What if the Vikings colonised America?

RNG

Banned
What if the Vikings colonised America? Why didn't they in the first place and how could this reason be changed for them to want to colonise America? Would this mean other European nations try and get a foothold in America as well or would they miss out and by the time they got there America is colony of the Vikings? How would this change politics in Europe, would there be wars against Scandinavia in order to take America? What would the modern world look like? Would Scandinavia be powerful or would the rest of Europe have finished it off? Would technology be as advanced? What you think?
 
Why didn't they? Because the Americas had nothing to offer aside from wood which was in short supply in Greenland. There was nothing economical about colonising the Americas in the Viking Age, it's comparable to colonising the Moon nowadays for resources--you can get a lot from it, but you'll be undercut at every moment by Earth-based resources meaning you're wasting a lot of money doing so. In the Viking Age, this includes cod and furs, where more economical sources can be found in Europe. Shipbuilding is not advanced enough either at that point. Only a few centuries later, with better ships and relative depletion of fur and fisheries can you make the fur trade and cod trade from the Grand Banks competitive with that in Europe.

As has been noted in numerous threads on this subject, getting more than Newfoundland proper a colony of the Norse is very, very difficult. That's why if you want Norse America, you'd have to set another POD then Leif Erikson, like Didrik Pining in the 15th century and Denmark-Norway going back to Vinland and exploiting the Grand Banks and fur trade decades before even Columbus, let alone the French.
 
Wasn't there some trouble with hostility from the native Americans? Trouble in Europe might have forced the colonies to grow and become permanent. Over decades, they could have spread southward. It just didn't happen and there are probably many threads on this site over the issue.
 
Wasn't there some trouble with hostility from the native Americans? Trouble in Europe might have forced the colonies to grow and become permanent. Over decades, they could have spread southward. It just didn't happen and there are probably many threads on this site over the issue.

The indigenous Beothuk were never numerous (probably no more than a few hundred adult men), but compared to southern Greenland (barely anyone at the time) or Iceland (just a few monks), it was definitely some resistance. Overall, you were better just to go to Iceland or Greenland instead of even further on a very long chain of colonies.
 
Labrador and L'Anse Aux Meadows have very harsh, cold climates. Apparently, the Vikings went up the St. Lawrence, the extent to which is debatable. They did not see promising territory to colonize. Now, had they sailed southward to Nova Scotia, history could have been very different. But it didn't happen. Conversely, we can imagine what might have happened if Columbus had not returned from the New World. How long before an adventurous sailing party would have tried another expedition? Maybe the first American colonies would have moved from Greenland to Newfoundland to Nova Scotia in the sixteenth century.
 
Labrador and L'Anse Aux Meadows have very harsh, cold climates. Apparently, the Vikings went up the St. Lawrence, the extent to which is debatable. They did not see promising territory to colonize. Now, had they sailed southward to Nova Scotia, history could have been very different. But it didn't happen. Conversely, we can imagine what might have happened if Columbus had not returned from the New World. How long before an adventurous sailing party would have tried another expedition? Maybe the first American colonies would have moved from Greenland to Newfoundland to Nova Scotia in the sixteenth century.

The Mikmaq are a much more formidable foe than the Beothuk, and the Greenlandic settlers don't really have an advantage over the Mikmaq in terms of anything aside from iron weapons and armour which will be in short supply. They'd probably merge with the Mikmaq in the long run if they weren't utterly destroyed.

Otherwise, nicer places in Newfoundland like the Avalon peninsula compare favourably to the southern tip of Greenland or better parts of Iceland (all are better than Labrador). There still isn't much there, though.
 
The "Vikings" weren't a polity that could effectively coordinate a colonial policy. Indeed, it was the lack of the sort of stronger states that could impose a monopoly on force or directly move an areas resources towards some particular large scale project that allowed for that class of adventurer-raider-merchant to even exist.
 

Onlooker

Banned
Have the Scandinavian population explosion continue while their other expansion attempts fail, such as Russia, Normandy, Bretagne and England without making any leeway. Unable to push into Europe with huge population they would be eager for any kind of release and North America might provide it easily
 
Have the Scandinavian population explosion continue while their other expansion attempts fail, such as Russia, Normandy, Bretagne and England without making any leeway. Unable to push into Europe with huge population they would be eager for any kind of release and North America might provide it easily
It would take a different level of Scandinavian prosperity in the generations (or centuries) after the early expeditions. If they can make it to Newfoundland, they could make it farther south. The challenge would be to build a timeline that expands the Nordic population in the 11th and 12th centuries.
 
Top