Greenland Mineral Deposits

[wkwillis]

Picked up the October 2004 Mining Engineering issue with Greenland's mineral resources.
Bad news, there isn't much there that's been found so far to date. Disregarding cryolite, coal, graphite, iron, and marble as not worth shipping, zircon, molybdenum, uranium, and olivine as not usable with medieval or renaissance technology, we are left with copper and gold in the eighteen hundreds, and lead/zinc/silver around 1950, both before modern prospecting technology, and both in ice free areas eleven months a year.
They could ship ore to the lumber of Vinland or to the coal mines and smelt it there for a denser and more convenient shipping weight for transport to Eurpean markets. Also, once they started looking at Greenland's minerals, they would start looking down the coast till they got to warmer areas around New England and then started exploring North America.

 

[Nik]

Little Ice Age

Don't forget the 'Little Ice Age' that killed off the Scandinavian ('Viking') settlements...

Unfortunately, IIRC, the local Catholic church had flagged the 'indigenous' locals' ways as primitive & barbarous, dooming the settlers when the weather took a down-turn...

They needed 'Eskimo'-style housing, clothing & food to survive.

You need to 'butterfly' that aspect.

 

[Max Sinister]

Does anybody have a map by Greenland without the ice? I'm just asking because I read that Greenland actually consists of several islands which are connected only by the icecap.

 

[Nicole]

Does anybody have a map by Greenland without the ice? I'm just asking because I read that Greenland actually consists of several islands which are connected only by the icecap.

From what I've read of that, it's one island, but raising sea levels caused by the lack of icecap would make it several islands...

 

[Doctor What]

Does anybody have a map by Greenland without the ice? I'm just asking because I read that Greenland actually consists of several islands which are connected only by the icecap.

Here--try this one.

From here

 

[wkwillis]

Don't forget the 'Little Ice Age' that killed off the Scandinavian ('Viking') settlements...

Unfortunately, IIRC, the local Catholic church had flagged the 'indigenous' locals' ways as primitive & barbarous, dooming the settlers when the weather took a down-turn...

They needed 'Eskimo'-style housing, clothing & food to survive.

You need to 'butterfly' that aspect.

The only butterfly I would have is when they got the hell out of that frozen wasteland and moved someplace civilised. Bermuda, for instance.
One of the most ironical tragedies is when some ships on the way to Virginia ran into a storm around 1600. One ran ashore on the "Isle of Devils", aka Bermuda. Everybody got off the ship safely. They grew fat and happy on the marooned pigs, birds, shellfish, fruit, etc. Then they rebuilt their ships and sailed on to the promised land of Virginia.
Most of them starved to death in the next year.

 

[Nik]

Greenland(s)

"It's one island, but raising sea levels caused by the lack of icecap would make it several islands..."

Like Scandinavia, Greenland would rebound a lot when the ice came off.

I reckon most of its valleys would be flooded to fiords before the rebound caught up. Sorry, I don't know if being close to Iceland hot-spot would make much difference in the timing...