Did you know?
The vikings came from Northern Europe, so they are also called Norsemen. They are the keepers of the oDid you know? ld Nordic culture.
Over the past 1000 years, Inuit and Viking cultures have shaped the people and land of South Greenland. Five core areas in the region represent the most comprehensive and rich examples of Norse and Greenlandic farming culture. This unique heritage is now officially recognised and inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage List, and it is all within reach from Narsarsuaq and Qaqortoq.
Five core areas in the region represent the most comprehensive and rich examples of Norse and Greenlandic farming culture.
Continues further down the page...
The farming history in South Greenland began when a small fleet of settlers, led by Erik the Red, arrived to the region just before 1000 AD. According to tales, Erik the Red was the first to call the island “Greenland”. This was the last westward migration of the Vikings and the first time Europeans settled on the North American continent. They brought with them Christianity, farming and exceptional mariner skills that allowed them to journey all the way to the hunting grounds in the Disko Bay area, and as far as Labrador and Newfoundland.
The Nordic settlers established two settlements in Greenland, of which the so-called “Eastern Settlement” in South Greenland was the largest. They built farms in the deep fjords, where a warmer and drier micro-climate made it possible to sustain farming and livestock. Anyone that pays a summer visit to the settlements today will realize that Erik the Red was not only spinning tales. Greenland can truly be a “green land”: grass and wildflower pastures cover the mountain sides around the farms, while birch and willow shrubs spread over more remote expanses. Erik himself was quick to claim one of the best places for himself: Brattahlid – the present day Qassiarsuk just across the fjord from Narsarsuaq.
The descendants of the Vikings built farms, cleared fields and established churches after the Scandinavian model, but they also adapted to their new homeland by fishing and hunting. Experts estimate a peak population of between 2-3,000 Norsemen in Greenland.
The Norse settlements in Greenland thrived for hundreds of years, but towards the end of the 14th century, they were facing difficult odds. A volatile and cool climatic period had begun, which made farming difficult and seafaring in the ice-filled waters dangerous. This combined with changing European markets made it difficult to attract foreign merchants. Political disruptions and economic recession in Scandinavia added to the isolation of the Norsemen in Greenland and by AD 1450, their colonies lay abandoned. The final fate of the last Norse Greenlanders still remains a mystery.The Norse settlements in Greenland thrived for hundreds of years, but towards the end of the 14th century, they were facing difficult odds. A volatile and cool climatic period had begun, which made farming difficult and seafaring in the ice-filled waters dangerous. This combined with changing European markets made it difficult to attract foreign merchants. Political disruptions and economic recession in Scandinavia added to the isolation of the Norsemen in Greenland and by AD 1450, their colonies lay abandoned. The final fate of the last Norse Greenlanders still remains a mystery.
However, the story of the Norse Greenlanders had an unsuspected spin to the tale. In 1783, Norwegian Anders Olsen and his Greenlandic wife Tuperna resettled Igaliku, the old farm of Gardar of the Vikings, to renew farming. For the next 130 years, their descendants farmed the fields of the Norse Greenlanders, kept similar livestock and even used the stones of the Norse ruins to build houses and new farm buildings, creating an architecture unique in Greenland, which still can be seen in Igaliku.
Yet, the new farming culture in South Greenland was not just a repetition. The descendants of Anders and Tuperna successfully mixed Greenlandic cultural traditions, knowledge of the nature and language with Scandinavian farming culture and technology.
They created a unique local culture that embraced both farming and hunting. In 1924, Qassiarsuk, the old Brattahlid, was re-founded by pioneer Otto Frederiksen as a sheep farming community. His descendants and other families soon established other farms in the area, thus repopulating and reusing the places and fields first cleared by the old Vikings.
Since the first settlers, farming in Greenland has been challenging. In order to survive and thrive, the Vikings of old had and the present-day farmers have to be innovative, open for new ideas, experimenting and adaptive – which is very much an integral part of the unique South Greenland culture.
In recognition of these exceptional, intertwined stories of farming and hunting in the Arctic, Norse and Greenlandic core farming areas were in 2017 inscribed on UNESCO’s World Heritage List under the title: Kujataa Greenland: A Norse and Inuit farming landscape on the Edge of the Ice Cap. The World Heritage Area comprises five areas that represent the most comprehensive and rich examples of both Norse and Greenlandic farming histories.
The cultural landscapes of South Greenland are exceptional, undisturbed Norse ruins lying side by side with thriving Greenlandic farms in a setting shaped jointly by violent Arctic forces, grazing livestock, and the pioneer spirit and labor of generations of Arctic farmer-hunters.
The article is edited by: Anders La Cour Vahl
