Vikings of America

[Lysandros Aikiedes]

They do not need permanent settlements for it! After they have crossed the Niagara portage to Grass Island Pool and Grand Island and built sailing ships for Upper Great Lakes, they can sail all across Erie, Huron and Michigan, stop briefly for trade in each Iroquois or Ojibwa village , sheltered bay and rivermouth... and then sail back or onwards.


And St. Mary Rapids are relatively nearby. What the Norse need to settle is the portage - to new ships built to sail Lake Superior.


Why Manhattan Island of all East Coast islands?

If the Detroit-site isn't required as a link in the network of Norse markets, maybe the Iroquois take advantage of the site, and if they get to the point of replicating Norse vessels, they could try to exact a toll on ships coming and going. A situation like this may lead to future conflicts.

The Norse need to try and get on with every autonomous tribal-nation in the region. Be it intermarriage between chieftainly dynasties, or setting up a market just for the benefit of individual chiefdoms. These subsequent emporia founded after the really vital portage stations would be the foundations of later Metis states.

Maybe just any island inside the Hudson river where OTL New York city is located. Perhaps Ellis Island might be defensible? To take advantage of the naturally-suited harbour.

 

[altwere]

The 1100 century limit of maize growing seems to be just about as far north as it is now. Into North Dakota then eastwards,skimming north of the great lakes then across through Southern Quebec.
The Indians of NewEngland were gardeners not farmers.
Manhattan Is at the mouth of the Hudson River which leads north the lake George then to Lake Champlain and the St Lawrence.

 

[Martinus Paduei]

I am in agreement with the posters who are emphasizing what would likely be a very large aboriginal component of TTL's Vinlandish population. You will have numerous immigrant Norse males and native Vinlandish exploring and trading across northeastern North America, and likely a surplus of males over females. It would be absurd to think that there would not be significant intermarriage between the Vinlandish and the tribes they come in contact with.

Further, the Vinlandish settlements will to some extent become magnets for aboriginal displaced, mercenaries, and those dissatisfied with their place in their own tribes. Over time, even some full blooded aboriginees will become culturally Vinlandish. This will swell the Vinlandish population base a great deal.

 

[chornedsnorkack]

Maybe just any island inside the Hudson river where OTL New York city is located. Perhaps Ellis Island might be defensible? To take advantage of the naturally-suited harbour.

Remember that the Hudson is connected via East River to Long Island Sound, all the way east to Block Island Sound. Which is right next to Narrangansett Bay. So the naturally suited harbour of Narrangansett Bay would give inside passage, small-ship access to the whole Long Island Sound-Hudson network with tributaries like Connecticut and Thames.

Manhattan Island will not be an important way to St. Lawrence because the Norse can sail up St. Lawrence itself. But the exit of Lake Champlain, at Saint-Jean-Sur-Richelieu, is just 50 km from Montreal - so a logical spot for Norse settlement.

The north edge of farmers is going to be a good point for emporia.

North of that line, the hunter-gatherers are few and scattered, so the small volume of trade with them is likely to be scattered and be handled by temporarily visiting boats. South of that line, the farmers are more numerous, a better market for iron, cloth etc. - but good farmland is taken by them and hard to conquer or buy. Since the trading Viking will be wanting to grow their own barley and have pastures to raise sheep and cows instead of relying solely on maize sold by locals, they would prefer spots where locals cannot grow maize and Norse can occupy sizable pastures - yet close enough to the maizer grower populations for convenient trade.

 

[altwere]

Saint -Jean-Sur- Richelieu is east of Montreal and the Richelieu River is big enough so that oneone traveling up river to Montreal will miss it.

 

[chornedsnorkack]

Saint -Jean-Sur- Richelieu is east of Montreal and the Richelieu River is big enough so that oneone traveling up river to Montreal will miss it.

Yes, and the Vikings will explore Richelieu river up to Chambly, and the rapids to Lake Champlain.

But if they want to use the 30 km portage Chambly to Champlain, they need to found 2 settlements - one at Chambly and the other at Champlain, which they otherwise would not have needed. Since Lake Champlain is only 50 km from Montreal and they are settling Montreal anyway, they can just portage the 50 km to Champlain and skip the settlement at Chambly.

Though they probably will settle at Chambly, too.

 

[Lysandros Aikiedes]

Remember that the Hudson is connected via East River to Long Island Sound, all the way east to Block Island Sound. Which is right next to Narrangansett Bay. So the naturally suited harbour of Narrangansett Bay would give inside passage, small-ship access to the whole Long Island Sound-Hudson network with tributaries like Connecticut and Thames.

Manhattan Island will not be an important way to St. Lawrence because the Norse can sail up St. Lawrence itself. But the exit of Lake Champlain, at Saint-Jean-Sur-Richelieu, is just 50 km from Montreal - so a logical spot for Norse settlement.

The north edge of farmers is going to be a good point for emporia.

North of that line, the hunter-gatherers are few and scattered, so the small volume of trade with them is likely to be scattered and be handled by temporarily visiting boats. South of that line, the farmers are more numerous, a better market for iron, cloth etc. - but good farmland is taken by them and hard to conquer or buy. Since the trading Viking will be wanting to grow their own barley and have pastures to raise sheep and cows instead of relying solely on maize sold by locals, they would prefer spots where locals cannot grow maize and Norse can occupy sizable pastures - yet close enough to the maizer grower populations for convenient trade.

The open-ocean traders, not to mention resident foreign merchants from Europe, for their own part, are going to be shadowing the east coast, with or without the presence of river-merchants from OTL Montreal. It may not be founded for the sake of whatever Markland-Vinlandic commonwealth polity that exists, but some sites along the east coast of North America would be founded by private parties. Someone's definitely going to take advantage of that site.

 

[chornedsnorkack]

The open-ocean traders, not to mention resident foreign merchants from Europe, for their own part, are going to be shadowing the east coast, with or without the presence of river-merchants from OTL Montreal. It may not be founded for the sake of whatever Markland-Vinlandic commonwealth polity that exists, but some sites along the east coast of North America would be founded by private parties. Someone's definitely going to take advantage of that site.

At first, no one is going to found a site for the sake of a commonwealth polity. Because even if King of Vinland or Archbishop of Vinland or Veche of Vinland exist, it will take time till they will expend their limited resources to subsidize founding a site which would not make a profit for a private party.

The Newfoundland settlers may be farming their delimited and defended areas, but they will also sail their ships south along the east coast and St. Lawrence, and trade along the coast. But they are going to weigh their decision either to trade and sail on or found a site. They are going to want a sufficient reason and a lucrative market to found a site rather than keep sailing and short-term visits - and the presence of other Norse merchants and their sites as competitors will be a consideration.

 

[altwere]

The area around the northern end of Lake Champlain is low and marshy. Reading the early accounts it was mostly spruce bog before being drained.
As for ports try Boston, Fall River and Providence.

 

[chornedsnorkack]

As for ports try Boston, Fall River and Providence.

Oh, there are lots of natural ports along Maritimes and New England coastline. Halifax, Annapolis Basin, St. John River, Portsmouth... But the problem with these natural harbours is that most of them only lead to small, unnavigable rivers and hilly forests settled only by small families of Micmac hunter-gatherers. And the next family along the coast has also more or less tolerable sheltered bay. Sure, the Norse will explore the coast, memorize and name the capes, bays and rivers, spend nights in sheltered bays or on shore, pick up water and firewood, trade with the Skraelings they meet - but they will need bigger markets to justify an emporium.

 

[Lysandros Aikiedes]

At first, no one is going to found a site for the sake of a commonwealth polity. Because even if King of Vinland or Archbishop of Vinland or Veche of Vinland exist, it will take time till they will expend their limited resources to subsidize founding a site which would not make a profit for a private party.

The Newfoundland settlers may be farming their delimited and defended areas, but they will also sail their ships south along the east coast and St. Lawrence, and trade along the coast. But they are going to weigh their decision either to trade and sail on or found a site. They are going to want a sufficient reason and a lucrative market to found a site rather than keep sailing and short-term visits - and the presence of other Norse merchants and their sites as competitors will be a consideration.

So, if they were to sail into the Caribbean Sea and eventually meet up with the Maya in Yucatan in the first place, would this lead to the necessity for a chain of ports along the east coast to facilitate frequent voyages from Vinland to the Caribbean Sea? As long as they're still doing business with Iceland and northern Europe, then the Vinlanders won't be the only party needful of goods from the region.

 

[chornedsnorkack]

So, if they were to sail into the Caribbean Sea and eventually meet up with the Maya in Yucatan in the first place, would this lead to the necessity for a chain of ports along the east coast to facilitate frequent voyages from Vinland to the Caribbean Sea?

That depends on what could be a navigationally sensible spot for this.

The Atlantic coast had maize growers - but no mounds. Does it mean that the East Coast Indians encountered all the way to Florida will be relatively poor and unorganized?

 

[Lysandros Aikiedes]

That depends on what could be a navigationally sensible spot for this.

The Atlantic coast had maize growers - but no mounds. Does it mean that the East Coast Indians encountered all the way to Florida will be relatively poor and unorganized?

What if they were looking for a a different route to the Mississippi? Which they may do if they feared the Hansas finding it themselves, and not being so reliant on the Vinlanders? Or if the Great Lake-based Metis states were acting in some way against the interests of the Vinlanders? Would this be the initial spur for the Vinlanders to go voyaging beyond Florida?

 

[Martinus Paduei]

For trading emporia to really prosper, you need trading partners who either have something very valuable to trade, or who are very numeous, so that their comparatively low value items have value in bulk. I think the Maya and the Toltecs are too far away, at least for the first several generations. I think it all comes down to the mound building cultures, which lived in the OTL American Midwest and South, and traded though most of the rest of the eastern half of OTL America.

Would agricultural goods (had the mound builders domesticated the turkey to some extent--there seems to be some evidence of it) such as corn, tobacco, and the rest of the local agricultural package, and either raw metals (I know the mound builders had copper--did they have gold and silver?) or perhaps ores, once they were shown what to look for, be enough to drive large-scale commerce with the Vinlandish?

 

[Lysandros Aikiedes]

For trading emporia to really prosper, you need trading partners who either have something very valuable to trade, or who are very numeous, so that their comparatively low value items have value in bulk. I think the Maya and the Toltecs are too far away, at least for the first several generations. I think it all comes down to the mound building cultures, which lived in the OTL American Midwest and South, and traded though most of the rest of the eastern half of OTL America.

Would agricultural goods (had the mound builders domesticated the turkey to some extent--there seems to be some evidence of it) such as corn, tobacco, and the rest of the local agricultural package, and either raw metals (I know the mound builders had copper--did they have gold and silver?) or perhaps ores, once they were shown what to look for, be enough to drive large-scale commerce with the Vinlandish?

I reckon that the late 1200-early 1300's would be about the time the Vinlanders would be searching for new markets in the Caribbean. So it wouldn't be so soon after Leif Eiriksson and Thorfinn Karlsefni establish their chiefdoms in the New World.

If Corn is already acquired from the Iroquois, Mid-Atlantic Algonquins or the Ojibwa, then copper would still be their most valuable commodity. The originally Norse emporium-settlements in the Great Lakes would within several generations, start to become a political force onto themselves. Its people largely of Iroquois and Ojibwa descent but with Norse technology, these may later evolve into city-states engaged in turf-wars. If slavery was still practised among the Norse or Iroquois, then this may drive conflicts.

If the Norse in Vinland to maintain their links with the Mississippian cultures, they could exchange horses for war-captives from around the Mississippi watershed.

 

[altwere]

The indians of the southeast from Virginia south lives in large chieftianships where each chief controlled several villages. Some of them were quite large.

 

[RGB]

i've always wanted to write a TL about a Vinland that expands similar to OTL Russia;

starting out in the 900s by vikings, by the 1400s vinlands population should be big enough to start expanding where they could easily take Labrador and northern maine and then expand deeper into canada.

This isn't a good comparison. Varangian genetic contribution to Russia is minimal, culturally and linguistically the Slavic component is paramount (over both the elite Norse and the colonised Finns), and most importantly, the area was intermittently urbanised and on the same material level as Scandinavia way before the Varangians ever sailed in.

They mostly contributed some of the political system, men for early private armies, and probably the name (Rus). This isn't too different from what the Normans did in France. You can't expect the pattern to hold in North America.

First off, there would be pandemics. Secondly, there will be severe culture differences. It's a completely different scenario.

 

[Tobit]

This isn't a good comparison. Varangian genetic contribution to Russia is minimal, culturally and linguistically the Slavic component is paramount (over both the elite Norse and the colonised Finns), and most importantly, the area was intermittently urbanised and on the same material level as Scandinavia way before the Varangians ever sailed in.

They mostly contributed some of the political system, men for early private armies, and probably the name (Rus). This isn't too different from what the Normans did in France. You can't expect the pattern to hold in North America.

First off, there would be pandemics. Secondly, there will be severe culture differences. It's a completely different scenario.

Actually the pattern would likely hold, if you imagine how long it took for Norse descended Russians to be seen by the Scandinavians as "other" the same pattern would hold true for the the American Norse to be seen as just some Skraelings. An epidemics don't really wipe out entire populations and it is likely that intermarriage would occur.

Also the idea that the natives were hunter-gatherers and few and far between is simply false. The natives of that area were mainly fishing natives and had access to some of the largest fishing stocks on earth. Using pretty advanced fishing techniques plus the natural abundance of the area they could support substantial populations.

 

[RGB]

Actually the pattern would likely hold, if you imagine how long it took for Norse descended Russians to be seen by the Scandinavians as "other" the same pattern would hold true for the the American Norse to be seen as just some Skraelings.

There was a tiny handful of Norse-descended Russians, mostly among nobles and long-distance traders, but the answer is less than 200 years at the generous end of the estimate. There was a kinship among the royals into the 11th c. but that was no different from other royal marriages elsewhere.

An epidemics don't really wipe out entire populations and it is likely that intermarriage would occur.

North America had a mortality rate of 40-70% all the way into the mid-19th c., and was probably much higher than that at initial contact. It's hard to overstate it.

Also the idea that the natives were hunter-gatherers and few and far between is simply false. The natives of that area were mainly fishing natives and had access to some of the largest fishing stocks on earth. Using pretty advanced fishing techniques plus the natural abundance of the area they could support substantial populations.

Slavs were farmers, Finns were fishermen, they sat on major trade routes, and both were iron age people. It's not the same. Blending into locals is different from rebuilding your civilization from scratch with tiny numbers.

 

[chornedsnorkack]

What if they were looking for a a different route to the Mississippi? Which they may do if they feared the Hansas finding it themselves, and not being so reliant on the Vinlanders? Or if the Great Lake-based Metis states were acting in some way against the interests of the Vinlanders? Would this be the initial spur for the Vinlanders to go voyaging beyond Florida?

Maybe. Just how developed were the Southeastern Mississippian culture people? Georgia and Carolinas? The Norse can easily enter e. g. St. Johns River from Jacksonville to beyond Palatka... if they hear of sea in the west, it will be easier to just check if the peninsula has an end. Consider the number of first settlers who did the 1000 km circumnavigation of Iceland, or Erik the Red exploring over 1000 km northwest along Greenland coast.

Regarding Hansas... when will anyone except the Vinlanders themselves develop ships suitable for trans-Atlantic trade?