Seattle Sun Newspaper - Vol. 7, Issue 3, March 2003

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Museum to show Viking exhibit

By MATTHEW PREUSCH

On the green and rocky shore of Newfoundland, there is small village of sod huts and wooden fences called L'Anse aux Meadows.

The town is a replica of a 1,000-year-old Viking colony that many believe represents the first European settlement in the New World, predating Columbus by hundreds of years.

Next month, Ballard's Nordic Heritage Museum will debut an exhibit titled "Full Circle: First Contact." It's a hodge-podge of art, archeology and historical theory tracing the arc of early Viking travellers' journey from Norway and Greenalnd to the Meadows, in present day Canada.

The display will highlight the Viking's contact with Skraelings, a Norse term for Native Americans. The exhibit tells how interaction between the two peoples closed the "full circle" of human migration from its origins in Africa.

Both the Canadian government and UNESCO, the United Nations' educational body, recognize the Meadows as a legitimate Viking settlement.

Still, the historical claims at the root of Full Circle are sure to cause debate. Marianne Forssblad, director of the museum since it opened its doors 20 years ago, admits as much, but she thinks the exhibit will be first and foremost instructive.

"It's a proven fact that there was a Norse settlement in America 500 years before Columbus," she said, "It's so very educational, and it really shows how humans lived and developed."

The exhibit includes a tremendous amount of archeological data, over 300 artifacts from around the world: 90,000-year-old African stone axes, 2,000-year-old Scandanavian weapons, bone needles, carved wooden maps and more.

Much of the physical content of Full Circle is the result of the dogged study of the Norwegian explorer, Helge Ingstad, and his wife, archeologist Anne Stine Ingstad. The two used ancient Norse legends to follow the 11th century journey of explorer Leif Erikson from well-known settlements in Greenland to a point further west across the Atlantic Ocean: Vinland.

Using the legends as their guidebook, the two pored over the Newfoundland coastline in 1961 until they discovered the remnants of the sod shelters of the Meadows; later excavation revealed a forge a number of iron boat nails an rivets.

Forssblad is obviously proud to be bringing the story of Norse navigation to Seattle's own Nordic colony, Ballard. "I think what's exciting is that there was exploration that early, that they travelled in open ships on the Atlantic," she said.

Oddly, the museum is having some difficulties importing portions of the exhibit specifically an ancient walrus tusk across the border from their previous home in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Forssblad, a petiteSwedish immigrant, looks more like a librarian than a smuggler, but U.S. Customs has balked at allowing rare animal bones across its borders. The scheduled opening remains Wednesday, March 5.

Aside from the exhibit, Full Circle will host a number of educational programs and cultural events through May. A number of childrens programs will be offered, such as Viking weaving or map making lessons. For the grown ups, there will be lectures, like a Viking symposium, including a Viking meal, and a boat building seminar.

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For more information, call the Nordic Heritage Museum at 789-5707.