Erik Röde Thorvaldsson (abt. 920 - 1003)

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Erik Thorvaldsson was part of early Scandinavian history. Join: Early Scandinavia Project Discuss: EARLY_SCANDINAVIA

Biography

Erik Thorvaldsson is Notable.

Erik is best known as one of the earliest settlers of Greenland & being the father of Leif Erikson.

Erik the Red's father was banished from Norway for the crime of manslaughter. He sailed West from Norway with his family and settled in Hornstrandir in northwestern Iceland. The Icelanders later sentenced Erik to exile for three years due to "some killings" he committed around the year 982.

Erik did a good job convincing others to settle Greenland with him. The settlement flourished, growing to 5000 inhabitants spread over a considerable area along Eriksfjord and neighboring fjords. Groups of immigrants escaping overcrowding in Iceland joined the original party. However, one group of immigrants which arrived in 1002 brought with it an epidemic that ravaged the colony, killing many of its leading citizens, including Erik himself. Nevertheless, the colony rebounded and survived until the Little Ice Age made the land marginal for European life-styles in the 15th century (shortly before Christopher Columbus's first voyage to the Americas in 1492). Pirate raids, conflict with Inuit moving into the Norse territories, and the colony's abandonment by Norway became other factors in its decline.

Research Notes

Eiríkur "rauði" Þorvaldsson Erik the red.

Settled Greenland 986

Literature Source : Landnáma, Ann.I.300, Ann., Flóamanna saga, Eiríks saga rauða

• The database Íslendingabók contains genealogical information about the inhabitants of Iceland, dating more than 1,200 years back. Íslendingabók is a collaboration project between deCODE genetics, a research company in the field of medical genetics, and Friðrik Skúlason, an anti-Helpvirus software entrepreneur. The project's goal is to trace all known family connections between Icelanders from the time of the settlement of Iceland to present times and register the genealogical information in a database.

In the creation of the Íslendingabók database we have used various sources and both unpublished and published documents. Most of the genealogical information comes from sources such as church records, national censuses, inhabitants registers and other public documents, but in addition to these sources there are chronicles, books of convictions, various publications on genealogy, books about individuals within specific occupations, lists of descendants and ancestral records as well as memorial articles to name but a few.

• Birthyear is an estimated date from Íslendingabók. (Thorisdottir-4 11:18, 15 October 2022 (UTC))

Sources

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erik_the_Red