Note 41-3 — THE SAGA OF ERIC THE RED

Nothing can with certainty be extracted from these names. The chances that they were incorrectly recorded are of course great. Storm contends that they cannot be Eskimo. Captain Holm of the Danish navy, an authority on the Eskimos, says, “It is not impossible that the names may have been derived from Eskimo originals.” Fiske says, p. 189, note: “There is not the slightest reason for supposing that there were any Eskimos south of Labrador so late as nine hundred years ago.” In this connection Captain Holm says: “It appears to me not sufficiently proven that the now extinct race on America’s east coast, the Beothuk, were Indians. I wish to direct attention to the possibility that in the Beothuk we may perhaps have one of the transition links between the Indians and the Eskimo.” See Reeves, p. 177, (57).