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History of Greenland

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History of Greenland



 
 
The history of Greenland, the world's largest island
Island

An island or isle is any piece of land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls are called islets....
, is the history of life under extreme Arctic
Arctic

The Arctic is the region around the Earth's North Pole, opposite the Antarctica region around the South Pole. The Arctic includes the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Greenland , Russia, the United States , Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland....
 conditions: an ice cap
Ice cap

An ice cap is an ice mass that covers less than 50 000 km? of land area . Masses of ice covering more than 50 000 km? are termed an ice sheet....
 covers about 95 percent of the island, largely restricting human activity to the coasts.

The first humans are thought to have arrived around 2500 BC.






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Kayakbearhunter
The history of Greenland, the world's largest island
Island

An island or isle is any piece of land that is surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls are called islets....
, is the history of life under extreme Arctic
Arctic

The Arctic is the region around the Earth's North Pole, opposite the Antarctica region around the South Pole. The Arctic includes the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Greenland , Russia, the United States , Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland....
 conditions: an ice cap
Ice cap

An ice cap is an ice mass that covers less than 50 000 km? of land area . Masses of ice covering more than 50 000 km? are termed an ice sheet....
 covers about 95 percent of the island, largely restricting human activity to the coasts.

The first humans are thought to have arrived around 2500 BC. This group apparently died out and were succeeded by several other groups migrating from continental North America
North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
. To Europeans, Greenland
Greenland

Greenland is a member country of the Kingdom of Denmark located between the Arctic Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago....
 was unknown until the 10th century, when Iceland
Iceland

Iceland, officially the Republic of Iceland , is an island country located in the North Atlantic Ocean between mainland Europe and Greenland....
ic Viking
Viking

A Viking is one of the Norsemen explorers, warriors, merchants, and Piracy who raided and colonized wide areas of Europe from the late eighth to the early eleventh century....
s settled on the southwestern coast. This part of Greenland was apparently unpopulated at the time when the Vikings arrived; the direct ancestors of the modern Inuit
Inuit

Inuit is a general term for a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic regions of Canada, Greenland, Russia and Alaska, United States....
 Greenlanders are not thought to have arrived until around AD 1200 from the northwest. The Norse settlements
Eastern Settlement

The Eastern Settlement was the largest and first settled of the three areas of Greenland settled in approximately 985 AD by Norsemen farmers from Iceland ....
 along the southwestern coast eventually disappeared after about 500 years. The Inuit thrived in the icy world of the Little Ice Age
Little Ice Age

The Little Ice Age was a period of cooling occurring after a warmer North Atlantic era known as the Medieval Warm Period or Medieval Climate Optimum....
 and were the only inhabitants of the island for several centuries. Denmark-Norway nonetheless claimed the territory, and, after centuries of no contact between the Norse Greenlanders and their Scandinavian brethren, it was feared that the Greenlanders had lapsed back into paganism
Norse mythology

Norse, Viking or Scandinavian mythology comprises the beliefs, myths and legends of the Norse paganism of the North Germanic language people, including those who settled on Faroe Islands and Iceland, where most of the written sources for Norse mythology were assembled....
; so a missionary expedition was sent out to reinstate Christianity in 1721. However, since none of the lost Norse Greenlanders were found, Denmark-Norway instead proceeded to baptize the local Inuit Greenlanders and develop trading colonies along the coast as part of its aspirations as a colonial power. Colonial privileges were retained, such as trade monopoly.

During World War II
World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
, Greenland became effectively detached, socially and economically, from Denmark and became more connected to the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
 and Canada
Canada

Canada is a country occupying most of northern North America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean....
. After the war, control was returned to Denmark, and, in 1953, the colonial status was transformed into that of an overseas amt
Amt (subnational entity)

"Amt" is a type of administrative division of some northern European countries. It is generally larger than a municipality, and the term is thus roughly equivalent to a U.S....
 (county). Although Greenland is still a part of the Kingdom of Denmark
Denmark

Denmark is a Scandinavian country in northern Europe and the senior member of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries....
, it has enjoyed home rule
Home rule

Home rule refers to a demand that constituent parts of a state be given greater self-governance within the greater administrative purview of the central government....
 since 1979. In 1985, the island became the only territory to leave the European Union
European Union

The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 European Union member state, located primarily in Europe. It was established by the Treaty of Maastricht on 1 November 1993 upon the foundations of the pre-existing European Economic Community....
, which it had joined as a part of Denmark in 1973.

Early Paleo-Eskimo cultures

The prehistory
Prehistory

Prehistory is a term often used to describe the period before Recorded history. Paul Tournal originally coined the term Pr?-historique in describing the finds he had made in the caves of southern France....
 of Greenland is a story of repeated waves of Paleo-Eskimo
Paleo-Eskimo

The Paleo-Eskimo are the peoples who inhabited the Arctic region of North America before the rise of the modern Eskimo cultures across the region....
 immigration from the islands north of the North America
North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
n mainland. As one of the furthest outposts of these cultures, life was constantly on the edge and several cultures have come and then died out during the centuries. Of the period before the Norse exploration of Greenland, archaeology
Archaeology

Archaeology, archeology, or arch?ology is the science that studies Homo cultures through the recovery, documentation, analysis, and interpretation of material remains and environmental data, including architecture, Artifact , features, Biofact s, and cultural landscape....
 can give only approximate times.

The Saqqaq culture
Saqqaq culture

The Saqqaq culture was a Paleo-Eskimo culture in Greenland. The earliest known archaeological culture in southern Greenland, it existed from around 2500 BC until about 800 BC....
 is the earliest culture established in the southern and western parts of Greenland. It arose around 2500 BC and declined around 800 BC. For much of that time Saqqaq culture coexisted with the Independence I culture
Independence I culture

The Independence I culture was a Paleo-Eskimo culture that lived in northern Greenland from 2,400 to 1,000 B.C. It is named after Independence Fjord....
, which arrived in northern Greenland from Canada. The earliest culture in the northern and northeastern parts of the island, Independence I arose around 2400 BC and lasted until about 1300 BC. In around 800 BC the Independence II culture
Independence II culture

The Independence II culture was a Paleo-Eskimo culture that flourished in northern and northeastern Greenland from the 8th century BC to the 1st century BC, north and south of the Independence Fjord....
 rose in the same area where rose Independence I. Independence II has been called an intermediate phase between the earlier cultures and the Dorset culture
Dorset culture

The Dorset culture were a Paleo-Eskimo culture that preceded the Inuit culture in Arctic North America. Inuit legends mention the Tuniit or Sivullirmiut , who were driven away by the Inuit....
, which arrived in Greenland in around 700 BC; recent studies have shown the cultures may be identical within Greenland. For this reason the cultures have been designated "Greenlandic Dorset." The most recent dates for Independence II artifacts are from the second or first century BC. The Early Dorset culture existed in Greenland until about AD 200, and artifacts have been found as far north as Inglefield Land on the west coast and the Dove Bugt area on the east coast.

There is general consensus that, after the collapse of the Early Dorset culture, the island remained unpopulated for several centuries. The next to arrive may have been people belonging to the Late Dorset culture, perhaps as early as AD 800. The Late Dorset culture was limited to the northwest part of the island, and disappeared around AD 1300. The Norse
Norsemen

Norsemen is used to refer to the group of people as a whole who speak one of the North Germanic languages as their native language. The meaning of Norseman was "people from the North" and was applied primarily to Nordic people originating from southern and central Scandinavia....
 arrived in AD 980 and began to colonize the island.

Norse settlement

Islands off Greenland were sighted by Gunnbjörn Ulfsson
Gunnbjörn Ulfsson

Gunnbj?rn Ulfsson , name also given as Gunnbj?rn Ulf-Krakuson, was the first European to sight North America.Ulfsson was blown off course while sailing from Norway to Iceland....
 when he was blown off course while sailing from Norway to Iceland, probably in the early 10th century. During the 980s, explorers from Iceland
Iceland

Iceland, officially the Republic of Iceland , is an island country located in the North Atlantic Ocean between mainland Europe and Greenland....
 and Norway
Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a constitutional monarchy in Northern Europe that occupies the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula....
 arrived at mainland Greenland and, finding the land unpopulated, settled on the southwest coast. The name Greenland (Grænland in Old Norse
Old Norse

Old Norse is a North Germanic languages that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
 and modern Icelandic
Icelandic language

Icelandic is a North Germanic languages, the language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese language and Norwegian dialects such as Telemark dialect and Sognam?l....
, Grønland in modern Danish
Danish language

Danish is one of the North Germanic languages , a sub-group of the Germanic languages branch of the Indo-European languages. It is spoken by around 6 million people, mainly in Denmark; the language is also used by the 50,000 Danes in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein in Germany where it holds the status of minority language....
 and Norwegian
Norwegian language

Norwegian is a North Germanic languages language spoken primarily in Norway, where it is an official language. It is also spoken as a second language among Norwegian-Americans in the United States of America, especially in the central northern states....
) has its roots in this colonization and is attributed to Erik the Red
Erik the Red

Erik the Red founded the first Nordic countries colonization in Greenland. Born in the J?ren district of Rogaland, Norway, as the son of ?orvaldr ?svaldsson , he therefore also appears, patronymically, as Erik Thorvaldsson ....
 (the modern Inuit call it Kalaallit Nunaat, meaning "Land of the Kalaallit (Greenlanders)"). There are two written sources on the origin of the name, in The Book of Icelanders (Íslendingabók
Íslendingabók

?slendingab?k, Libellus Islandorum or The Book of Icelanders is an historical work dealing with early history of Iceland. The author was an Icelandic priest, Ari ?orgilsson, working in the early 12th century....
), an historical work dealing with early Icelandic history from the 12th century, and in the medieval Icelandic saga, The Saga of Eric the Red
Saga of Eric the Red

Eir?ks saga rau?a or the Saga of Erik the Red is a Norse saga on the Norse colonization of the Americas.In the saga, the events that led to Erik the Red's banishment to Greenland are chronicled, as well as Leif Ericson's discovery of Vinland, after his longship was blown off course....
 (Eiríks saga rauða), which is about the Norse settlement in Greenland and the story of Erik the Red in particular. Both sources write: "He named the land Greenland, saying that people would be eager to go there if it had a good name."

At that time, the inner regions of the long fjords where the settlements were located were very different from today. Excavations show that there were considerable birch woods with birch trees up to 4 to 6 meters high in the area around the inner parts of the Tunuliarfik- and Aniaaq-fjords, the central area of the Eastern settlement, and the hills were grown with grass and willow brushes. This was due to the medieval climate optimum. The Norse soon changed the vegetation by cutting down the trees to use as building material and for heating and by extensive sheep and goat grazing during summer and winter. The climate in Greenland was much warmer during the first centuries of settlement but became increasingly colder in the 14th and 15th centuries with the approaching period of colder weather known as the Little Ice Age
Little Ice Age

The Little Ice Age was a period of cooling occurring after a warmer North Atlantic era known as the Medieval Warm Period or Medieval Climate Optimum....
.

According to the sagas, Erik the Red was exiled from Iceland for a period of three years, due to a murder. He sailed to Greenland, where he explored the coastline and claimed certain lands as his own. He then returned to Iceland to bring people to settle on Greenland. The date of establishment of the colony is said, in the Icelandic sagas, to have been AD 985, when 25 ships left with Erik the Red. Only 14 arrived safely in Greenland. This date has been approximately confirmed by radiocarbon dating of some remains at the first settlement at Brattahlid
Brattahlíð

Brattahl?? was Erik the Red's estate in the Eastern Settlement Viking colony he established in south-western Greenland toward the end of the 10th century....
 (now Qassiarsuk
Qassiarsuk

Qassiarsuk is a settlement in the Kujalleq municipality, in southern Greenland. Its population is 60 . The settlement is also where Erik the Red's estate Brattahl?? used to be....
), which yielded a date of about 1000. According to the sagas, it was also in the year 1000 that Erik's son, Leif Eirikson, left the settlement to discover Vinland
Vinland

Vinland was the name given to an area of North America by the Norsemen Leif Eriksson, about the year A.D. 1001.In 1960 archaeology evidence of the only known Norse colonization of the Americas in North America was found at L'Anse aux Meadows on the northern tip of the island of Newfoundland , in what is now the Canada province of Newfoundl...
, generally assumed to be located in what is now Newfoundland.

Hvalsey
This colony existed as three settlement areas — the larger Eastern settlement
Eastern Settlement

The Eastern Settlement was the largest and first settled of the three areas of Greenland settled in approximately 985 AD by Norsemen farmers from Iceland ....
, the smaller Western settlement
Western Settlement

The Western Settlement was the smaller of the two main areas of Greenland settled in around 985 AD by Norsemen farmers from Iceland . There was also a third, still smaller area known as the Ivittuut....
, and the still smaller Middle Settlement
Ivittuut

Ivittuut, was a municipality , located on the coast of Arsuk fjord in southern Greenland. With an area of just 100 km? , it was the smallest municipality of Greenland, bordering on the former Narsaq municipality in the north, east, and south, and on the west by the Labrador Sea....
 (which is sometimes considered part of the Eastern). Population estimates vary from highs of only 2000 to as many as 10,000 people. More recent estimates such as that of Dr. Niels Lynnerup in "Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga by Fitzhugh Ww and William W. Fitzhugh", have tended toward the lower figure. Ruins of around 600 farms have been found in the two settlements, 500 in the Eastern settlement, 95 in the Western settlement, and 20 in the Middle. This was a significant colony (the population of modern Greenland is only 56,000) and it carried on trade in ivory
Ivory

File:Ivory decoration.jpgIvory is formed from dentine and constitutes the bulk of the teeth and tusks of animals such as the elephant, hippopotamus, walrus, mammoth and narwhal....
 from walrus
Walrus

The walrus is a large pinniped marine mammal with a discontinuous circumpolar distribution in the Arctic Ocean and sub-Arctic seas of the Northern Hemisphere....
 tusk
Tusk

Tusks are unusually long teeth, usually but not always in pairs, that protrude well beyond the mouth of certain mammal species. They are most commonly canine tooth, as with warthogs, boar , and walruses, or, in the case of elephants and narwhals, elongated incisors....
s with Europe as well as exporting rope, sheep, seals and cattle hides according to one 13th century account. The colony depended on Europe (Iceland and Norway) for iron tools, wood, especially for boat building, which they also may have obtained from coastal Labrador
Labrador

Labrador is a region of Atlantic Canada. Together with the island of Newfoundland from which it is separated by the Strait of Belle Isle, it constitutes the province of Newfoundland and Labrador....
, supplemental foods, and religious and social contacts. Trade ships from Iceland and Norway (from late 13th century all ships were forced by law to sail directly to Norway) traveled to Greenland every year and would sometimes overwinter in Greenland.

In 1126, a diocese
Diocese

In many rites of the Roman Catholic Church and in Anglicanism, a diocese is an administrative territorial unit administered by a bishop. It is also referred to as a bishopric or Episcopal Area or episcopal see, though strictly the term episcopal see refers to the domain of ecclesiastical authority officially held by the bi...
 was founded at Garðar
Gardar, Greenland

Gar?ar was the 'capital' of the Norse settlements in Greenland and seat of the bishop of Greenland. Presently the settlement of Igaliku is situated on the same location....
 (now Igaliku
Igaliku

Igaliku is a settlement located between Qaqortoq and Narsarsuaq in southern Greenland, in the Kujalleq municipality. Its population in 2005 was 60....
). It was subject to the Norwegian
Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a constitutional monarchy in Northern Europe that occupies the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula....
 archdiocese of Nidaros
Nidaros

Nidaros was the old name of Trondheim , a city of Norway, in the Middle Ages. Nidaros was Northern Europe's most important Christian pilgrimage site during this time, the pilgrims' goal being the Christ Church, also known as the Nidaros Cathedral, established as the seat of the archdiocese of all Norway in 1152 by Pope Adrian IV, who later be...
 (now Trondheim
Trondheim

is a city and Municipalities of Norway in S?r-Tr?ndelag Counties of Norway, Norway. The city of Trondheim was established as a municipality on 1 January 1838 ....
); at least five churches in Norse Greenland are known from archeological remains. In 1261, the population accepted the overlordship of the Norwegian King
List of Norwegian monarchs

Members of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark royal families have been Norwegian monarchs. Norwegian territories were not united until about 860 and were ruled by Jarl #Norway....
 as well, although it continued to have its own law
LAW

LAW may refer to:* Anti-tank warfare, e.g. the US Army M72 LAW or the British Army LAW 80*Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights ...
. In 1380 the Norwegian kingdom entered into a personal union with the Kingdom of Denmark
Denmark

Denmark is a Scandinavian country in northern Europe and the senior member of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries....
. After initially thriving, the Norse settlements declined in the 14th century. The Western Settlement was abandoned around 1350. In 1378, there was no longer a bishop
Bishop

A bishop is an ordination or consecration member of the Clergy#Christian clergy who is generally entrusted with a position of authority and oversight....
 at Garðar. After 1408, when a marriage was recorded, not many written records mention the settlers. There are correspondence between the Pope and the Biskop Bertold af Garde from same year. The Danish Cartographer Claudius Clavus seem to have visited Greenland in 1420 from documents written by Nicolas Germanus and Henricus Martellus who had access to original cartographic notes and map by Clavus. Two mathematical manuscripts containing the second chart of the Claudius Clavus map from his travel to Greenland where he himself mapped the area were found during the late 20th Century by the Danish scholar Bjönbo and Petersen. (Source: originals in Hofbibliothek at Vienna. A Greenlander in Norway, on visit; it is also mentioned in a Norwegian Diploma from 1426, [Peder Grønlendiger] source: Diplomatarium Norwegicum bind 13 nr 91.)

It is probable that the Eastern Settlement was defunct by the middle 15th century although no exact date has been established.

The demise of the Greenland Norse settlements

There are many theories as to why the Norse settlements collapsed in Greenland. Jared Diamond
Jared Diamond

Jared Mason Diamond is an American evolutionary biologist, physiologist, biogeography, lecturer, and nonfiction author. Diamond works as a professor of geography and physiology at University of California, Los Angeles....
, author of Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed
Collapse (book)

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed is a 2005 book by Jared Diamond, professor of geography and physiology at University of California, Los Angeles....
, suggests that some or all of five factors contributed to the demise of the Greenland colony: cumulative environmental damage, gradual climate change, conflicts with hostile neighbors, the loss of contact and support from Europe, and, perhaps most crucial, cultural conservatism and failure to adapt to an increasingly harsh natural environment. Numerous studies have tested these hypotheses and some have led to significant discoveries. On the other hand there are dissenters: In The Frozen Echo, Kirsten Seaver contests some of the more generally-accepted theories about the demise of the Greenland colony. Thus Seaver asserts that the Greenland colony, towards the end, was healthier than Diamond and others have thought. Seaver believes that the Greenlanders cannot have starved to death. They may rather have been wiped out by Inuit or unrecorded European attacks, or they may have abandoned the colony to return to Iceland or to seek out new homes in Vinland
Vinland

Vinland was the name given to an area of North America by the Norsemen Leif Eriksson, about the year A.D. 1001.In 1960 archaeology evidence of the only known Norse colonization of the Americas in North America was found at L'Anse aux Meadows on the northern tip of the island of Newfoundland , in what is now the Canada province of Newfoundl...
. However, these arguments seem to conflict with the physical evidence from archeological studies of the ancient farm sites. The paucity of personal belongings at these sites is typical of North Atlantic Norse sites that were abandoned in an orderly fashion, with any useful items being deliberately removed but to others it suggests a gradual but devastating impoverishment. Midden heaps at these sites do show an increasingly impoverished diet for humans and livestock.

Greenland was always colder in winter than Iceland and Norway, and its terrain less hospitable to agriculture. Erosion of the soil was a danger from the beginning, one that the Greenland settlements may not have recognized until it was too late. For an extended time, nonetheless, the relatively warm West Greenland current flowing northwards along the southwestern coast of Greenland made it feasible for the Norse to farm much as their relatives did in Iceland or northern Norway. Palynologists' tests on pollen counts and fossilized plants prove that the Greenlanders must have struggled with soil erosion and deforestation
Deforestation

Deforestation is the logging or burning of trees in forested areas. There are several reasons for doing so: trees or derived charcoal can be sold as a commodity and are used by humans while cleared land is used as pasture, plantations of commodities and human settlement....
. As the unsuitability of the land for agriculture became more and more patent, the Greenlanders resorted first to pastoralism
Pastoralism

File:Nomadic Camping .jpgPastoralism or pastoral farming is the branch of agriculture concerned with the raising of livestock. It is animal husbandry: the care, tending and use of animals such as camels, goats, cattle, yaks, llamas, sheep, and so forth....
 and then to hunting for their food. But they never learned to use the hunting techniques of the Inuit, one being a farming culture, the other living on hunting in more northern areas with pack ice.

To investigate the possibility of climatic cooling, scientists drilled into the Greenland ice caps to obtain core samples. The oxygen isotopes from the ice caps suggested that the Medieval Warm Period had caused a relatively milder climate in Greenland, lasting from roughly 800 to 1200. However from 1300 or so the climate began to cool. By 1420, we know that the "Little Ice Age"
Little Ice Age

The Little Ice Age was a period of cooling occurring after a warmer North Atlantic era known as the Medieval Warm Period or Medieval Climate Optimum....
 had reached intense levels in Greenland. Excavations of midden or garbage heaps from the Viking farms in both Greenland and Iceland show the shift from the bones of cows and pigs to those of sheep and goats. As the winters lengthened, and the springs and summers shortened, there must have been less and less time for Greenlanders to grow hay. By the mid-fourteenth century deposits from a chieftain
Tribal chief

A traditional tribal chief is the leadership of a tribe, or the head of a tribal form of self-government.The notion of a "tribal chief" is rather vague and arbitrary; neither chief nor tribe is clearly defined, so in many cases other designations are used for the same institution, such as petty ruler or even headman ....
’s farm showed a large number of cattle and caribou remains, whereas, a poorer farm only several kilometers away had no trace of domestic animal remains, only seal. Bone samples from Greenland Norse cemeteries confirm that the typical Greenlander diet had increased by this time from 20% sea animals to 80%.

Although Greenland seems to have been uninhabited at the time of initial Norse settlement, after a couple of centuries the Norse in Greenland had to deal with the Inuit
Inuit

Inuit is a general term for a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic regions of Canada, Greenland, Russia and Alaska, United States....
. The Thule-Inuit
Thule people

The Thule or proto-Inuit were the ancestors of all modern Canadian Inuit. They arrived in Alaska from north-eastern Siberia in around the year 500 Anno Domini and Nunavut, Canada in 1000 AD....
 were the successors of the Dorset
Dorset culture

The Dorset culture were a Paleo-Eskimo culture that preceded the Inuit culture in Arctic North America. Inuit legends mention the Tuniit or Sivullirmiut , who were driven away by the Inuit....
 who migrated south and finally came into contact with the Norse in the 12th century. There are limited sources showing the two cultures interacting; however, scholars know that the Norse referred to the Inuit (and Vinland natives) as skraeling. The Icelandic Annals are among the few existing sources that confirm contact between the Norse and the Inuit. They report an instance of hostility initiated by the Inuit against the Norse, leaving eighteen Greenlanders dead and two boys carried into slavery. Archeological evidence seems to show that the Inuit traded with the Norse. On the other hand, the evidence shows many Norse artifacts at Inuit sites throughout Greenland and on the Canadian Arctic islands but very few Inuit artifacts in the Norse settlements. This may indicate either European indifference—an instance of cultural resistance to Inuit crafts among them—or perhaps hostile raiding by the Inuit. It is also quite possible that the Norse were trading for perishable items such as meat and furs and had little interest in other Inuit items, much as later Europeans who traded with Native Americans.

We know that the Norse never learned the Inuit techniques of kayak
Kayak

A kayak is a small human-powered boat. It typically has a covered deck, and a cockpit covered by a spraydeck. The kayak was used by the native Ainu people, Aleuts and Eskimo hunters in sub-Arctic regions of northeastern Asia, North America and Greenland....
 navigation or ring seal hunting. Indeed, they never learned to adjust to the cold winters as the Inuit did. Archeological evidence plainly establishes that by 1300 or so the Inuit had successfully expanded their winter settlements as close to the Europeans as the outer fjords of the Western Settlement. Yet by 1350, the Norse, for whatever reasons, had completely deserted their Western Settlement. It may also have to do with the Inuit being a hunting society, hunted the Norse livestock, forcing the Norse into conflict or abandonment.

In mild weather conditions, a ship could make the 900-mile (1400 kilometers) trip from Iceland to Eastern Settlement within a couple of weeks. Greenlanders had to keep in contact with Iceland and Norway in order to trade. Little is known about any distinctive shipbuilding techniques among the Greenlanders. We do know that they lacked the timber resources of Europe or America, however. So they were completely dependent on Icelandic merchants or, possibly, logging expeditions to the Canadian coast.

The sagas mention Icelanders traveling to Greenland to trade. But the settlement chieftains and large farm owners controlled this trade. The chieftains would trade with the foreign ships and then disperse the goods by trading with the surrounding farmers. The Greenlanders' main commodity was the walrus
Walrus

The walrus is a large pinniped marine mammal with a discontinuous circumpolar distribution in the Arctic Ocean and sub-Arctic seas of the Northern Hemisphere....
 tusk
Tusk

Tusks are unusually long teeth, usually but not always in pairs, that protrude well beyond the mouth of certain mammal species. They are most commonly canine tooth, as with warthogs, boar , and walruses, or, in the case of elephants and narwhals, elongated incisors....
, which was used primarily in Europe as a substitute for elephant ivory for art décor, whose trade had been blocked by conflict with the Islamic world. Professor Gudmundsson also suggests a very valuable narwhal tusk trade, through a smuggling route via western Iceland (where the Greenlanders came from) to the Orkney islands (where Western Icelanders came from).

Many scholars believe that the royal Norwegian monopoly on shipping contributed to the end of trade and contact. However, Christianity
Christianity

Christianity is a Monotheistic religion #Christian view religion centered on the life and teachings of Jesus as New Testament view on Jesus' life....
 and European customs continued to hold sway among the Greenlanders for the greater part of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. In 1921, a Danish historian, Paul Norland, found human remains from the Eastern Settlement in the Herjolfsnes church courtyard. The bodies were dressed in fifteenth century medieval clothing with no indications of malnutrition or genetic deterioration. Most had crucifixes around their necks with their arms crossed as in a stance of prayer. Perhaps the buried were sailors having died en route or while over wintering. It is known from Roman papal records that the Greenlanders were excused from paying their tithe
Tithe

A tithe is a one-tenth part of something, paid as a voluntary contribution or as a tax or levy, usually to support a Christian religious organization....
s in 1345 because the colony was suffering from poverty. The last reported ship to reach Greenland was a private ship that was "blown off course", reaching Greenland in 1406, and departing in 1410 with the last news of Greenland: the burning at the stake of a condemned witch, the insanity and death of the woman this witch was accused of attempting to seduce through witchcraft, and the marriage of the ship's captain, Thorsteinn Ólafsson, to another Icelander, Sigridur Björnsdóttir. However, there are some suggestions of much later unreported voyages from Europe to Greenland, possibly as late as the 1480s.

The last of the five factors points to the failure of the Norse to adapt to the changing conditions of Greenland. We know that some of the Norse left Greenland in search of a place called Vinland
Vinland

Vinland was the name given to an area of North America by the Norsemen Leif Eriksson, about the year A.D. 1001.In 1960 archaeology evidence of the only known Norse colonization of the Americas in North America was found at L'Anse aux Meadows on the northern tip of the island of Newfoundland , in what is now the Canada province of Newfoundl...
. When hostile natives injured several of them, they returned to Greenland after only 10 years. The Greenland colony survived for some 450-500 years (AD 985 to 1450-1500). The Norse struggled to adapt, as the excavations show plainly. Some of the Norse, perhaps most, dramatically changed their folkways. But it is not known whether they adapted the ways of the Inuit, even, it seems, when faced with extinction. Most likely no single factor brought about their extinction. What is plain is that the settlement died out once and for all, while contributing 5% to the West Greenlanders' DNA.

One intriguing fact is that we find very few fish remains among their middens. This has led to much speculation and argument. Most archeologists reject any decisive judgment based on this one fact, however, as fish bones decompose more quickly than other remains, and may have been disposed of in a different manner. Isotope analysis of the bones of inhabitants shows that marine food sources in fact supplied more and more of the diet of the Norse Greenlanders, making up between 50% and 80% of their diet by the 1300s.

Late Dorset and Thule cultures

Thulegreenlanderswhaling
The Norse may not have been alone on the island when they arrived; a new influx of Arctic people from the west, the Late Dorset culture, may predate them. However, this culture was limited to the extreme northwest of Greenland, far from the Norse who lived around the southern coasts. Some archaeological evidence may point to this culture slightly predating the Norse settlement. It disappeared around 1300, around the same time as the westernmost of the Norse settlements disappeared. In the region of this culture, there is archaeological evidence of gathering sites for around four to thirty families, living together for a short time during their movement cycle.

Around 1200, another Arctic culture, the Thule
Thule people

The Thule or proto-Inuit were the ancestors of all modern Canadian Inuit. They arrived in Alaska from north-eastern Siberia in around the year 500 Anno Domini and Nunavut, Canada in 1000 AD....
, arrived from the west, having emerged 200 years earlier in Alaska
Alaska

Alaska is the largest U.S. state of the United States by area; it is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait....
. They settled south of the Late Dorset culture and ranged over vast areas of Greenland's west and east coasts. These people, the ancestors of the modern Inuit
Inuit

Inuit is a general term for a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic regions of Canada, Greenland, Russia and Alaska, United States....
, were flexible and engaged in the hunting of almost all animals on land and in the ocean, including big whales. They had dogs, which the Dorset did not, and used them to pull the dog sledges; they also used bows and arrows, contrary to the Dorset. Increasingly settled, they had large food storages to avoid winter famine
Famine

A famine is a widespread shortage of food that may apply to any faunal species, which phenomenon is usually accompanied by regional malnutrition, starvation, epidemic, and increased death....
. The early Thule avoided the highest latitudes, which only became populated again after renewed immigration from Canada in the 19th century.

The nature of the contacts between the Thule, Dorset and Norse cultures are not clear, but may have included trade
Trade

Tradeis the willing exchange of goods, Service , or both. Trade is also called commerce. A mechanism that allows trade is called a market. The original form of trade was barter , the direct exchange of goods and services....
 elements. The level of contact is currently the subject of widespread debate, possibly including Norse trade with Thule or Dorsets in Canada or possible scavenging of abandoned Norse sites (see also Maine penny
Maine Penny

The Maine penny is a Norway silver penny dating to the reign of Olaf Kyrre. It was allegedly found in 1957 at the Goddard site, the extensive archeological remains of an old Indigenous peoples of the Americas settlement at Naskeag Point, Brooklin, Maine on Penobscot Bay....
). No Norse trade goods are known in Dorset archaeological sites in Greenland; the only Norse items found have been characterized as "exotic items". Carved screw threads on tools and carvings with beards found in settlements on the Canadian Arctic islands show contact with the Norse. Some stories tell of armed conflicts between, and kidnappings by, both Inuit and Norse groups. The Inuit may have reduced Norse food sources by displacing them on hunting grounds along the central west coast. These conflicts can be one contributing factor to the disappearance of the Norse culture as well as for the Late Dorset, but few see it as the main reason. Whatever the cause of that mysterious event, the Thule culture handled it better, avoiding extinction.

Later European colonization and exploration

In 1536, Denmark and Norway were officially merged by personal union
Personal union

A personal union is the combination by which two or more different states are governed by the same monarch, while their boundaries, their laws and their interests remain distinct....
 into Denmark–Norway
Denmark–Norway

Denmark?Norway is the historiography name for a former political entity, union, consisting of the kingdoms of Denmark and Norway, including the Norwegian dependencies of Iceland, Greenland and the Faroe Islands....
, and the old Norwegian land claims were taken up by the new kingdom. In the 1660s, this was marked by the inclusion of a polar bear
Polar Bear

The polar bear is a bear native to the Arctic Ocean and its surrounding seas. The world's largest carnivore found on land, and shares the title of largest land predator with the Kodiak Bear, an adult male weighs around , while an adult female is about half that size....
 in the Danish coat of arms
Coat of arms

A coat of arms, more properly called an armorial achievement, armorial bearings or often just arms for short, in European tradition, is a design belonging to a particular person and used by them in a wide variety of ways....
. In the second half of the 17th century Dutch
Netherlands

The Netherlands is a country that is part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is a parliamentary democratic constitutional monarchy. The Netherlands is located in North-West Europe, and bordered by the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east....
, German
Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
, French
France

France , officially the French Republic , is a country whose Metropolitan France is located in Western Europe and that also comprises various Overseas departments and territories of France....
, Basque
Basque Country (historical territory)

The Basque Country as a cultural region is a European region in the western Pyrenees that spans the border between France and Spain, on the Atlantic Ocean coast....
, and Dano-Norwegian ships hunted bowhead whale
Bowhead Whale

The Bowhead Whale , also known as Greenland Right Whale or Arctic Whale, is a baleen whale of the right whale family Balaenidae. A stocky dark-colored whale without a dorsal fin, it can grow to 20 meters in length....
s in the pack ice off the east coast of Greenland, regularly coming to shore to trade and replenish drinking water. Foreign trade was later forbidden by Danish monopoly merchants.

In 1721 a joint merchant-clerical expedition led by Norwegian missionary Hans Egede
Hans Egede

Hans Poulsen Egede was a Norway Lutheran missionary, called the Apostle of Greenland. Egede was an evangelist on the northern Norwegian islands of Lofoten when he heard stories about the Viking settlements in Greenland, with which contact had been lost years before....
 was sent to Greenland, not knowing whether the civilization remained there, and worried that if it did, they might still be Catholics
Catholicism

Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its Theology and doctrines, its Catholic liturgy, Ethics, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....
 200 years after the Reformation
Protestant Reformation

The Protestant Reformation was a Christian reform movement in Europe. It is thought to have begun in 1517 with Martin Luther's Ninety-Five Theses and may be considered to have ended with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648....
, or, worse yet, have abandoned Christianity altogether. The expedition can be seen as part of the Danish colonization of the Americas
Danish colonization of the Americas

Denmark and the former political union of Denmark?Norway had a Danish colonial empire from the 17th through the 20th centuries, large portions of which were found in the Americas....
. Gradually, Greenland became opened for Danish merchants, and closed to those from other countries. This new colony was centered at Godthåb
Nuuk

Nuuk is the Capital and largest city of Greenland, and the seat of government for the Sermersooq municipality. It has a population of 15,047 , of whom 11,862 were born in Greenland....
 ("Good Hope") on the southwest coast. Some of the Inuit that lived close to the trade stations were converted to Christianity
Christianity

Christianity is a Monotheistic religion #Christian view religion centered on the life and teachings of Jesus as New Testament view on Jesus' life....
. In 1733 German followers of Nicolaus Ludwig Zinzendorf
Nicolaus Ludwig Zinzendorf

Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf und Pottendorf, Imperial Count of Zinzendorf and Pottendorf, , German religious and social reformer and bishop of the Moravian Church, was born at Dresden....
 from Herrnhut
Herrnhut

Herrnhut is a municipality in the district of G?rlitz, in the Free State of Saxony, Germany.It has access to Bundesstra?e 178 between L?bau and Zittau....
 founded a mission post in South Greenland; this attracted southeast Greenlanders, who subsequently abandoned that part of the coast.

When Norway was separated from Denmark in 1814, after the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars were a series of conflicts involving Napoleon I of France First French Empire and changing sets of European allies and opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815....
, the colonies, including Greenland, remained Danish. The 19th century saw increased interest in the region on the part of polar explorers and scientists like William Scoresby
William Scoresby

William Scoresby , English Arctic explorer, scientist and divine, was born near Whitby in Yorkshire. His father, William Scoresby , made a fortune in the Arctic whale fishery....
 and Greenland-born Knud Rasmussen. At the same time, the colonial elements of the earlier trade-oriented Danish presence in Greenland expanded. In 1861, the first Greenlandic language
Inuktitut

Inuktitut is the name of the varieties of Inuit language spoken in Canada. It is spoken in all areas north of the tree line, including parts of the provinces of Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec, to some extent in northeastern Manitoba as well as the territories of Nunavut, the Northwest Territories, and traditionally on the Arctic Ocean coa...
 journal was founded. Danish law still applied only to the Danish settlers, though. At the turn of the 19th century, the northern part of Greenland was still sparsely populated; only scattered hunting inhabitants were found there. During that century, however, Inuit families immigrated from British North America
British North America

British North America consisted of the colonies and territories of the British Empire in continental North America after the end of the American Revolutionary War and the recognition of United States ....
 to settle in these areas. The last group from what later became Canada
Canada

Canada is a country occupying most of northern North America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean....
 arrived in 1864. During the same time, the Northeastern part of the coast became depopulated following the violent 1783 Lakagígar eruption in Iceland.

Democratic elections for the district assemblies of Greenland were held for the first time in 1862–1863, although no assembly for the land as a whole was allowed. In 1888, a party of six led by Fridtjof Nansen
Fridtjof Nansen

Fridtjof Wedel-Jarlsberg Nansen was a Norway explorer, scientist and diplomat. Nansen was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1922 for his work as a League of Nations High Commissioner....
 accomplished the first land crossing of Greenland. The men took 41 days to make the crossing on skis, at approximately 64°N latitude. In 1911, two Landstings were introduced, one for northern Greenland and one for southern Greenland, not to be finally merged until 1951. All this time, most decisions were made in Copenhagen
Copenhagen

Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban area with a population of 1,153,615 . Copenhagen is situated on the Islands of Zealand and Amager....
, where the Greenlanders had no representation. Towards the end of the 19th century, traders criticized the Danish trade monopoly. It was argued that it kept the natives in non-profitable ways of life, holding back the potentially large fishing
Fishing

Fishing is the activity of catching fish. Fishing techniques include Fish net, Fish trap, Spearfishing, angling and Gathering seafood by hand. The term fishing may be applied to catching other aquatic animals such as different types of shellfish, squid, octopus, turtles, Edible frog and some edible marine invertebrates....
 industry. Many Greenlanders however were satisfied with the status quo, as they felt the monopoly would secure the future of commercial whaling. It probably did not help that the only contact the local population had with the outside world was with Danish settlers. Nonetheless, the Danes gradually moved over their investments to the fishing industry.

At the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century, American explorers, including Robert Peary
Robert Peary

Robert Edwin Peary was an United States explorer who claimed to have been the first person, on April 6, 1909, to reach the geographic North Pole....
, explored the northern sections of Greenland. Peary discovered that Greenland was an island and mapped the northern coasts. These discoveries were considered to be the basis of an American territorial claim in the area. All claims in Greenland itself were ceded to Denmark by a declaration connected with the U.S. Virgin Islands
Virgin Islands

The Virgin Islands are an archipelago, part of the Leeward Islands in the Caribbean Sea. The Leeward Islands are the northern islands of the Lesser Antilles, where the Caribbean Sea meets the western Atlantic Ocean....
 purchase treaty.

Strategic importance


After Norway
Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a constitutional monarchy in Northern Europe that occupies the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula....
 regained full independence in 1905, it refused to accept Denmark's sovereignty over Greenland, which was a former Norwegian possession severed from Norway proper in 1814. In 1931, Norwegian whaler Hallvard Devold occupied uninhabited eastern Greenland, on his own initiative. After the fact, the occupation was supported by the Norwegian government, who claimed the area as Erik the Red's Land
Erik the Red's Land

Erik the Red's Land was the name given by Norwegians to an area on the coast of eastern Greenland occupied by Norway in the early 1930s. It was named after Erik the Red, the founder of the first Norsemen Eastern Settlements in Greenland in the 10th century....
. Two years later, the Permanent Court of International Justice
Permanent Court of International Justice

The Permanent Court of International Justice, sometimes called the World Court, was the international court of the League of Nations, established in 1922....
 ruled in favour of the Danish view.

Thuleairbase
During World War II
World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
, when Germany
Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany and the Third Reich are the colloquial English names for Germany under the regime of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party , which established a Totalitarianism dictatorship that existed from 1933 to 1945....
 extended its war operations to Greenland, Henrik Kauffmann, the Danish Minister to the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
 — who had already refused to recognize the German occupation of Denmark — signed a treaty with the United States on April 9, 1941, granting the US Armed Forces permission to establish stations in Greenland. Because of the difficulties for the Danish government to govern the island during the war, and because of successful export
Export

Export goods or services are provided to foreign consumers by domestic Production theory basics. It is a good that is sent to another country for sale....
, especially of cryolite
Cryolite

Cryolite is an uncommon mineral identified with the once large deposit at Ivittuut on the west coast of Greenland, which ran out in 1987....
, Greenland came to enjoy a rather independent status. Its supplies were guaranteed by the United States and Canada
Canada

Canada is a country occupying most of northern North America, extending from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west and northward into the Arctic Ocean....
.

During the Cold War
Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state of conflict, tension and competition that existed between a number of world powers, including the United States, the Soviet Union, People's Republic of China, France, United Kingdom and those countries' respective allies from the mid-1940s to the early 1990s....
, Greenland had a strategic importance, controlling parts of the passage
GIUK gap

The GIUK gap is an area in the northern Atlantic Ocean that forms a naval warfare chokepoint. Its name is an acronym for Greenland, Iceland, and the United Kingdom, the gap being the open ocean between these three landmasses....
 between the Soviet
Soviet Union

The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a Constitution of the Soviet Union socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991.The name is a translation of the , romanization of Russian Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, abbreviated ????, SSSR....
 Arctic
Arctic Ocean

The Arctic Ocean, located in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Arctic North Pole region, is the smallest and shallowest of the world's five major oceanic divisions....
 harbours and the Atlantic
Atlantic Ocean

The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's oceanic divisions; with a total area of about 106.4 million square kilometres . It covers approximately one-fifth of the Earth's surface....
, as well as being a good base for observing any use of intercontinental ballistic missile
Intercontinental ballistic missile

An intercontinental ballistic missile, or ICBM, is a long-range ballistic missile typically designed for nuclear weapons delivery, that is, delivering one or more nuclear weapon....
s, typically planned to pass over the Arctic
Arctic

The Arctic is the region around the Earth's North Pole, opposite the Antarctica region around the South Pole. The Arctic includes the Arctic Ocean and parts of Canada, Greenland , Russia, the United States , Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland....
. The United States therefore had a geopolitical
Geopolitics

Geopolitics is the art and practice of using international political power. Traditionally, the term has applied primarily to the impact of geography on politics, but its usage has evolved over the past century to encompass a wider connotation....
 interest in Greenland, and in 1946, the United States offered to buy Greenland from Denmark for $100,000,000, but Denmark did not agree to sell. In 1951, the Kauffman treaty was replaced by another one. The Thule Air Base
Thule Air Base

Thule Air Base , an unincorporated area enclave within Qaasuitsup municipality in northern Greenland, is the United States Air Force's northernmost base, located 1118 km north of the Arctic Circle and 1524 km south of the North Pole on the northwest side of the island of Greenland....
 at Thule
Qaanaaq

Qaanaaq is the main town in the northern part of the Qaasuitsup municipality in northwestern Greenland. The inhabitants of Qaanaaq speak the Kalaallisut and many also speak Inuktun....
 (now Qaanaaq
Qaanaaq

Qaanaaq is the main town in the northern part of the Qaasuitsup municipality in northwestern Greenland. The inhabitants of Qaanaaq speak the Kalaallisut and many also speak Inuktun....
) in the northwest was made a permanent air force base. In 1953, some Inuit families were forced by Denmark to move from their homes to provide space for extension of the base. For this reason, the base has been a source of friction between the Danish government and the Greenlandic people. Tensions mounted when, on January 21, 1968, there was a nuclear accident
List of military nuclear accidents

This article lists notable military accidents involving nuclear material. Civilian accidents are listed at List of civilian nuclear accidents. For a general discussion of both civilian and military accidents, see nuclear and radiation accidents....
 — a B-52 Stratofortress
B-52 Stratofortress

The Boeing B-52 Stratofortress is a long-range, subsonic, jet engine, strategic bomber operated by the United States Air Force since 1955.Beginning with the successful contract bid on 5 June 1946, the B-52 went through several design steps; from a straight wing aircraft powered by six turboprop engines to the final prototype YB-52, with ei...
 carrying four hydrogen bomb
Nuclear weapon

A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either nuclear fission or a combination of fission and nuclear fusion....
s crashed near the base, leaking large amounts of plutonium
Plutonium

Plutonium is a rare transuranic radioactive chemical element. It is an actinide metal of silvery-white appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air, forming a dull coating when plutonium oxide....
 over the ice. Although most of the plutonium was retrieved, natives still make claims about resulting deformations in animals.

Home rule


The colonial status of Greenland was lifted in 1953, when it became an integral part of the Danish kingdom, with representation in the Folketing
Folketing

The Folketing , or Folketinget, is the national parliament of Denmark. The name literally means ? People's Thing ??that is, the people's governing assembly....
. Denmark also began a program of providing medical service and education to the Greenlanders. As a result, the population became more and more concentrated in the towns. Since most of the inhabitants were fishermen and had a hard time finding work in the towns, these population movements may have contributed to unemployment
Unemployment

File:World map of countries by rate of unemployment.pngUnemployment occurs when a person is available to work and currently seeking work, but the person is without Wage labour....
 and other social problems that have troubled Greenland lately.

As Denmark engaged in the European cooperation later to become the European Union
European Union

The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 European Union member state, located primarily in Europe. It was established by the Treaty of Maastricht on 1 November 1993 upon the foundations of the pre-existing European Economic Community....
, friction with the former colony grew. Greenlanders felt the European customs union
Customs union

A customs union is a free trade area with a common external tariff. The participant countries set up common external trade policy, but in some cases they use different import Import quotas....
 would be harmful to their trade, which was largely carried out with non-European countries such as the United States and Canada. After Denmark, including Greenland, joined the union in 1973 (despite 70.3% of Greenlanders having voted against entry in the referendum
Referendum

A referendum , ballot question, or plebiscite is a direct vote in which an entire Constituency is asked to either accept or reject a particular proposal....
), many residents thought that representation in Copenhagen was not sufficient, and local parties began pleading for self-government. The Folketing granted this in 1978, the home rule law coming into effect the following year. On February 23, 1982, a majority (53%) of Greenland's population voted to leave the European Community
European Community

The European Community is one of the three pillars of the European Union created under the Maastricht Treaty . It is based upon the principle of supranationalism and has its origins in the European Economic Community, the predecessor of the European Union....
, which it did in 1985, the only governmental entity to have done so.

Self-governing Greenland has portrayed itself as an Inuit nation. Danish placenames have been replaced. The center of the Danish civilization on the island, Godthåb, has become Nuuk
Nuuk

Nuuk is the Capital and largest city of Greenland, and the seat of government for the Sermersooq municipality. It has a population of 15,047 , of whom 11,862 were born in Greenland....
, the capital of a close-to-sovereign country. In 1985, a Greenlandic flag
Flag of Greenland

The flag of Greenland was designed by Greenland native Thue Christiansen. It features two equal horizontal bands of white and red with a large disk slightly to the hoist side of centre....
 was established, using the colors of the Danish Dannebrog
Flag of Denmark

File:Flag of Denmark.svgFile:Dannebrog.jpgThe national flag of Denmark, Dannebrog, is red with a white Nordic Cross Flag that extends to the edges of the flag; the vertical part of the cross is shifted to the hoist side....
. However, the movement for complete sovereignty
Sovereignty

File:Leviathan gr.jpgSovereignty is the exclusive right to control a government, a State, a people, or oneself. A sovereign is a supreme lawmaking authority....
 is still weak.

International relations
International relations

International relations represents the study of foreign affairs and global issues among states within the international system, including the roles of states, international organization , non-governmental organizations , and multinational corporations ....
, a field earlier handled by Denmark, are now left largely, but not entirely, to the discretion of the home rule government. After leaving the EU, Greenland has signed a special treaty with the Union, as well as entering several smaller organizations, not least with Iceland
Iceland

Iceland, officially the Republic of Iceland , is an island country located in the North Atlantic Ocean between mainland Europe and Greenland....
 and the Faroe Islands
Faroe Islands

The Faroe Islands or Faeroe Islands or simply Faroe or Faeroes are an island group situated between the Norwegian Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean, approximately half way between Scotland and Iceland....
, and with the Inuit populations of Canada and Russia
Russia

Russia , or the Russian Federation , is a list of countries spanning more than one continent country extending over much of northern Eurasia....
. It was also one of the founders of the environmental Arctic Council
Arctic Council

The Arctic Council is a high-level International organization forum which addresses issues faced by the Arctic governments and the indigenous people of the Arctic....
 cooperation in 1996. Renegotiation of the 1951 treaty between Denmark and the United States, with a direct participation of self-governing Greenland, is an issue, and the 1999–2003 Commission on Self-Governance suggested that Greenland should then aim at the Thule Air Base eventually becoming an international surveillance and satellite tracking station, subject to the United Nations
United Nations

The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are to facilitate cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, Social change, human rights and achieving world peace....
.

Modern technology has made Greenland more accessible, not least due to the breakthrough of aviation
Aviation

File:Norwegian military Bell 412SP helicopters.jpgAviation refers to activities involving man-made flying devices , including the people, organizations, and regulatory bodies involved with them....
. However, the capital Nuuk still lacks an international airport (see transportation in Greenland). Television broadcasts began in 1982.

See also

  • Danish colonization of the Americas
    Danish colonization of the Americas

    Denmark and the former political union of Denmark?Norway had a Danish colonial empire from the 17th through the 20th centuries, large portions of which were found in the Americas....
  • History of Iceland
    History of Iceland

    This article is about the history of Iceland and the areas comprising modern day Iceland....
  • History of Norway
    History of Norway

    From around the time of the Roman Empire until about 800 AD, many stone inscriptions can be found, written in Runes. Apparently, the small kingdoms developed during these centuries....
  • History of Denmark
    History of Denmark

    This article covers the history of the Kingdom of Denmark and of the areas comprising modern-day Denmark....
  • Inuit
    Inuit

    Inuit is a general term for a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic regions of Canada, Greenland, Russia and Alaska, United States....
  • Inuit mythology
    Inuit mythology

    Inuit mythology has many similarities to the religions of other polar regions. Inuit traditional religious practices could be very briefly summarised as a form of shamanism based on Animism principles....
  • Norse colonization of the Americas
    Norse colonization of the Americas

    As early as the 10th century Norsemen sailors explored and settled areas of the North Atlantic, including the northeastern fringes of North America....
  • History of America
    History of America

    History of America may refer to:* The History of the Americas* The European colonization of the Americas* The History of the United States...


Bibliography

  • Diamond, Jared. Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. New York: Viking, 2005. ISBN 0143036556.
  • Seaver, Kristen A The Frozen Echo Stanford University Press, 1996 ISBN 0 8047 3161 6
  • Kendrick, Thomas Downing. A History of the Vikings. New York: C. Scribner’s Sons, 1930.
  • The Complete sagas of Icelanders. Edited by Vidar Hreinsson; editorial team led by Robert Cook et al.; introduction by Robert Kellogg. Reykjavík: Leifur Eiríksson Publishers, 1997.
  • Vikings: the North Atlantic Saga. Edited by William W. Fitzhugh and Elisabeth I. Ward. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press in association with the National Museum of Natural History, 2000.
  • Grønlands forhistorie, ed. Hans Christian Gulløv, National Museum of Denmark, Gyldendal, 2005. ISBN 87-02-01724-5.


External links

  •  – Information about the various cultures, from the Greenland Research Centre and the National Museum of Denmark
    National Museum of Denmark

    The National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen is Denmark largest museum of cultural history, comprising the histories of Danish and foreign cultures, alike....
  •  – With video sequences, from the US National Museum of Natural History
    National Museum of Natural History

    File:Smithsonian Natural History Museum circa 1926.jpgThe National Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.....
  •  – Another account, from the Archaeological Institute of America
    Archaeological Institute of America

    The Archaeological Institute of America is a North American nonprofit organization devoted to the promotion of public interest in archaeology, and the preservation of archaeological sites....
  •  – Traces the history of Greenland for 10th century to the present.
  •  – Account of the 1968 cleanup process
  •  – 2001 Greenpeace
    Greenpeace

    Greenpeace is an international non-governmental organization for the protection and conservation of the environment. Greenpeace utilizes direct action, lobbying and research to achieve its goals....
     report.