Introduction

• Main Author: Plank, Geoffrey
• Format: Book Part
• Language: unknown
• Published: Oxford University Press 2020
• Subjects: Greenland; Newfoundland
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190860455.003.0001

The introduction highlights the distinctiveness of the Atlantic as the least-navigated temperate ocean in the medieval and early modern period. When Europeans first crossed the Atlantic in the eleventh century, they faced no deep-water competition from indigenous Americans or Africans, but maritime supremacy did not easily translate into power on land. The introduction examines the Norse colonization of Greenland and attempted colonization of Newfoundland to illustrate the military challenges Europeans faced across the Atlantic. Compared to subsequent colonists, the Norse were unusually isolated. After encountering indigenous American military resistance, they abandoned their colony on Newfoundland. The Europeans who crossed the ocean in the late fifteenth and sixteenth century had larger ships to ferry and supply people and maintain communications, but even with these advantages, colonists depended on indigenous American trading partners and military allies in order to survive.