Gunnbjörn Ulfsson
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by Carl Rasmussen
Gunnbjörn Ulfsson (fl. c. 10th century), also Gunnbjörn Ulf-Krakuson, was a Norwegian settler of Iceland. He was reportedly the first European to sight Greenland. A number of modern place names in Greenland commemorate Gunnbjörn, most notably Gunnbjørn Fjeld.[1]
Sources
The only reference to Gunnbjörn is from the Book of Settlement of Iceland (
Waldemar Lehn (1911–2005), professor emeritus at the University of Manitoba and an expert in atmospheric refraction and mirages, argued that the skerries Gunnbjörn saw could be explained as the sighting of Greenland's coast via the refraction of a superior mirage.[4] Such phenomena were not unknown to the Norse, who called them hillingar.[5]
References
- ^ Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 10. Chicago. 1955. p. 858.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - ^ "Greenland's Lost Islands". The History of Nothing. September 22, 2013. Retrieved January 20, 2016.
- ^ "Gunnbjörn Ulf-Krakuson & Greenland". University of Victoria, Medieval Mapping Project. 31 January 2012. Retrieved January 20, 2016.
- PMID 18349932.
- ISBN 9781784530570.
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