ABSTRACT
The first maritime empire in the west since Antiquity was that of the Scandinavians. From the second century BC the remote north, that ‘womb of nations’ we now know as Norway, Denmark and Sweden, had pushed out wave after wave of peoples into Roman dominated Europe, their fearsome behaviour and astonishing customs sharply observed by classical historians. Iceland was the sole survivor, but for a time the Norse empire in the Atlantic had been more extensive. Early in the tenth century one Gunnbjorn, on passage from Norway to Iceland, had been blown past his destination and had sighted new lands to the west. The ultimate and most spectacular achievement of Norse seamen was the discovery of North America. The Norse probably had craft suitable for offshore passages by at least the middle of the eighth century, which is to say that had there been sufficient incentive their raids to the west might have started some half century before they did.
