

  My favorite observation was "When the Europeans came to America they found the Indian tribes where the men hunted and fished all day and the women did all the rest of the work. And they worked hard to change this system - what were they thinking?"

[barbender]

WV one of my uncles used to have a plaque on his wall to that effect 😂

Danny, I'd read that term "high degree of genetic variability", and I thought, "hey, that's me!" but being a logger and a simple person I never had an opportunity to use my newly learned term. Well, one time my wife and kids and I were at a graduation party. I was visiting with an acquaintance that is college educated. As we conversed, my kids would walk by randomly (we have 5), they all have a very different appearance. From one white blond haired, blue eyed girl to one daughter that has dark skin and very curly hair. This lady finally paused and asked, "was that another one if your kids?" When I told her it was, she said, "you guys must have a high degree of genetic variability!"😂😂 I could've just hugged her😂

[GAB]

 My favorite observation was "When the Europeans came to America they found the Indian tribes where the men hunted and fished all day and the women did all the rest of the work. And they worked hard to change this system - what were they thinking?"

Howard:
Simple answer to your question - They weren't.
GAB

[Ianab]

I suspect a small group of fishermen could not sustain themselves in such a harsh environment and without fresh young settlers including women to replenish the group they would simply die off. Also by that time the Scandinavians were converting to Christianity and taking up farming, the warrior way of life was disappearing.

There are records from shortly after that time that document the "adventures" of those explorers. It seems that they had a falling out with the Locals, and got into some skirmishes with them. While they had the better weapons, they were outnumbered, some of them got killed, and the rest basically decided to cut their losses and go home. They thought the land was good enough, but they didn't have the forces to take control of it from the locals, and it would have been an ongoing war to try. 

[farmfromkansas]

 Stories I have heard from the old country lead me to think that some of my female ancestors were actually from the Danish. They say the origination of the term "best man" was the guy that went along and kept the family busy while you grabbed the girl and headed for the boat. And the meaning of the "honeymoon", is that the grooms family furnished enough mead to keep the "bride" drunk for a month. Appears the Scots were raiding the Swedes when the Vikings were off raiding. Would be interesting for those of us who are of Scottish descent to get tested.

[barbender]

Yeah, human genetics are a big mishmash. No population is "pure", what is ethnicity more than a language and culture? How much Slavic blood is present in Germans? For instance, I was reading about a German WWII General, Heinz Guderian. He came from the West Prussian area that is now part of Poland. This area had been in Polish hands before, and Poland had invited immigrants from Armenia in the past. So it has been suggested that Guderian was actually of Armenian ancestry (it is an Armenian sounding name), which was somewhat of an embarrassment at that time. All of this to say, people have moved, been kidnapped, bought and sold, led conquering parties, and myriad other ways to mix genetics up that no population is "pure" anything. I find it all fascinating!

[SwampDonkey]

@farmfromkansas   Got'a be some humour in there someplace.

[Ianab]

eah, human genetics are a big mishmash.

Yup, some of my ancestry is on this page. Some of the first European settlers in NZ, who married one of the local Polynesian locals. His daughters married a couple of brothers from the later more organised settlement ships.

https://barretthoneyfield.com/2015/07/16/dicky-rawinia-and-family/

When Lil went on a Maori Language course for work (teaching), she got chatting to the tutors, and commented how their "tribal history" from the course was pretty much the same story as I'd told my family history. Suddenly she was part of the "tribe", by marriage. She was invited to be part of the Welcome team for the marae visit. But she chose to remain with the 'visitors". But the invite was there.

Likewise when we go to the Cook Islands, it's general knowledge that NZ was first settled from there. The locals identify as Maori, and speak a very similar language.

Fathers side of the family I'm not so sure about.... I can trace them back ~100 years, and the old family farm was a couple of miles from here.  

[farmfromkansas]

My son came up with some interesting stuff, including those mentioned above. Other sayings like "raining cats and dogs", came from the days of grass roofs, and during cold weather, your pets climbed up on the roof, and when it rained, the roof got slippery and the cats and dogs fell off the roof.

[SawyerTed]

Yes we are a big mishmash.  My mother's ancestry traces back to Spain and Portugal in the 1500's when Spain was colonizing Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and Western North Carolina.  We have determined that our ancestors were among the early Spanish and Portuguese settlers in South Carolina (St. Elena), Western North Carolina and Southwestern Virginia.  They were called Mulungeons.  At one time they held large tracts of land prior to the arrival of the Northern Europeans settlers.  Eventually, the Mulungeons, who apparently intermarried with native Americans (particularly the Cheraw and Lumbee), were deemed to be "free colored people" and laws were such that "colored people" could not own property.  Their land was confiscated by the Northern European settlers.  

Ironically, my dad's family is among the Northern European settlers, those ancestors come from Switzerland.  My dad's mother's family traces their ancestry to Germany.  

So yes we are a mishmash, some us more than others, and some us are less "Viking" than others.  

[barbender]

Those are interesting backgrounds, SawyerTed and Ianab! I really do find this stuff fascinating. I haven't done a DNA test yet, one thing I am interested to find out is if we have any Sub-Saharan African ancestry. The tribes my Grandpa descended from came from the New England area, and had became "civilized". They were known as "praying Indians" because they had converted to Chrisitianity in the many revivals that swept over the Northeast during the Great Awakening, which I think was in the early 1700's. There were so many revivals that part of New England was known as the "Burned Over" area because so many revivals burned through😂  Anyhow, the towns these Indians established were part of the Underground Railroad, and it is well documented that they took in many runaway slaves and free blacks, who were able to freely marry among these tribes. These tribes all later relocated to Wisconsin, and I have seen historical documents where Army officers that visited their reservations disparaged that they were all "half negro", also one of the tribes when they got their land allotments, it was specified that no one with negro blood qualified. Anyways, just curious. My one daughter actually like other girls I've seen that are 1/4 black. I always compare our family to our free range chickens. The hens keep sneaking off, laying clutches and hatching chicks. After about 4 years and many generations of chickens, what started out as Barred Rocks, Speckled Sussex, Frizzles and Americaunas it gets to a point where you never know what's going to cone out of that egg!😂 That frizzle rooster you forgot you had 4 years ago has genes that are living on and eventually they pop out again. So it is with my bunch😊

[barbender]

This is a picture of my crew about 5-6 years ago, with my Grandpa in the middle. 

[Magicman]

That is a fine looking crew and I see that the little man in the lower center is outgunned. 

[moodnacreek]

Everyone is trashing on Columbus these days. His discoveries were a huge event and there is no getting around that. The Vikings were here, but for whatever reason disappeared and prompted no further exploration. I'm of part Native ancestry, I probably come from this from a different angle. I get sick of hearing my relatives whining about Columbus and "genocide" he committed, "stealing" Native land blah blah. With current historical interpretation, if another tribe invaded, tortured, mutilated and killed most of the invaded except for women and children they kidnapped, that was merely "inter-tribal warfare". Europeans come in, make a treaty and displace a tribe and are vilified, even if they didn't kill anyone. I realize there was plenty of double dealing, broken promises, and atrocities aplenty but I really tire of the narrative of the peaceful natives who never had any impact on the earth living their idyllic in tune with nature lives until the big wasteful selfish white man came it ruined it. All that to say, I like Christopher Columbus😁

Very good post B.B.  This is just what I wanted to say.

[barbender]

Thanks Magic, God has blessed me far beyond anything I deserve, no doubt about it! And yes, Mr. Silas is way outgunned, but he doesn't know any different so he gets by just fine😊 

[moodnacreek]

And that's a nice looking family.

[Southside]

I dated a Viking for two years, has the red hair and all to prove it, then settled with her till this day. Don't recall any "carbon dating", but we did go fishing if that counts.  

[barbender]

Maybe she considers you spoils, Southside😂

Thanks moodnacreek, I'm pretty proud of them😊

SawyerTed, I had to go read about the Malungeons. A very interesting history that sounds a lot like my family's. In fact, a lot of the pictures I looked at, the folks looked like they could've been my family. 

[reedco]

 Look pretty american to me.  A lot to be proud of!

[Tacotodd]

In canine terms, we are all mutts! I love it. Heinz57. It’s just the truth.

[SwampDonkey]

We should make a John Cabot day, he came 5 years or so after Columbus and began the first fishery in the Bay of Fundy. The one thing he is credited with was fishing with baskets dipped into the Fundy.

French actually made the first European settlements in this neighborhood yet Trudeau's "Canada: a Peoples History" claim it was upper Canada, which is totally bull crap. And the only reason upper Canada became the boom town was because of government policy called 'centralization'. That meant sucking everywhere else out to build it. I've always heard that confederation was the demise of the Maritimes. Bank of Montreal, was actually began as Bank of New Brunswick, if you are factual about it. Living in New Brunswick, when you invest your money in Canada, where do you think your money goes?
Transfer payments, everyone gets those, so no point in mentioning it.

[WDH]

That is an impressive pack there, Mr. Barbender. 

[Sedgehammer]

Thanks Magic, God has blessed me far beyond anything I deserve, no doubt about it! And yes, Mr. Silas is way outgunned, but he doesn't know any different so he gets by just fine😊

This made me laugh. You are so correct. He don't know no different.
Nice crew for sure and looks like you got the better end of the deal.....

[SawyerTed]

This is a picture of my crew about 5-6 years ago, with my Grandpa in the middle.
(Image hidden from quote, click to view.)

Great looking family!  And yes our families do resemble each other. 

[barbender]

I definitely married up! That is one fine woman God gave me, in so many ways! I'm pretty proud of her, after choosing to be a stay at home mom and homeschooling our kids, she finished her bachelor's degree online and is now working on her Master's. I call her my "Sugah Momma" now, we're working towards my goal of being a stay at home dad😁

[Southside]

Oh yea BB, she lets me know what a prize I am often enough. 

[barbender]

Difference in perspective, you hear "prize" and think "trophy", when she says "prize" she may be thinking more along the lines of a door prize, as in, "what am I going to do with this?"😂😂