Etymology
The word skræling is the only word surviving from the Old Norse dialect spoken by the medieval Norse Greenlanders. In modern Icelandic, skrælingi means a barbarian or foreigner. The origin of the word is not certain, but it is probably based on the Old Norse word skrá which meant "skin"; and as a verb, "to put in writing" (written accounts, such as the Icelandic Sagas, were put on dried skin in Iceland). The Inuit, both Thule and Dorset, as well as other indigenous people whom the Norse Greenlanders met, wore clothes made of animal skins, in contrast to the woven wool clothes worn by the Norse.
Some scholars have speculated that skrælingi came 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. But, this speculation 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. Skræling in modern Norwegian means weakling. [1]. Skrælna refers to shrinking or drying (plants for example). But, the written medieval texts do not use skræling 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).
As documented William H. Babcock in "Certain Pre-Columbian Notices of American Aborigines", the word skræling may have been the name of one of the North American tribes encountered by Norse during initial contact. The story was that Norseman Bjorn the Bonde saved two Skræling siblings from the sea. As was their custom in gratitude, the Skrælings 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 . . .” on his return to Iceland. [2]