Our first installment of Hitting the Books with CBS’s Ghosts finds us learning more about Thorfinn!!!
[What is Hitting the Books with CBS’s Ghosts? To find out, click here.]
Played by Devan Chandler Long, Thorfinn is a Viking who died in between 920 to 1050 A.D. The latest research pinpoints Viking settlement in North America specifically to 1021 A.D. Of the Vikings who came to Newfoundland that scholars do know about, one of them was named Thorfinn Karlsefni.
One book that explores the Norse’s travels across the North Atlantic to America is Norse America: The Story of a Founding Myth. This book approaches the idea of Vikings in America from two perspectives. One is a historical analysis of how the Norse learned about North American after generations of traveling. The other is how later European colonists wanted the Norse to have a greater presence in the New World so that they could argue this land was first discovered by Europeans and not Native Americans. This is sadly, one of many examples of history being whitewashed.
Those specifically interested in learning more about the times Vikings landed and explored North America, check out The Viking Discovery of America: The Excavation of a Norse Settlement in L’Anse Aux Meadows, Newfoundland. Written by Helge and Anne Stine Ingstad, the book is a documentation of the Ingstad’s locating and excavating the remains of Viking homes in Newfoundland.
For those wanting to learn more about Norse mythology in general, check out Neil Gaiman’s Norse Mythology, which features Gaiman telling his version of Norse mythology.
(Fun fact, Thorfinn means “the thunder of Finns / thunderous Finnish.”)
For more information about Ghosts, check out its homepage and follow it on Twitter @GhostsCBS.
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