Читать книгу Search Engines - Jon Jonsson - Страница 27

The first generation of Icelandic settlers raided Europe for riches and fair maidens. The chilling problem came decades later when they needed to replace their proud ships. Iceland has no timber to speak of, nor can it grow crops of any size. The settlers had brought a few cows and sheep over from Norway, which now sustained them. The ocean had plenty of fish, but strong ships were needed to go out on those rough Atlantic waves. After a short time in Iceland, the Vikings found themselves in a struggle for survival against the forces of nature. They were now confined on a faraway island and could not renew their ships. Their proud achievement of wandering freely across the ocean had become their entrapment, and they faced the unexpected dilemma of being powerless to leave this faraway place. This strained situation became a problem that lasted centuries. With the long, dangerous sailing between them and Norway, no ships would be coming their way in the foreseeable future. Total isolation and grinding poverty came upon the Icelandic settlers like a sudden snare. A Viking without a longship was not a proud Viking. So this most daring discovery of new lands came to an anticlimactic end on a rocky island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. They had boldly found the "New World," an endless territory of riches there for the taking. No other discovery in history would match that. You can just imagine North America inhabited over the following centuries by that violent Viking race. That would have changed the course of all history in some drastic ways. But they were strangely halted there at the threshold of a momentous success.