Note 320 — Chapter II · THE CONTRIBUTION OF WESTERN CHRISTENDOM BEFORE 1100 A. D.
Reading edition
As is well known, the Icelandic discovery of America has been a 392subject of constant discussion throughout the last century. Innumerable and often incredible theories have been propounded in an attempt to identify the places mentioned in the Sagas, and a large library of books, articles, and pamphlets has come into being relating to this subject. The sole aim in the present work is to give as brief as possible a statement of what countries the Icelanders of the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries believed to lie to the southwest of Greenland.
The sources for the Icelandic discovery of America are collected in: Rafn, Antiq. americanae, 1837, and Supplement, 1841. Icelandic texts are there given with Danish and Latin translations. For English translations of the Wineland Voyages, see Reeves, Wineland, 1890. The best bibliography is Hermannsson, Northmen, 1909. For references to recent studies on the subject see Geographisches Jahrbuch, vol. xxxix (1919–1923), Gotha, 1924, p. 277.