The story of the Vikings in North America as both fact and fiction, from the westward expansion of the Norse across the North Atlantic in the tenth and eleventh centuries to the myths and fabrications about their presence there that have developed in recent centuries. Tracking the saga of the Norse across the North Atlantic to America, Norse America sets the record straight about the idea that the Vikings 'discovered'
America. The journey described is a continuum, with evidence-based history and archaeology at one end, and fake history and outright fraud at the other. In between there lies a huge expanse of uncertainty: sagas that may
contain shards of truth, characters that may be partly historical, real archaeology that may be interpreted through the fictions of saga, and fragmentary evidence open to responsible and irresponsible interpretation. Norse America is a book that tells two stories. The first is the westward expansion of the Norse across the North Atlantic in the tenth and eleventh centuries, settling in Greenland and establishing a shore station at L'Anse aux Meadows in
Newfoundland (to which a chapter of the book is devoted) and ending (but not culminating) in a fleeting and ill-documented presence on the shores of the North American mainland. The second is the appropriation and
enhancement of the westward narrative by Canadians and Americans who want America to have had white North European origins, who therefore want the Vikings to have 'discovered' America, and who in the advancement of that thesis have been willing to twist and manufacture evidence in support of claims grounded in an ideology of racial superiority.
The story of the Vikings in North America as both fact and fiction, from the westward expansion of the Norse across the North Atlantic in the tenth and eleventh centuries to the myths and fabrications about their presence there that have developed in recent centuries. Tracking the saga of the Norse across the North Atlantic to America, Norse America sets the record straight about the idea that the Vikings 'discovered'
America. The journey described is a continuum, with evidence-based history and archaeology at one end, and fake history and outright fraud at the other. In between there lies a huge expanse of uncertainty: sagas that may
contain shards of truth, characters that may be partly historical, real archaeology that may be interpreted through the fictions of saga, and fragmentary evidence open to responsible and irresponsible interpretation. Norse America is a book that tells two stories. The first is the westward expansion of the Norse across the North Atlantic in the tenth and eleventh centuries, settling in Greenland and establishing a shore station at L'Anse aux Meadows in
Newfoundland (to which a chapter of the book is devoted) and ending (but not culminating) in a fleeting and ill-documented presence on the shores of the North American mainland. The second is the appropriation and
enhancement of the westward narrative by Canadians and Americans who want America to have had white North European origins, who therefore want the Vikings to have 'discovered' America, and who in the advancement of that thesis have been willing to twist and manufacture evidence in support of claims grounded in an ideology of racial superiority.
1: Discovering America
2: Sagas and Chronicles
3: Maps
4: Iceland and the Discovery of Greenland
5: Norse Greenland
6: L'Anse aux Meadows
7: The Limits of the Norse Presence in North America
8: American Runestones
9: The Kensington Runestone
10: Understanding Norse America
Glossary
Further Reading
Gordon Campbell is Fellow in Renaissance Studies at the University
of Leicester, and is a Fellow of the British Academy. In January
2012 he was presented with the Longman History Today Trustees Award
(for lifetime contribution to history). He has authored and edited
many books for OUP including The Oxford Dictionary of the
Renaissance (2003); Renaissance Art and Architecture (2004); John
Milton: Life, Work and Thought (2008; co-author);
Bible: the Story of the King James Version, 1611-2011 R(2010); and
IThe Hermit in the Garden: from Imperial Rome to Ornamental Gnome
(2013). He most recently edited The Oxford Illustrated History of
the Renaissance for OUP.
It has the potential to shift the debate on the Vinland journeys
and the Norse discovery of North America in new and welcome
directions.
*Sverrir Jakobsson, History: Reviews of New Books*
Gordon Campbell's fascinating book explains how this questionable
theory evolved into an argument for the cultural supremacy of
people of northern European Protestant descent over Americans of
different ancestry.
*Tony Barber, Financial Times, Best History Books of 2021*
Campbell excels in deconstructing the "fantasy archaeology" that
has been used to bolster claims to Norse heritage, from genuine
Viking-Age weapons deliberately buried and then "discovered", to
outright fakes. [...] Norse America is a welcome deconstruction of
a founding myth that remains dangerously politicized.
*Jane Kershaw, Times Literary Supplement*
Norse America is an important book that equips the reader to
interrogate the stories we think we know, and asks how - and why -
we arrived where we are today. This highly readable volume is
particularly suited to those who want to understand how the past is
shaped in the present - often for explicit political aims.
*Cat Jarman, BBC History Magazine*
[An] engaging and illuminating account ... this breadth, this
willingness to see the Norse voyages to Greenland and Canada as
part of a much bigger story, is the great strength of this
book.
*Judith Jesch, History Today*
This breezy, well-researched, and frequently hilarious book is one
of the best recent take-downs of ethnic chauvinism I've seen in
years... Campbell, a Scotsman with a sense of humor as dry as a
finely-aged single malt, is merciless in dissecting every single
alleged Norse artifact, archaeological site, and inscription, up to
and including the Norse sagas themselves... [R]ead this book
post-haste.You will not be disappointed.
*Daily Kos*
Norse America provides an impressively complex overview of the
pre-modern movements of northern Europeans and discusses a large
array of forged objects and theories, thereby successfully
addressing common misconceptions and conspiracy theories related to
the medieval Norse presence in America.
*Verena Höfig, Speculum 99/1*
 |
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
