15 Facts About Leif Erikson
BY Mark Mancini
March 2, 2018
Leif Erikson's foray into North America began over a thousand years ago—long before Columbus's 1492 journey. Read on to find out more about the intrepid explorer.
1. LEIF ERIKSON’S STORY IS CHRONICLED IN THE ICELANDIC SAGAS.
Written in the 13th and 14th centuries, the Icelandic Sagas were a set of around 40 historical narratives about the bygone Age of Vikings. Nobody knows who authored them; it’s likely that the stories came from Iceland’s rich oral tradition, passed along verbally from one generation to the next until someone committed them to paper. Like Homer’s The Iliad, the sagas seem to mix fiction and fact. However, there is archaeological evidence to back up some of the historic claims they make. Two sagas—titled The Saga of Erik the Red and The Saga of the Greenlanders—retell the adventures of a Viking named Leif Erikson. Both works agree that he traveled west of Greenland around 1000 CE. Then, he reportedly founded a settlement in present-day North America. The two accounts diverge on specifics, but both agree that Leif Erikson was one of the first Europeans—if not the first European—to ever tread on the continent.
http://mentalfloss.com/article/532073/facts-about-leif-erikson
