Skræling

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Maps showing the different cultures in Greenland, Labrador, Newfoundland and the Canadian arctic islands in the years 900, 1100, 1300 and 1500. The green colour shows the Dorset Culture, blue the Thule Culture, red Norse Culture, yellow Innu and orange Beothuk
Maps showing the different cultures in Greenland, Labrador, Newfoundland and the Canadian arctic islands in the years 900, 1100, 1300 and 1500. The green colour shows the Dorset Culture, blue the Thule Culture, red Norse Culture, yellow Innu and orange Beothuk

Skræling (plural skrælingjar) is the name the Norse Greenlanders gave to the Thule people they encountered in Greenland, and perhaps to the late Dorset people; they used the same name for the inhabitants (possibly the ancestors of the later Beothuk) of North America, specifically present-day Newfoundland ("Vinland"), when they voyaged there.

As documented in Certain Pre-Columbian Notices of American Aborigines by William H. Babcock, the word skræling may have been the name of one of the North American tribes encountered during initial contact. Norseman Bjorn the Bonde saved two Skræling siblings from the sea. As was their custom, the Skræling siblings decided to become the Norseman's life-long servants. During this service the Skrælings indicated that the word skræling was how their peoples' name was pronounced in Norse. Eventually, “The brother and sister killed themselves and threw themselves down the cliffs into the sea when they were prohibited from following along with Bjorn Bonde . . .” to Iceland. [1]

The word skræling is the only word surviving into modern times from the Old Norse dialect spoken by the medieval Norse Greenlanders. In modern Icelandic, skrælingi means a barbarian. The origin of the word is not certain but it is probably based on the Old Norse word "skrá" which meant "skin" and also (as a verb) "to put in writing" (which was done on dried skin in Iceland for example in the case of the Icelandic Sagas). This would refer to the fact that the Inuit (both Dorset and Thule) as well as the other indigenous people the Norse Greenlanders met wore clothes made of animal skins, in contrast to the woven wool clothes worn by the Norse.

There have also been guesses that the word comes from the Scandinavian word skral or the Icelandic word skrælna. The word skral connotes "thin" or "scrawny". In the Scandinavian languages it is often used as a synonym for feeling sick or weak. This is probably a case of folk etymology or linguistic "false friend"; the word skral does not exist in medieval Norse texts (for example the Icelandic sagas) nor in modern Icelandic. It is a 17th century loanword from Low German into the Scandinavian languages (Danish, Norwegian and Swedish). However, skræling in modern Norwegian means weakling. Skrælna refers to shrinking or drying (plants for example). But nothing in the written medieval texts mentioning skræling uses the term in an adverse sense.

The Greenlandic ethnonym Kalaalleq may be based on the Norse Skræling (the combination skr is unknown in the Inuit language) or on the Norse klæði (meaning cloth).

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[edit] Literary sources

Skrælingar inhabiting North America are first mentioned in the Icelandic sagas that relate how the first Norsemen to settle in Greenland discovered the American continent, and there encountered a hitherto unknown race that they called Skrælingar. Thus, in the Saga of the Greenlanders it is told that :

“ After the first winter summer came, and they became aware

of Skrælings, who came out of the forest in a large flock.

 ”

The story's setting is a forested area rich in all sorts of food and even grapes (Vinland). Whence one may conclude that the first Skrælings that the Norsemen encountered lived somewhere on the Eastern Seaboard of the present day Canada.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Certain Pre-Columbian Notices of American Aborigines by William H. Babcock, American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 18, No. 3 (Jul. - Sep., 1916), pp. 388-397
  • Grønlands Forhistorie, editor Hans Christian Gulløv, Gyldendal, Copenhagen, 2005. ISBN 87-02-017245-5

[edit] Further reading

  • "Skraeling: First Peoples of Helluland, Markland, and Vinland.” Odess, Daniel; Stephen Loring; and William W. Fitzhugh. From Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga. Fitzhugh, William W. and Elisabeth I. Ward, editors. Copyright 2000 Smithsonian Institution. Pages 193-205. ISBN 15-60-98995-5.

[edit] External links