History of Greenland - SpeedyLook encyclopedia

The history of Greenland is divided into several very distinct phases. Colonized successively or in parallel by various people (Inuits, Scandinavians, etc), the Greenland enjoys an important autonomy within the Royaume of Denmark since 1979.

Prehistory of Greenland (- 2500 - 950)

The Préhistoire of Greenland is a succession of waves of immigration coming from the islands of North America. Being one of the most remote outposts of these cultures, the life of these immigrants was due often only to one wire and various people followed one another during the centuries. The Archéologie can give only approximate periods for these various cultures.

Towards -2500 took place the first Amerindian wave of migration of S towards the Greenland. It was members about the Culture Saqqaq. They left traces of camps of hunting, in particular in the Disko bay and in Qaja, close to the Fjord Jakobshavn (Ilulissat) then disappeared towards -800.

Towards -2400, another culture, named Independence I, was established in Greenland, but in the northern part of the island. This culture would have disappeared towards -1300.

Towards -800, a named culture Indépendance II is also established it in the north of Greenland, and will disappear right before the beginning from the Christian era.

Towards -800 always, another culture is established in Greenland: after having occupied all the island, the culture of Dorset. It will disappear towards 300, to return at the 8th century.

Vikings in Greenland (10th century-15th century)

General chronology

beginning of the 10th century - Discovered of Greenland by Gunnbjörn Ulfsson.
982 - Exploration and Colonization by Erik the Red.
1124 - the king of Norway names the first bishop of Greenland, with Garðar.
1261 - Greenland admits Norwegian sovereignty in exchange of the insurance to be visited by two boats per annum. The trade with Greenland becomes a royal Monopole then.
1349 - 1350 - the Black Death kills half of the population.
1362 - a text mentions that a forwarding had been carried out to drive out the Inuit S of the establishment of the west, but that “they found nobody, neither Christians nor heretics.”
1368 - last boat sent by the king of Norway
1378 - died of the last bishop
1379 - Inuits kill 18 Norwegian and capture a woman and two children
1397 - Norway, and thus Greenland, pass under Danish domination
1410 - last return of a smuggler of Greenland (the trade with Greenland remains a royal monopoly, even if no boat ensures it); it does not announce anything abnormal.
1435 - last vestige (a dress) dated with the radiocarbon.
1576 - redécouverte of Greenland by Martin Frobisher.
1607 - forwarding of research of the Norwegian colony of Greenland (basing itself on its name, she seeks it on the east coast and does not find it).
1723 - redécouverte of the establishment of the east by Hans Egede.

The discovery of Greenland

According to the Icelandic saga S, some Gunnbjörn Ulfsson would have discovered towards 930 the rocks which bear its name today, whereas its ship was diverted of its race at the time of the voyage from Norway in Iceland. These rocks, which it named Gunnbjarnarsker (Rocks of Gunnbjörn), are probably located near Angmagssalik. They would have been then inhabited until the 17th century. It there did not unload, but brought back the news to Iceland.

In 982, Érik the Red, rich landowner banished of Norway then of Iceland for murder leaves to research this ground, it explores the east coast then the west coast. According to the sagas, it named this ground Green Pays “because people would have strong envies to go there if this country bore a beautiful name”. In fact, if this name can appear astonishing for this country, really it is not a question of a misleading advertizing: " At the beautiful season, Greenland can, on its coasts, to present the vast wide ones of a green indeed little banal".

It returned to Iceland three years to later convince of other colonists to accompany it in Greenland. A new forwarding then left Iceland in 985 with 25 ships. Only 14 arrived at destination.

Scandinavian establishments in Greenland

Life of the colonists

The colony founded by Érik the Red counted to approximately 5000 people (3000 only according to Régis Boyer), in 250 farms gathered around fourteen principal churches, distributed for the three quarters in the “establishments of the east” ( Eystribyggd ) located all at the south-south-west of the island (Qaqortoq), and for a quarter in the “establishments of the west” ( Vestribyggd ), located five hundred kilometers more at north (Nuuk).

The whole of the colonies founded in Greenland will be copied almost in any point on their fatherland of origin, Iceland. Thus, until its disappearance, this colony remained radically European, immediately adopting all the cultural, vestimentary and different evolutions of the Métropole. As the establishments remained deserted 15th century almost until our days, their vestiges constitute the remainders best preserved European rural settlements of the Moyen-âge.

Like the Viking S of Norway and other Atlantic colonies, the colonists were peasants who practiced primarily the breeding. In the first years the high species were the same ones as in Norway or in Iceland (Vache S, Cochon S), but, as in Iceland, of the less prestigious species (Mouton S, Chèvre S) but more robust replaced them gradually. Indeed the Climat Greenlandic forces to nourish the cows and the pigs with the cattle shed most of the year and thus to cultivate Fourrage, which pushes badly under these latitudes. Only the richest farmers continued to raise cows, especially for their milk. The most important farms, like that of Eirik with Brattahlid or that of the bishop with Gardar, counted more than one hundred cows. There is on the other hand no vestige of animals of farmyard in the establishments.

According to Jared Diamond, which is based on archaeological statements, the colonists also practiced the Chasse (Renne S and Phoque S, the latter being able to constitute the three quarters of the food mode in the poorest farms) but oddly at all the fishing, even during the last period, where the food intakes became insufficient. This absence of the Poisson in the food mode of the colonists, whereas the fresh water and of sea is particularly full of fish and that the Norwegians of metropolis had a made up mode for half of fish is one of the principal archaeological mysteries of the colony, before even his disappearance.

This absence of fish in the food of the Vikings of Greenland does not achieve however the unanimity. Else Rosedahl affirms thus that " the colonists exploited also the rich person resources of fish, and baleines". Régis Boyer supported the same point of view in one of its works.

The colonists practiced a kind of Transhumance, occupying of the refuges located on the highlands (400 meters to the maximum) during the summer. It hurried to make a thin harvest there and made there feed their animals time for the pastures of the principal farm to recover from the pasture of spring.

The establishments, particularly those of the west, were in extreme cases extreme of the zone where the Agriculture is possible and a year a little colder or a winter a little longer could compromise the animal feed, and, therefore, the survival of the inhabitants. Indeed it was not possible with the Middle Ages to import food even from Iceland: taking into account the listed voyages, the average volume of the Importation S was to be only three kilos per anybody and per annum.

Principal the Exportation S of Greenland was the Ivoire of Morse (which constituted a substitute with the ivory of elephant before the Croisades do not make it possible to find access to this resource) and the fur of Polar bear, like, as in Iceland, the vaðmal , a wool fabric. The principal imports were also products of prestige, plus the Bois (extremely rare in Greenland), the Fer (whose manufacture would have required too great quantities of wood) and the Goudron (obtained by coniferous timber heating).

The colonists had only some rowing boats, of small size, used for the hunting for the Morse, but of any boat of open sea.

In spite of the poverty of the colony, constructions of prestige were high. The church of Hvalsey is one of the rare stone monuments of the Norwegian colonies of the Atlantic, the cathedral of Gardar was as large as the two cathedrals of Iceland which served a population ten times more important, and most of the imports, reducing as much iron and wood loadings, was intended for religious furniture.

The explorations carried out starting from Greenland

The elements brought back hereafter rest mainly on written sources of the Middle Ages, that they are Icelandic sagas ( Saga d' Erik the Red , Saga of the Greenlanders , Dit of the Greenlanders ) or Western sources (chronic of Adam of Bremen, in particular). The archaeological evidence is extrêmements thin, of the vestiges having been found only with the Handle in Meadows.

Towards 985, according to the Saga of the Greenlanders , Bjarni Herjólfsson, going from Iceland to Greenland, is diverted and sees a covered ground of forests in the south-west of Greenland.

In 1000, Leif the Lucky, wire of Érik, bought the boat of Bjarni and put in search new ground. He discovered several parts of the American continent, probably the Baffin Island, the Labrador, and Newfoundland, where he set up “hutments”. Then it returns to Greenland.

His/her Thorvald brother spent the next winter in the “hutments of Leif” ( Leifsbuðir ) then explored the area. The Norwegians met nine Indian, and they killed eight out of them. The reprisals were not made wait: Thorvald was killed in the combat which followed and the survivors returned to Greenland.

In 1005 Thorfinn Karlsefni, son-in-law of Eirik, took along an about sixty men to colonize the area explored by Leif. After two winters, the relations with the Indians became too bad so that the colony can be viable and the Norwegians gave up definitively America then. The exploration of the site of the Handle in Meadows showed, if it is indeed Leifsbuðir and that this abandonment had resulted in a calm and methodical removal.

It is nevertheless probable that forwardings were still carried out towards the Labrador to bring back of it wood, whose Greenland missed cruelly. One finds of it a trace in a text of 1347.

Causes of the disappearance of the Vikings of Greenland

Civilization European medieval established with Greenland has disappeared with 15th century initially in establishment from west, then, without the historians not having traces of the events which caused this disappearance, in the establishment of the east. However the Archéologie provides many indices making it possible to have a relatively clear idea of the situation in the last years of the colony.

The researchers could note that Greenland gradually knew a serious shortage of Fer; thus, the archeologists found only very few objects out of iron (nails, etc) and no weapon, whereas the analysis of the corpses shows that it was about a particularly violent company. The few found tools were worn until the last limit.

The study of the dumps of the establishment of the west shows that the last inhabitants had exhausted their reserves of fuel and food, and that they died certainly of hunger and cold. With the disappearance of the establishment of the west, the colonists lost the access to their principal exports of high value.

At present however, no certainty can be presented and the answers to be brought to this question do not achieve the unanimity. It is thus necessary to present several different points of view in this chapter.

Jared Diamond considers that all the five factors which it listed as causes of the collapse of the companies played simultaneously in the case of Greenland: anthropic degradation of the environment, Climate change, neighbors hostile, defection of friendly business partners (falls of the courses of the ivory and the fur of bear), answers unsuited to the other factors:

the Palynologie watch that the Norwegians discovered a covered country of forests of Saule S and of Bouleau X that they hastened to clear to create of the Pâturage S. the analysis of the Sédiment S shows that the erosion accelerated brutally as of their arrival, so much so that even sand present under the topsoil was involved in the lakes.
the colonization of Greenland had started towards the beginning of the “climatic optimum of the Middle Ages”, but the climate started to cool as from the 14th century, and in 1420 the Petit Ice Age was well installed.
Contrairement to Inuits which was heated and lit using animal grease, the Norwegians continued until the end to use only wood and the Tourbe, thus worsening their environmental problems. They never tried either to imitate the techniques of hunting of Inuits.

In addition to the problems of food and climate, Régis Boyer had also evoked to him the negligence of Norway and Denmark. The Greenland knörr , which ensured an annual connection between Denmark and Greenland, will not be replaced after its destruction in 1367.

The theory of Jared Diamond does not achieve however the unanimity. Kirsten Seaver had before disputed some of the points most commonly allowed concerning the disappearance of the Norwegian colonies in Greenland. It estimated thus already which the colony was healthier than than one generally thought in the years 1980 and than the colonists had not simply died of hunger. They rather would have been exterminated at the time of European attacks or local populations, or would have given up their colonies to go either to Iceland, or with the Vinland. The absence of personal effects on these sites would suggest thus that the Vikings simply left.

Inuits (13th century-18th century)

Danish domination (1721 with today)

The second Scandinavian colonization (1721-1940)

In 1536, the kingdoms of Denmark and Norway amalgamated in only one entity. It is at this time that one started to regard Greenland as a Danish dependence, and either Norwegian. While at the same time any contact with Greenland was broken, the Kings of Denmark inlassablement continued to proclaim their sovereignty on the island. During years 1660, the polar bear was even added to the armorial bearings of the Kingdom of Denmark.

During the 17th century, the whaling brought English, Dutch and German boats in Greenland, where fishermen unloaded sometimes without never being really established there.

In 1721, a clérico-commercial forwarding carried out by the Norwegian missionary Hans Egede was sent to Greenland, not knowing if there were still a civilization and, if it were the case, if they were always catholic 200 years after the Réforme or, still worse with the eyes of Egede, if they were become again pagan. In addition to these religious elements, Greenland was also interesting from the point of view of the piscicultural economy (fisheries, industry whale-boat). Lastly, this forwarding can be seen like one of the manifestations of the Danish attempts at colonization of America.

In all the cases, Greenland opened gradually with the Danish companies of trade and closed itself for those of the other countries. The new colony was centered around Godthåb, which means " literally; Good espoir" , on the south-western coast of the island.

If Hans Egede were respected and then honoured both in Greenland and abroad, he is criticized today for his lack of respect of the values inuits and his use of the constraint. Part of Inuits which lived close to the centers of trade were converted with Christianity. Since colonization by the Danes in 1721, Inuits gradually sédentarisés and adopted a Western lifestyle. However in winter, isolated from the supplies coming from Europe, they tend to find a little their traditions of hunter and fisherman.

In 1734, the tradesman and landowner Jacob Severin put the hand on the trade and the infrastructures of Greenland. After 1750, it was not however able any more to manage competition in the field of the whaling and knew repeated failures.

In 1776, the Kongelige Grønlandske Handel (KGH) accepted the commercial monopoly for Greenland and also took again the administration of the island and the control of the missionaries activities. 18th and 19th centuries, the rise of the piscicultural economy in Greenland allowed the development of Flensburg, which is currently a German city, but which was then the second Danish port. This city benefitted particularly from the trade of the Huile of whale.

After the Napoleonean wars, in 1815, when Norway was separated from Denmark and was attached to Sweden, the colonies, whose Greenland, remained Danish. During the 19th century, the interest that the explorers of the poles and the scientists like William Scoresby or Knud Rasmussen carried to Greenland increased considerably. In same time, the colonization of Greenland became extensive, the Danes being limited less and less to the only marketing activities. The activities of the missionaries were largely crowned success. In 1861, a first newspaper in Greenlandic language was created. The Danish law applied on the other hand always only to the only colonists.

During the 19th century, new Inuits families immigrated of Canada to be established in the northern part of Greenland, which was almost uninhabited up to that point. The last group of immigrants arrived in 1864. During the same period, the Eastern coast of the island was depopulated gradually because of the increasing economic difficulties.

The first democratic elections were held in Greenland in 1862 and 1863 for assemblies of district, without however that there is not an assembly representing the whole of the territory. In 1911, two assemblies will be created, one for North and the other for the South. It will have to be waited until 1951 so that these two assemblies are brought together and that Greenland is thus equipped with a Parliament. Up to that point, all the decisions concerning Greenland were made with Copenhagen, without the Greenlanders not being represented in the Danish institutions.

After having obtained its independence supplements in 1905, the Norway refused to accept Danish sovereignty on Greenland, which was an old Norwegian possession. It put in particular ahead the fact that the Traité of Kiel was not reported, according to it, that with the economic use of the colonies of the west of Greenland. It accepted however that Greenland remains Danish, but the polemic burst again when Denmark decided to close Greenland with the not-Danes. Following that, in 1931, Norwegian fishermen, in particular the whaler Hallvard Devold, occupied the uninhabited Eastern coast of Greenland, on their own initiative. The Norwegian government, put in front of the accomplished fact, supported this occupation afterwards. In 1933, the International Court of Justice had to slice and decided in favor of Denmark. Norway accepted this judgment.

In addition, an activity of breeding was reintroduced in 1924, to reduce the Chômage, with the same environmental consequences as at the time of the Norwegian colony. It remains only thanks to governmental subsidies.

Greenland, strategic issue of importance (1940-1979)

The second world war

During the Second world war, Denmark was occupied by Germany on April 9th, 1940. The Danish civils servant of Greenland took again themselves then the administration of the territory and the Danish ambassador in the United States, Henrik Kauffmann, announced on April 10th that it would not receive from now on any more any order of Denmark.

After German warships had emerged off the coasts of Greenland, Henrik Kauffmann signed a treaty with the United States on April 9th, 1941. This treaty gave the right to the United States to establish military bases in Greenland. This territory was used before very basic for the American observation aircrafts with research as underwater German in the Atlantic, but was also used like station of supply for some maritime missions. The Germans also on several occasions tried to use the island to establish weather stations there, but these attempts failed.

After the difficulties of the Danish government of controlling indeed the island during the war and the success of some products of export, the Greenlanders came from there to ask for a statute giving them more autonomy. These requests were supported by the United States and the Canada.

The cold war

The Cold war made it possible Greenland to acquire an strategic importance, since it controlled part of the passage between the Soviet ports of the Arctique and the Atlantic Ocean. It also became a base of observation of the possible use of intercontinental ballistic missiles, which would have passed above the Arctic.

In 1951, the treaty signed by Henrik Kauffmann with the United States during the war is replaced by another treaty, thus making it possible the air base of Thulé (with Qaanaaq) to become permanent. This same treaty placed Greenland in a military zone of the NATO which defense was to be jointly assured by Denmark and the United States.

In 1953, Inuits de Thulé were forced by Denmark to leave their residences to allow the extension of the American base. Since then, this base became a source of frictions between the Danish government and the Greenlanders. These frictions increased on January 21st, 1968 considerably, when an American B-52 transporting four hydrogen bombs was crushed close to the base, spreading great quantities of Plutonium on the ice. Although the major part of plutonium could be recovered, Inuits always speak about the deformations from which still certain animals suffer.

Decolonization

In 1950, the Danish monopoly on the trade is abolished and Greenland is opened with the free trade. The Kongelige Grønlandske Handel also loses its administrative competences. The chief of the administration will be from now on a Dane named by Copenhagen and a Parliament will be elected democratically.

The coming into effect of the new Danish constitution, on June 5th, 1953, changed the statute of Greenland. It was not any more one colony, but became a Danish province ( amt ), made up of eighteen communes. Since this date, Greenland also sends two deputies democratically elected to the Danish Parliament, the Folketing. August 30th, 1955, finally, a Ministry for Greenland is created in Denmark. There will remain until 1987.

The opening of Greenland to the free trade did not remain however without effect on the Inuit culture. Much of them spoke indeed about cultural colonization, from which they had been protected up to that point by the insulation from the island.

During the first decades which followed the second world war, the Inuit culture was indeed catapulted brutally in the industrial era. If this upheaval incontestably created better living conditions and better possibilities of formation, it led also Inuits in a deep identity crisis. The Alcoholism and the Criminalité became important problems then.

Autonomy (1979 with today)

After adhesion of Denmark, and thus of Greenland, of Economic community European in 1973 (in spite of the fact that the Greenlanders had massively rejected adhesion by 70.3% of the voters), of many inhabitants thought that the statute of county of overseas obtained in 1953 was not sufficient and the local political parties then started to ask for the territorial Autonomie. In 1975, a joint committee dano-Greenlander was created and, three years later, the Danish Parliament granted this autonomy. It came into effect the following year, after the Greenlanders had approved this statute by Référendum, on January 17th, 1979.

February 23rd, 1982, 53% of the Greenlanders decided for the withdrawal of the European Economic community, decision which was effective in 1985 and which remains a single case to date. The piscicultural economy was a determining stake in this vote. The fact of being member of the European Union indeed made it possible to the European fishermen to come in Greenlandic water, which disadvantaged the local fishermen.

Autonomous Greenland is presented itself in the form of a Inuit nation. The place names in Danish were replaced by the names inuits. Thus, Godthåb, its capital and center Danish civilization on the island, became Nuuk. In 1985, Greenland adopted its own flag, using the colors of the Danish flag.

Even the International relations, which were formerly spring of Denmark, are left today partially at the local government. After having left the European Economic community, Greenland thus signed a special treaty with this specific institution and, especially, several treaties with the Iceland, the Faroe Islands and the Inuits populations of the Canada and Russia. It was also one of the founding members of the Arctic Conseil in 1996.

The renegotiation of the treaty of 1951 with the east United States with the day order and the Commission on the self-determination which sat between 1999 and 2003 suggested that the air base of Thulé becomes an international center of monitoring and satellite follow-up, placed under the authority of the the United Nations. The United States would wish, them, capacity to install in Greenland a station of their anti-missile shield.

If modern technologies made Greenland more accessible, an international airport is always lacking with the capital, Nuuk.

References

Random links:

Jaime Gavilán Martínez | Behavioral ecology | Blazon of Totatiche | Large slam of Rugby to XV | Welsh Lucien