Chapter XII: Regional Geography (4)

Adam of Bremen enjoyed peculiar opportunities for gathering information about the lands immediately to the north of Denmark through his association with archbishop Adalbert of Bremen.[1549] Beyond Denmark, he wrote, a new world was opened up. Norway, he believed, extended northward to the limits of the known world, to the Rhipaean Mountains.[1550] Through a second of his patrons, King Svend Estridsson of Denmark, who had spent no less than twelve years in these parts, Adam was enabled to learn something of the remote land of Sweden: a rich country, the principal towns of which were Birka and Upsala, the latter possessing a heathen temple, the scene of human sacrifices. Northward of Sweden were regions inhabited by tribes of Finns of marvelous swiftness of foot. These so-called “Finns”—probably in reality Lapps—are frequently mentioned in medieval literature on Scandinavia and the North.[1551] They are sometimes called “Scritefinns,” “Skritofinns,” or “Skridfinns.” Saxo Grammaticus spoke of them as great hunters who can climb over the rocky crags of the mountains to the very summits.[1552] In the _Historia Norwegiae_ we are told that they “fasten smoothed pieces of wood [literally, balks, stakes] under their feet, which appliances they call ‘ondrer,’ and, while the deer [i.e. reindeer] gallop along carrying their wives and children over the deep snow and precipitous mountains, they dash on more swiftly than the birds” (Nansen’s translation).[1553] Here we have one of the earliest accounts of the use of skis.

Beyond the Finns Adam of Bremen placed the realm of fable that encircled the medieval world,[1554] where were to be found a race of dwarfs and bearded women inhabiting the Rhipaean Mountains; where were also Amazons, Cyclopes, and monsters like those which other writers of our age placed in the heart of Asia or of Africa.

Adam of Bremen, Saxo Grammaticus, and the author of the _Historia Norwegiae_, though they included much that is fanciful in their geographical chapters, also provided reliable data regarding the peoples of the North. Ragewin, on the other hand, in the continuation of the _Gesta Friderici_, and Gunther of Pairis give an account which undoubtedly represented a more usual idea of these people in the minds of Western Europeans. These northern folk aroused Ragewin’s disgust, for, he said, they devour each other in time of famine. Owing to perpetual frosts, agriculture is impossible in their country, and their lives consequently are given over to hunting and killing. Well versed in the arts of piracy, these treacherous tribes infest the shores and isles of the ocean, Hibernia, Britain, Denmark, and other coasts.[1555] Gunther in the _Ligurinus_[1556] enlarges and amplifies this uncomplimentary description by drawing on his own imagination. He says that the inhabitants of the isles of the “Scythian Sea” are strong in the arm but weak in the head. They neither plow a soil made sterile by the perpetual cold nor harrow their uncultivated fields. Neither do they couple the vine to the elm, nor gather in the fruits of the trees, autumn’s gifts, but seek their food by the chase and by frequent forays and grow old in piracy on the tireless waves of the sea. And when long privation aggravates a famine—horrible to relate and scarce to be believed, though report would have it so!—these miserable creatures bite and lacerate their own limbs. Father does not know enough to spare his son, nor brother his brother, and the daughter finds refreshment by devouring the boiled body of her mother!

We certainly must not take this effusion as a literally exact account of the customs of the Scandinavians at a time when they were far from being sunk in the abject state of savagery which Gunther pictures; but it shows the terror which the Vikings had instilled into the consciousness of Europe and also the very vague and hazy kind of reports which an intelligent German of the twelfth century received in regard to regions not very distant from his home. Furthermore, it is not at all improbable that the story of cannibalism among these people may have arisen from an actually existing practice of human sacrifice coupled with cannibalistic rites at an earlier date.[1557]

FRANCE

Otto of Freising regarded the Rhine as the boundary between Germany and Gaul. Though he had studied at Paris, he used Orosius as the main source for the description of Gaul in his _Chronicon_[1558] and discussed the various parts of this country and the proper manner in which it ought to be subdivided in a way that reminds us of Caesar. Authorities, he said, declare that there are two main subdivisions; Gallia Cisalpina and Gallia Transalpina. The former lies in Italy between the Po and the Alps; the latter—our France—in turn may be divided into three parts (the three parts made famous by Caesar), Belgian, Lugdunensian, and Aquitanian. Otto then proceeds to a dry and technical discussion of how these parts should be properly grouped in relation to an ill-defined Celtic Gaul.

_Paris_

More full of color than the pedantic discussion of Otto is a picturesque description of the Paris of the last half of the twelfth century in one of the letters of Guy of Bazoches.[1559] “The city,” Guy writes, “lies in the lap of a delightful valley crowned on both sides by hills which Ceres and Bacchus make beautiful, striving with one another in their eagerness. The Seine, by no means a humble stream among a host of rivers, takes its rise in the east and in mid-course divides its proud current into two branches, thus making an island out of the center of the city. Two suburbs stretch forth on either side, and even the lesser of these arouses the envy of many an envious town which it surpasses. Connecting each suburb with the island is a bridge of stone, the name of which is derived from the amount of traffic that falls to its lot. The bridge facing the north, the sea, and England is styled the ‘great bridge’ and the one which faces the Loire on the opposite side is called the ‘little bridge.’” The so-called great bridge—

“Densely crowded with a wealthy, bargaining throng,

· · · · ·

Swarms with boats, groans under riches, overflows
With merchandise: for lo! there is nowhere its equal!”

The little bridge, on the other hand, is given over to walkers, strollers, and disputers of logic. On the narrow strip of land that forms the island the royal palace towers up to lofty heights and audaciously overlooks with its shoulders the roofs of the whole city. Reverence for it is commanded not so much by the marvelous structure of the building as by the noble authority of its rule.

“This is that house, the glory of the Franks, whose
Praises the eternal centuries will sing.
This is that house which holds in its power
Gaul mighty in war, Flanders magnificent in wealth.
This is that house whose scepter the Burgundian,
Whose mandate the Norman, and whose arms the Briton fears.”

The description of Paris closes with a tribute to the island, from ancient times the home of philosophy and of the seven sisters—the liberal arts.

_Alsace_

Godfrey of Viterbo seems to have known something of Alsace, whose attractions and beauties he highly praised.[1560] The Rhine, he said, is enlivened with shipping. Flowing into Alsace from Basel it laves with its waters wide fields through varied stretches of landscape and traverses a rich countryside. To cross this region takes a traveler three beautiful days’ journey, and such vineyards as flourish there the poet sees nowhere else in the world, and the grainfields are marvelous in their fertility. It is a land that can be aptly compared with “Liguria” (Lombardy), for in like manner it is naturally defended by rivers and mountains. The Lord, in his special love for Alsace, had made its plain stand preëminent in beauty among the plains of the world. The population is extremely numerous, and so great are the riches of the people that England and Denmark look thither for markets. Dominating the whole country is the city of Argentina (Strasburg), through which flows the river Ill, rushing to pour forth its water into the Rhine.

_Southern France_

We find various passages in the _Otia imperialia_ of Gervase of Tilbury revealing his familiarity with the south of France. On two different occasions Gervase speaks of the three mouths of the Rhone, which enclose the Sucades (or Sicades) Islands, “commonly called the Camargae.”[1561] The earth here is rich in salt of a high quality, and the region as a whole is incomparable for its sea and pond fishing, for the hunting of game and birds, and for its pastures.[1562] Orosius[1563] and Isidore[1564] had mentioned the Sicades, undoubtedly having in mind the Stoechades of the ancient geographers, or what are now either the Iles d’Hyères or else, possibly, the small islets just outside the harbor of Marseilles. Gervase, on the other hand, identifies them undeniably with the flat alluvial islands of the Rhone delta, the largest of which is now called Camargue, as in Gervase’s day. He also mentions the famous church of Saints Martha and Mary Magdalene on this isle, then, as at present, a much frequented shrine of pilgrimage.[1565]

Gervase knew something of the Narbonnese.[1566] On the authority of the _De imagine mundi_[1567] he states that this province was called _togata_ because of the length of the togas worn there, but adds that the description was no longer apt, because in his time the natives wore shorter garments.

Concerning Provence, Gervase made observations intended to impress on the Emperor Otto some idea of the strategic importance of this territory to his empire.[1568] We have here an example of medieval political and strategic geography, based in this case not on classical authority but on what the writer actually had observed and thought. The argument, curiously enough, arose out of the discussion we have already mentioned[1569] of the effects of the _mistral_ on the character of the people of the lower Rhone valley. Gervase concluded that not only does the atmosphere exert an influence on everything upon which it bears down but also that every weight, whether material or spiritual, affects in some manner the objects upon which it rests. This led him to warn Otto that it would be advisable to moderate his _imperium_ over Provence in order to propitiate the people. This should be done because the strategic position of that country—the old Kingdom of Arles—is of such nature that it might prove either a great menace or else a great benefit to the unity of the empire. Though admirably situated to threaten France, Gervase explained that Provence is subject to easy invasion by land from Spain, by sea from Africa, or across the Alpine passes from Italy. The character of the people, furthermore, makes it particularly important that they should be handled with circumspection. The Provençaux are shrewd in council and effective in whatever enterprise they undertake but false to their promises and without military strength; owing to their poverty largely dependent on charity (_pro sua paupertate in cibando larga_); insidious in crime (_nocenda_); but calm in the face of trouble. If they have a stable ruler whom they honor, no race is more quickly turned by good impulses, but no other race is more prone to evil when not blessed by such a ruler. In addition, their land is worth holding for its own sake, fruitful as it is above all countries in its seas, fish, meats, and all kinds of hunting, precious stones, swamps, lakes, mountains, rivers, springs and groves, and delicious in its woods and pastures.[1570]

_ISLANDS OF THE ATLANTIC OCEAN_

The Romans had discovered the Canary and Madeira groups and, owing to the mild climate and favorable conditions, had associated them with the “Islands of the Blest” of Greek mythology and hence had come to call them the “Fortunate Isles.” In the Middle Ages these isles passed again into the realm of the unknown, though their memory lingered on to adorn the Western Ocean on the Beatus maps, together with more fabulous isles and to serve as the datum point for the western prime meridian. The Cape Verde group and the Azores were utterly unknown.

On most of the maps of the world of our period the islands are arbitrarily squeezed within narrow confines of the encircling ocean, and no attempt is made to represent them in their relative positions or to indicate their distinctive shapes. On the St. Sever Beatus map[1571] all islands are shaped like sausages (see Fig. 2, p. 69, above), whether in the Mediterranean or in the ocean. Ireland lies off the coast of Spain and is designated as “Insula Hibernia ab Scotorum gentibus colitur;” Britain, separated from the coasts of Frisia, Gaul, Aquitania, and Gascony by an “Oceanus Britannicus,” is said to be 800 miles long by 200 broad—figures taken from Orosius,[1572] who got them from Pliny.[1573] Five cities are equally spaced from north to south, London, Lincoln, Wroxeter, Seaton, and “Condeaco” (?). Indeed, among the maps of the world the only one which represents the British Isles in recognizable outline is the Cotton,[1574] and this probably dates from long before our period. Here we may note, in pleasing contrast to the absurdities we find elsewhere, such features as the westward extension of Cornwall and Devon and of Scotland; Ireland in its correct position and approximately its correct size; the Orkneys to the north of Scotland, and even Man and the Scilly Isles.

BRITISH ISLES

The medieval reader of the _De imagine mundi_ could certainly have gained no very accurate impression from the chapter devoted to the British Isles. This is worth translation in order to demonstrate the utter futility and antiquated character of this much-quoted and at one time, perhaps, unduly popular work:[1575]

“Over against Spain toward the setting sun are the following islands in the ocean: Britain, England, Hibernia, Thanet—the earth of which, wherever it may be carried, will destroy serpents—the thirty-three Orkneys on the Arctic Circle where the solstice occurs, Scotia and Chile (Thule)....” This is all the _De imagine mundi_ tells us of the British Isles!

For more ample data we must look to such native authorities as Giraldus Cambrensis, Alexander Neckam, Gervase of Tilbury, Matthew Paris, and the various British historians and chroniclers.

Gervase of Tilbury adds some details from Geoffrey of Monmouth to the brief notices which he took from Orosius on the dimensions of Britannia Major.[1576] His account, though not thoroughly up-to-date in any sense of the term, is fuller and less misleading than that of the _De imagine mundi_; and we certainly do not gain from it any impression like the one we derive from the latter work, that Britain, England, and Scotland are three distinct islands. Geoffrey of Monmouth had told how Great Britain—as distinguished from Britannia Minor, or Armorica (Brittany) on the Gallic side of the Britannic sea—was divided in ancient times into four parts: Cornwall (Cornubia) to the west; Cambria, called vulgarly Wallia, to the north of this; Albania, called also Scotia, in the far north; and Loegria, or Loegrino, called also Anglia, in the middle and south; and that the rivers dividing these provinces were the Waja (Wye), Sabrinus (Severn), Boecura (?), and Deia (Dee).

_Cities of Britain_

Alexander Neckam, in the _De laudibus divinae sapientiae_, also regales us with a rambling poetical description of the marvels of Britain and of its principal cities.[1577] Fame, he says, rejoices in placing Exeter before all other cities: but as for himself he would give New Troy (London) the first place, on account of its glory, wealth, customs, charm, and situation. The walls of London, he adds, would be worthy to hold a Helen. Among other famous cities he mentions Winchester, known in early times for its wealth, and also Canterbury, York, Lincoln, Durham (famous for its associations with the Venerable Bede), Gloucester, Verolamia (St. Albans), where took place the martyrdom of St. Alban, and Colchester. In the same poem Neckam discourses on the streams of England and Ireland when discussing the principal rivers of the world.[1578] In connection with the Thames, he retells the mythological story of the founding of London. The Severn, he says, delights in the cities of Worcester and Gloucester on its banks, and its waters are augmented by those of the Usk. He points out that Britain contains several streams named Avon besides the one upon which Bath stands; that the Trent sends its fish to London; and that the Humber, unsafe for shipping on account of its tides, disdains to see a city but flows through the open fields.

_Giraldus Cambrensis on Ireland and Wales_

Gervase of Tilbury and Alexander Neckam give us more or less hackneyed and stereotyped descriptions of the British Isles. Far greater originality is revealed in the works of Giraldus Cambrensis. In many other connections we have spoken of the _Topographia Hiberniae_ and _Descriptio Kambriae_, which are the most complete and satisfactory geographical descriptions of limited regions dating from our period. The introduction of a long series of fables into the treatise on Ireland tends to blind us to the merits of those parts of the work that have real scientific or historical value. In the beginning of the second “Distinctio” of the _Topographia Hiberniae_, Giraldus says that, as the prodigies of the East have long since been made familiar by the writings of diligent authors, he proposes to throw some light on the prodigies of the West. This he proceeds to do in a highly competent manner, wholly in keeping with the style of Solinus, that master among the “diligent authors” to whom he refers. The Englishman of the time who sat down with Giraldus’ work on Ireland before him gathered from it quite as much fabulous and fantastic lore as he could have gathered from the pages of Solinus, but in this case it was lore of countries near at hand. It would almost seem that Giraldus, like a novelist, deliberately set out to throw a glamour of romance over familiar scenes and places. But, however this may be, Giraldus, unlike his model, Solinus, was more than a mere spinner of yarns. His works show that in many respects he was a close and accurate, if not always critical, observer; and certainly he had a vivid and lively interest in nature and mankind.

_Ireland_

Ireland, he writes, after Britain is the largest of islands. It lies one rather short day’s journey to the west of Wales. Between Ulster and Galloway in Scotland the intervening arm of the sea narrows to about half its average width, and the promontories on either side can be seen across the straits in clear weather. South of Ireland, at three days’ sailing, is Spain; and northward at an equal distance, Iceland, the greatest of the northern isles.[1579] Cut off by the sea, Ireland is almost like another world and contains many phenomena not found elsewhere.[1580]

After discussing in detail various earlier theories about the dimensions of Ireland—what Solinus, Orosius, Isidore, and Bede had said[1581]—Giraldus proceeds to give some observations of his own on the healthful qualities of the climate, the character of the terrain,[1582] and the fertility[1583] and products of the soil. Ireland is a land full of pastures and of rich meadows flowing with milk and honey; wine is drunk there, but, as there are no vineyards, it has to be imported from Poitou in exchange for ox-hides and the skins of other cattle and of wild beasts. Owing to the presence of a certain poisonous wild yew tree and also to the violence of the rainy winds, not nearly so many bees are kept in Ireland as one would expect.[1584] Giraldus also remarks that there are more lakes in Ireland than in any other country,[1585] a statement which, though perhaps not true literally, shows that he was aware of one of the differences, if not of the reasons for the difference, between glaciated and nonglaciated countries. These lakes and the rivers abound in fish, many of which are peculiar to the island.[1586]

Giraldus gives a legendary account of the clearing of the Irish forests in the days of Partholan,[1587] who was supposed to have come there only three hundred years after the Deluge. At that time the whole landscape—with the exception of a few mountains—was covered by an immense forest; and even in his own time, Giraldus adds, the area under cultivation was very restricted in comparison with the woodlands.

His attitude toward the Irish people is neither sympathetic nor complimentary.[1588] A rude and inhospitable race, he says, they live like beasts and have scarcely advanced beyond a primitive pastoral stage of civilization. Their fields are used only to a limited extent for pastures, even less for raising of flowers, and less still for the sowing and cultivation of crops. What cultivated fields there are, are very poor; but this condition is the fault of the farmers rather than the result of defects in the soil, which is extremely fertile. There are few fruit trees, the metallic veins of the country are not worked, and there are neither manufacturing, trade, nor mechanical arts. But the people are great musicians![1589]

We ought not to place too much faith in the accuracy of this account of the Irish people. As Dimock points out in his introduction to the “Rolls Series” edition of the _Topographia_, Giraldus’ acquaintance with them was in all probability limited to a few clergy and to those elements of the population who could still submit “to exist in degradation under the grinding rule of the English invaders.”[1590] Giraldus was also prejudiced by the feeling of contempt for a supposedly “inferior race” which nearly always results from the conquest of one people by another.

Though his travels in Ireland were not extensive, the Welshman had acquired a superficial and inexact acquaintance with the topographical features of the island and, in particular, with its river systems.[1591] The existence of nine principal rivers, he says, dates back to the earliest times, although more recently other streams of no less size had sprung into being. The Shannon is by far the most important. Rising in a large and beautiful lake which divides Munster from Connaught, it separates into two branches that run off in opposite directions. One turns south and, forming the border between the two parts of Munster, flows into “St. Brandan’s Sea.” The other divides Meath and Connaught from Ulster and after a winding course debouches into the Northern Ocean. The western quarter of the island is thus separated from the other parts by this “mediterranean river” (_mediterraneum flumen_) from sea to sea. Giraldus was accused in the seventeenth century by a violent Irishman[1592] of either “raving or dreaming” when he made the Shannon divide Ulster from Connaught. It has nevertheless been shown that, though the Welshman’s hydrographic theories were false, there was some justification for his mistaken statements. Certainly, from very near the headwaters of the Shannon other rivers flow away to the north, and a hasty observer might easily have believed them to arise from the same source.[1593]

_Wales_

Giraldus was far better acquainted with his native country, Wales, about which his two treatises give us much accurate information regarding the mountain ranges and river systems, the types of terrain, and the character and customs of the people. He brings out the contrast between North and South Wales.[1594] South Wales, he says, is pleasanter by reason of its flat plains, but North Wales is stronger in its defenses, more productive of powerful men, and also more fertile. Merioneth, however, and the land of Canani are the roughest and most inaccessible of all parts of Wales.[1595] The Welsh people dwell for the most part in sequestered isolation and not in cities, villages, or castles.[1596] Their houses are of the simplest construction. They possess neither gardens nor orchards, and the land is little used for aught else than pasturage. The inequalities and natural defensive strength of the ground make Wales a very difficult region to conquer.

The character of the topographic detail which Giraldus gives reveals his extensive personal acquaintance with the country. We have already had occasion to mention[1597] his graphic description of the mountains around the Lake of Brecknock, of the valley of Ewyas, of the quicksands and submerged forests along the southern coast, and of the pasturage on Snowdon. His knowledge of the Welsh rivers (Severn, Wye, Usk, Dee), the mountains in which they take their source, and their courses seaward was far more accurate than his knowledge of the streams of Ireland. Certainly among the works of our period there is none that vies with the _Descriptio Kambriae_ either in richness and correctness of detail or in vividness of presentation.

We must say a few words about a chapter which Giraldus introduces on the dialects spoken in Wales,[1598] the only discussion of linguistic geography that the writer has found in the literature of the time.[1599] The Welshman points out that the British tongue spoken in North Wales is more delicate, beautiful, and generally more praiseworthy than that spoken elsewhere, because this region had been subjected to the intermixture of foreign peoples. The speech of Cardiganshire, however, though this province lies in the heart of South Wales, was also said to be very distinguished and praiseworthy. The natives of Cornwall and Brittany made use of tongues much alike and nearly always comprehensible to the Welsh, because originally the language of all these people was the same. Cornish and Breton, however, in so far as they were more lacking in delicacy and form than Welsh, approached more closely to the ancient British idiom. Similarly the English spoken in southern England, and especially in Devonshire, seemed to Giraldus to be far less correct and more archaic than the tongue of the northern parts of the island, which had been modified by the incursions of the Danes and Northmen. We thus see that Giraldus was broad-minded enough to grant that a language could be materially enriched by contact with alien speech and by the infusion of foreign expressions.

_William Fitzstephen on London_

Any discussion of the medieval geographical lore of the British Isles would be inadequate without some mention of a famous account of London that forms part of the preface of William Fitzstephen’s life of Thomas à Becket.[1600] The highly colored picture that William draws surpasses in superlatives Guy of Bazoches’ contemporary description of Paris.[1601] Even in the twelfth century local pride might lead to the innocent exaggeration of merit. William tells us that “among the noble cities of the world celebrated by Fame, the city of London in the kingdom of the English is the one seat that pours out its fame more widely, sends to farther lands its wealth and trade, lifts its head higher than the rest.” He goes on to specify how fortunate is London in its mild climate, piety, fortifications, site, manners and customs, and the character of its citizens. London’s piety is shown by the presence not only of an episcopal church but of no less than thirteen “larger conventual churches besides one hundred and twenty-six lesser parish churches.” “Above all other citizens,” he says, “the citizens of London are regarded as conspicuous and noteworthy for handsomeness of manners and of dress, at table and in the way of speaking. The city matrons are true Sabine women.” The city is very well organized so that the different businesses are distributed in different quarters. In the suburbs are “spacious and beautiful gardens” “planted with trees.” To the north lie pastures and meadowland with streams flowing through them, “where the turning wheels of mills are put in motion with a cheerful sound.” “The tilled lands of the city are not barren gravel but fat plains of Asia that make crops luxuriant and fill their tillers’ barns with Ceres’ sheaves.” Nevertheless “very near lies a great forest with woodland pasture, coverts of wild animals, stags, fallow deer, boars, and wild bulls” (Morley’s translation).[1602] In the long account of the sports of the London youth with which William Fitzstephen closes we see that even at this early period the English were devoted to outdoor athletics and games. Besides shows and cockfights we are told in detail of ball games, gymnastics, wrestling, dancing, and more strenuous horseback exercises, sham battles, tourneys, and combats in the water with lances. In winter, when the “great fen or moor which waters the walls of the city on the north side” was frozen, boys and girls engaged in sports upon the ice. Nor were young people alone interested in athletics, for in the twelfth, as in the twentieth century, “the ancient and wealthy men of the town came forth to see the sport of the young men and to take part of the pleasure in beholding their agility” (Stow’s translation).[1603]

_Matthew Paris’ Maps of Britain_

If Giraldus Cambrensis’ treatises are the best descriptions of regional geography in the literature of our period, the best regional maps were also the work of a native of the British Isles. In their relative accuracy and fullness of detail, as well as in their freedom from servile dependence on acknowledged authorities, Matthew Paris’ three maps of Britain occupy a place by themselves in medieval cartography. By far the best way to gain an idea of what they are like is to examine them in reproduction[1604] (one herewith in Fig. 9). It will not be amiss, however, to point out a few significant details.

FIG. 9—One of the three maps of Britain by Matthew Paris, that on
London Codex Claud. D VI, folio 8 vo. (From Miller, _Mappaemundi_,
vol. iii, 1895, fig. 23).
]

On one map a legend in the middle informs us that “Britain, which includes Scotia, Galloway, and Wales, is now called England.”[1605] Another legend on a different map gives the dimensions (800 miles in length from St. Michael in Cornwall to Caithness, and 300 miles from St. David’s to Dover)[1606] and says that there are two archiepiscopal and thirty-two episcopal sees. The outlines of the coasts are in general admirably shown, especially the west coast, with the westward-reaching promontories of Galloway, Wales, and Cornwall. The east coast is less satisfactory, for neither the indentation of the Wash nor the broad eastward projection of Norfolk appear, and by some confusion a point on the coast of Suffolk is taken as the southeastern corner of Britain, with the result that the Thames is shown as debouching into the English Channel. In the far north, the sketchy outlines of Scotland show that relatively little was known of this remote part of the island. Indeed, on two of the maps the Firths of Clyde and Forth join in such a way as to cut off “Scocia Ultramarina” from the remainder of Britain, with which it is connected by a bridge (see Fig. 9). The courses of the main rivers, Severn, Humber, Avon, Thames, on the whole are well delineated. A large tract in the east is labeled _mariscus_ to designate the Fen country, and the mountains Snowdon, Plynlimon, and Cheviot appear in their correct positions.[1607] The northern Scottish Highlands are described by long legends as mountainous and woody regions which generate an uncultivated and pastoral people, inasmuch as a great part of this area is boggy and full of reeds.[1608] Argyll is a “trackless and watery district well adapted to cattle and pasturage,”[1609] and South Wales is spoken of in much the same terms.[1610] Among the islands off the coast we notice Sheppey, Thanet, Wight, possibly some of the Channel Islands, Portland Head, Scilly, Lundy, Anglesey, Man, Tiree, Iona, and, to the east of Scotland, the Orkneys.[1611] The Hebrides are conspicuously absent, and in their place a legend reads “immense and trackless sea.” A large number of cities are placed more or less in their proper positions, together with the names of counties and other territorial divisions; and finally the Roman walls from Forth to Clyde and from Carlisle to Newcastle make the most prominent feature among the works of man.

_Orkneys and Shetlands_

Returning to Giraldus, we find that among the islands in the neighborhood of Britain he mentions Man, Mona (or Anglesey), the Orkneys, and the Shetlands. Man, he remarks, should be considered as belonging to Britain and not to Ireland. His criterion for so assigning it was the fact that its earth does not resemble the earth of Ireland in the property of killing venomous reptiles.[1612] The Orkneys and Shetlands,[1613] in the northern ocean beyond Ulster and Galloway, were subject to the Norwegian king, through whose piracy and prowess at sea they were held in submission even though geographically they lay nearer the coasts of other countries. Giraldus quotes Orosius and Isidore to the effect that, of the thirty-three Orkneys, thirteen were inhabited and twenty deserted, and he added that in his day, also, the greater part of these isles were uninhabited.

ICELAND AND THULE

Giraldus writes of Iceland, three days’ sail to the north of Ireland, and gives a few details regarding its people.[1614] The speech of the Icelanders was brief and truthful and they rarely made oath; their king was the equivalent of a priest; and government was in the hands of a bishop. Though thunder and lightning were rare in this distant isle, there was another curse far more terrible: volcanic eruptions and lava flows.

Apparently Giraldus did not associate Iceland with the Thule of the ancients, an isle which he was at a loss to identify.[1615] In regard to the latter, he remarked that it was strange that this island, the nature of which was so well known to the Orientals, should remain unknown to the people of the West. After quoting what Solinus and Isidore had written about it, he added that no island familiar to the men of the Occident partook of the qualities which these writers attributed to Thule and that consequently it must either be fabulous—as well as famous, he naively remarks—or else hidden away in the far corners of the Boreal Ocean under the Arctic Pole.

The Emperor Frederick II in his treatise on falconry says that the gerfalcons come from a certain island between Norway and Gallandia (Greenland) called in Teutonic “Islandia,” which may be translated as “frozen” or “region of ice.”[1616]

_Iceland in Icelandic Literature_

Long prior to the beginning of our period Iceland had become the home of an enterprising and cultivated Scandinavian people. From its shores pilgrims found their way to Italy and the Holy Land, and navigators sailed westward into the more mysterious recesses of the ocean. The Sagas give us data regarding these voyages and incidentally throw light on the geographical concepts in the minds of the Northern peoples concerning the seas and islands of the North. The _Ílendingabók_ of Ari Frodhi, dating from shortly after 1134, tells of the first Norse visit to Iceland in 870 by Ingolf. Ari mentions it as significant that “at that time Iceland was clothed with forest from the mountains to the strand,” and that “there were Christian men here, whom the Norsemen called Papar” (Nansen’s translation).[1617] It was supposed that these men came from the British Isles because here were found Irish books, bells, and crooks. In the _Historia de antiquitate regum Norwagiensium_ of the monk Theodricus we are told that certain merchants in the time of Harold Fairhair had sailed to the Faroes but were driven out to sea by storms and came “to a far distant land, which some think to have been the island of Thule; but I cannot either confirm or deny this, as I do not know the true state of the matter. They landed and wandered far and wide; but although they climbed mountains, they nowhere found trace of human habitation” (Nansen’s translation).[1618] In the _Historia Norwegiae_, dating probably from the thirteenth century, we are told that “next, to the west, comes the great island which by the Italians is called Ultima Tile; but now it is inhabited by a considerable multitude, while formerly it was waste land, and unknown to men, until the time of Harold Fairhair” (Nansen’s translation).[1619] In the _Landnámabók_, of about 1200, we have a vivid account of the first Norwegian discoverers’ ascent of a high mountain in this remote land. They “looked around them, whether they could see smoke or any sign that the land was inhabited, and they saw nothing.... As they sailed from the land much snow fell upon the mountains, and therefore they called the land Snowland” (Nansen’s translation).[1620]

GREENLAND

Greenland had been discovered about the year 900. In our period the southwestern coast had become the seat of two small settlements, the ruins of which may be seen at the present time.[1621] The population was not great (less than two thousand), and yet this far outpost of European civilization was large enough to be constituted an independent bishopric about the year 1110. From its settlements, certainly during and after the thirteenth century and probably in the course of our period as well, regular summer seal-hunting expeditions were made to the north along the coast, perhaps as far as Baffin’s Bay. The icebound east coast of Greenland, on the other hand, was avoided by the Scandinavian seafarers, although we read of frequent shipwrecks there. There is also a report of a seal-hunting trip to this coast made in 1129. From the mid-thirteenth century dates the work called the _King’s Mirror_, which gives us a vivid account of the ice floes and icebergs that beset the inhospitable eastern shore.

“Now in that same sea [i.e. the Greenland Sea] there are yet many more marvels, even though they cannot be accounted for by witchcraft [skrimslum]. So soon as the greater part of the sea has been traversed, there is found such a mass of ice as I know not the like of anywhere else in the world. This ice [i.e. the ice-floes] is some of it as flat as if it had frozen on the sea itself, four or five cubits thick, and lies so far from land [i.e. from the east coast of Greenland] that men may have four or five days’ journey across the ice [to land]. But this ice lies off the land rather to the northeast (landnorr) or north than to the south, southwest, or west; and therefore anyone wishing to make the land should sail round it [i.e. round Cape Farewell] in a southwesterly and westerly direction, until he is past the danger of [encountering] all this ice, and then sail thence to land. But it has constantly happened that men have tried to make the land too soon, and so have been involved in these ice-floes; and some have perished in them; but others again have got out, and we have seen some of these and heard their tales and reports.... These ice-floes are strange in their nature; sometimes they lie as still as might be expected, separated by creeks or large fjords; but sometimes they move with as great rapidity as a ship with a fair wind, and when once they are under way they travel against the wind as often as with it. There are, indeed, some masses of ice in that sea of another shape, which the Greenlanders call ‘fall-jökla.’ Their appearance is that of a high mountain rising out of the sea, and they do not unite themselves to other masses of ice, but keep apart” (Nansen’s translation).[1622]

POLAR SEAS

In the boreal parts of the Atlantic the Northern writers of our period placed great whirlpools and fabulous countries peopled by monsters. Adam of Bremen tells of the explorations of certain noblemen of Friesland during the time of the predecessor of archbishop Adalbert of Bremen. Sailing beyond Iceland “towards the extreme axis of the north ... they suddenly glided into the misty darkness of the stiffened ocean, which can scarcely be penetrated by the eye” (Nansen’s translation).[1623] Here they were caught by a terrible current and were almost sucked into the vortex of the deep, only to be thrown forth away from danger by a reverse tidal current. Thence they came to an island, fortified like a town, where they found a race of giants whom they called Cyclopes and from whom they barely were able to make their escape. Saxo Grammaticus, writing about 1200, tells of the voyage of a legendary King Gorm of Denmark and an Icelander Thorkill to an even more mysterious region called “Farther Biarmaland,” north of Norway.[1624] Here too were loathsome monsters, a river dividing the land of men from the land of spirits, and many other wonders. In the _Historia Norwegiae_ we are also told of a fabulous coast in the North Atlantic upon which sailors had landed when on the way from Iceland to Norway. This country lay “between the Greenlanders and the Bjarmas,” and the sailors “asserted that they had found people of extraordinary size and the land of virgins [‘virginum terram’] who are said to conceive when they taste water. But Greenland is separated from these by ice-clad skerries [‘scopulis’]” (Nansen’s translation).[1625] Yet more full of color is another description in the same work. Beyond Norway “there is the very deep and northerly gulf which has in it Charybdis, Scylla, and unavoidable whirlpools; there are also ice-covered promontories which plunge into the sea immense masses of ice that have been increased by heaving floods and are frozen together by the winter cold; with these traders often collide against their will, when making for Greenland, and thus they suffer shipwreck and run into danger” (Nansen’s translation).[1626]

Possibly these accounts in the _Historia Norwegiae_ refer to Svalbard, “the country of the cold coasts,” mentioned in the _Landnámabók_.[1627] The discovery of Svalbard was placed by the _Icelandic Annals_ in 1194,[1628] and it may well be that sailors in that year were driven out of their course and landed on the inhospitable shores of Spitsbergen.[1629]

WINELAND THE GOOD

The voyages of Leif Ericsson and others to the coasts of America, though they had taken place over a century earlier, were doubtless remembered by the Icelanders of the period we are studying. Ari Frodhi in the _Íslendingabók_, written about 1134, refers to Wineland and to the Skraelings as if they were entirely familiar to his contemporaries.[1630] There is also a record in the _Icelandic Annals_, under the date 1121, that the Bishop Eric of Greenland actually sought Wineland, though we are not told whether his search was successful or whether he made any important discoveries in prosecuting it.[1631] The detailed stories of the Wineland voyages which were current in oral tradition during the eleventh century were undeniably put into written form long before 1250, although the versions in which we now have them, the _Saga of Eric the Red_ and the _Flatey Book_, are of later date.[1632]

The true position of Wineland has for many years been a matter of acrimonious dispute among historians and geographers, but it is beyond our province to enter upon this controversy. On the other hand, it is of interest to point out that the Icelanders themselves or some of them, at least, must have believed that Wineland lay in relatively southern latitudes, for an Icelandic geographical description of the world,[1633] dating perhaps from our period, contains the following remark: Not far from Markland is “Wineland the Good, which some affirm extends from Africa; and, if this is so, an arm of the sea separates Wineland and Markland.”[1634] In Europe outside of the Scandinavian countries practically nothing was known of Wineland. The earliest mention of it is in the pages of Adam of Bremen’s description of the North, where we read the following brief passages: “Moreover he [King Svend Estridsson] spoke of an island in that ocean discovered by many, which is called Wineland, for the reason that vines grow wild there, which yield the best of wine. Moreover, that grain unsown grows there abundantly is not a fabulous fancy, but from the accounts of the Danes we know to be a fact” (Reeves’s translation).[1635] Ordericus Vitalis in his _Historia ecclesiastica_ includes Wineland in a list of countries made subject to the king of the Norsemen but gives no details.[1636]

Adam of Bremen or a later interpolator[1637] adds to the passage just quoted a description of the Northern Ocean, which he erroneously places beyond Wineland. He says: “Beyond this island, it is said that there is no habitable land in that ocean, but all those regions which are beyond are filled with unsupportable ice and boundless gloom, to which Marcian thus refers: ‘One day’s sail beyond Thile the sea is frozen.’ This was essayed not long since by that very enterprising Northmen’s prince, Harold, who explored the extent of the Northern Ocean with his ship but was scarcely able by retreating to escape in safety from the gulf’s enormous abyss, where before his eyes the vanishing bounds of earth were hidden in gloom” (Reeves’s translation).[1638]

FABULOUS ISLES

Until modern times the Atlantic has been an ocean filled by the imaginations of the coast-dwelling peoples of the Old World with fabulous and fantastic isles. In the _De imagine mundi_ we read of the Isle of the Gorgons and of the Hesperides,[1639] “among which was that great land described by Plato as having been submerged beneath that part of the sea now coagulated—an isle greater in extent even than Africa and Europe.” In this story we recognize the old legend of Atlantis which had been the subject of speculation and discussion ever since the time of Plato. The _De imagine mundi_ then goes on to speak of “Perdita,” or the Lost Island, which far exceeded all the surrounding countries in the delightfulness and fertility of all things to be found therein. Though as a general rule unknown to man, this isle was sometimes to be found by hazard, though never found when looked for. Hence it was called “Perdita,” or “Lost.” To it St. Brandan was said to have gone in the course of his wanderings.

_St. Brandan’s Isles_

For a full account of the islands visited by St. Brandan we must look to the famous narration of his voyages. Ernest Renan poetically characterizes this legend as follows: “In the midst of these dreams there appears with surprising truth a feeling for the picturesque in polar navigations: the transparence of the sea, the aspects of the ice floes and icebergs melting in the sun, the volcanic phenomena of Iceland, the playing of the cetaceans, the characteristic appearance of the fiords of Norway, the sudden fogs, the milklike sea, green islands covered with grass which overhangs into the waves....”[1640] In the most widely known Latin version, which was translated into English and French during our period,[1641] we are told[1642] that Brandan, the abbot of a large monastery in Munster, received information from a certain Barinthus of marvelous isles that the latter had visited in the western seas and in particular of the “Terra repromissionis sanctorum,” or Saints’ Land of Promise. Taking seven companions, the saint set out in a ship built especially for the voyage and wandered for seven years from one marvelous isle to another. After forty days’ sailing in a northerly direction they came to an islet, where they entered into a narrow harbor between high and precipitous rocks. This harbor mouth, just wide enough to admit a ship, was typical of the ragged western coasts of Ireland and Scotland and was doubtless suggested to the poet by some bleak cove among the rocks of St. Kilda or the Outer Hebrides. After leaving the islet the wanderers reached an isle covered with sheep—perhaps a reminiscence of the Faroes, the sheep of which had long before been described by Dicuil.[1643] Beyond this they came to a smooth islet lacking verdure and with no sand upon it; this turned out to be a sea monster, which dived beneath the waves when the saint and his companions tried to light a fire upon its back. Their fortunate escape from the monster was followed by wanderings that brought them to an isle full of birds in such numbers and of such brilliant plumage that the voyagers could scarce see the branches of the trees. Some of the birds could talk; and one spoke words of prophecy foretelling the future course of Brandan’s journeys. Thence they came to yet another isle, where they entered a port with a narrow entrance and found a monastery; then to an isle with a fresh-water spring which put each brother to sleep for a period corresponding to the number of cups he drank. After that they made their way still farther north, where the sea was coagulated, and then returned to many of the isles already visited in the course of their earlier sailings and also to fresh marvels—seas of miraculous clearness, terrible volcanoes, Judas’s rock, the islet of Paul the hermit.[1644] Finally, after seven whole years, they attained a broad and spacious country full of trees bearing apples as if it were the autumn of the year, a land where no night was ever known. Here a youth greeted Brandan and said that this was the country for which he had been seeking. Then Brandan sailed back to Ireland, where he lived out the remainder of his earthly life, and, after his death, returned forthwith to this “land of promise of the saints,” or Paradise, which for so long had been his goal.