Bleak, bleak, bleak are the wastes of Greenland.
With an average temperature chattering between -9 and 7 degrees centigrade the place is pinned to the earth’s crust by a vast ice sheet, which makes the country bow in the middle, forming a basin. Consequently the ice does not flow outwards towards the sea, but makes for the heart of this wild white empire, leaving its sparse human population shivering on the coasts.
What makes a human being want to settle in such a place? Did they commit a crime, that they chose to flee to one of the bleakest habitats the world has to offer us?
Perhaps you just have to be born there. There were prehistoric cultures, paleo-eskimos who dominated the landscape from 2500bc.
And then the Norsemen came. And evidence from ice cores and clam shell analysis has shown that things were better there, in those days. It was several degrees warmer, and the settlers were able to grow trees, plants and barley. Scientists dubbed it the Mediaeval Warm Period, and Greenland was really quite bearable. Three large settlements were formed, with some 400 farms.
But all good warm periods must come to an end, and into this comfortable state of affairs a little ice age must come.
It hit the Norse men hard. Cut off from their ancestors, when the climate became colder the crops dried up and fish became their staple source of food. They became malnourished; there was plague; and the men fought with the Inuits.
The last wedding recorded on the settlements is 1408. Soon after, there was no more heard from the Norseman of Greenland. There had even been a bishopric of Greenland which fell into disuse.
And the story lay fallow in the ice.
Until 18th century missionary Hans Egede got a bee in his thoroughly Lutheran bonnet about the tales of a lost race of his people, who had settled in Greenland in the olden days.
Egede was convinced the colony must still exist. In the early 1700s he gained permission from the King of Denmark to launch a mission to find these men and make them godly once more.
Not only that, but he secured huge sums from Bergen merchants to found the Bergen Greenland Company which was granted extensive powers by the King: to raise taxes, and have its own army and navy, and to administer justice.
Egede was a huge success; he never found his Norse men, only ruined settlements. But he laid the path for future settlers and within a short time the coastline was teeming with settlers once more.
He had a strange sighting in 1734, couple of years before he turned 50. He was on a ship off the coast of Greenland when he sighted a great sea serpent longer than the ship on which he sailed.
He recounts how he “saw a most terrible creature, resembling nothing [we] saw before. The monster lifted its head so high that it seemed to be higher than the crow’s nest on the mainmast.
“The head was small and the body short and wrinkled. The unknown creature was using giant fins which propelled it through the water. Later the sailors saw its tail as well. The monster was longer than our whole ship”.
Sea monsters have always captured our imagination, ever since Scylla herself, the terror of the Aegean and Odysseus’s foe: “Verily,” goes the account,”she has twelve feet, all misshapen, and six necks, exceeding long, and on each one an awful head, and therein three rows of teeth, thick and close, and full of black death.
“Up to her middle she is hidden in the hollow cave, but she holds her head out beyond the dread chasm, and fishes there, eagerly searching around the rock for dolphins and sea-dogs and whatever greater beast she may haply catch…
The images swam in my mind when I stumbled upon a chance picture: something one of our family had researched and left on the screen when I came to it.
It has an exotic sounding name, too: Pelamis. Creature of fathomless depths.
Yet it lives on the surface of the water, hungry for the power of the waves.
The brainchild of Pelamis Wave Power, the serpent is bright orange, a series of great armoured segments which are jointed in customary sea-monster tradition.
The monster is created to face the full force of the waves, taking huge draughts of seawater and the power they harness. In each joint is a system to remove the hydraulic power and a cable leads the power back to the mainland, miles away from the fiery serpent’s lair.
In the old days the ancient sea monsters were all sound and fury. And some ate sailors.
Now, our serpent eats the very sea itself: and sends the power, the cleanest you can get, back to its keepers.
Kate Shrewsday 
the real hero, one who can tame the monster and make it acceptable in society?
Indeed. Harnessing wave power is such an important aim, isn’t it?
definitely so important
Your stories never cease to amaze me Kate. I think I must have you on my dinner party wish list:)
😀 Thanks, Wanderlust. I shall look forward to that 😀
If any sea monsters exist today; they would be well advised, not to rear their heads above the surface. Can you imagine the media circus that would follow?
Lovely post Kate.
Thanks Helen:And you’re quite right; I feel sorry for poor Nessie if she is really there: she can’t get any peace.
What an excellent idea. I’m very keen on these alternative power generating systems and I like their look. We have a great deal of wind farms around us, which I think are very elegant.
I adore wind farms, we had a lot in Cornwall, though they have their dissenters. And I have the same regard for the sea serpent…what clever design…
It seems then that sea monsters are all a matter of perspective. The ironic name of Greenland has always captured my imagination so your tale was just up my street this morning. 🙂
Glad to hear it, IE. Perspective: you arevright. You have summed the whole matter up today! Thanks!
ooo,…. sea monsters… I always wonder do they exist really in their primitive form
One glance at Carl’s comment (below) indicates some are still around, Jas!
Try as we could we did not see the Loch Ness Monster! I loved reading this post 🙂
Glad you enjoyed it, Tandy. I think Nessie is a little media-shy these days 🙂
Love Sea Monster stories and especially enjoy anything about Greenland and Iceland. Always got a kick of how they each were named with Iceland trying to keep people away by presenting itself as a frozen tundra while actually being a lovely place.
I know: Maddie tours Iceland next year with her school. I’m tempted to pack myself in her suitcase 🙂
From wind farms to wave farms, there is no end (thank goodness) to the human imagination. What a fine telling of this tale of sea adventures, Kate – all 4,000 years or so wrapped up in another great blog.
How is your mum?
Thanks, Penny 🙂 Mum is home now recovering in her own familiar surroundings, with Dad. We are so happy!
Not sure which is more fascinating, the ancient lore or the modern incarnation! Loved this, Kate.
I know how you feel, Karen. I’d love to see the modern serpent for real. What a sight that must be.
this was very interesting. thanks for sharing
Thanks for reading, Terry 🙂
Sounds a bit like Nessie . . . but more useful. 😉
…and a bit oranger.
Wave power. Fascinating new technology that can and should be exploited around the world.
Clean, efficient, and straight from our natural surroundings. What could be better, PT?
In Florence around about the same time it was recorded as being an average of 8 degrees warmer than present times, interesting that the world has become slowly cooler since then and now we are warming up slightly again though that is reported to have plateaued in the last 5 or so years. We only need to look at history to see a repeat of what we see now. I am always thoroughly engaged when you teach us, i have read something of this story before, and even warmer it still must have been very cold there indeed..thank you for another beautifully presented lesson.. c
Celi, what lovely words, thank you! I think it was always a fairly inhospitable place. I’m thinking Arctic winters and darkness are not for the faint hearted…
Enjoying the romantic adventures of Kupa, by the way…
I was fishing on the bank of Biscayne Bay (North Miami, Florida, USA) . It is only 8-10 feet deep . As a storm approached a giant manta ray jumped out of the water. It was the size of a bus ! Hopped right in that car and split.
Carl, that is a story to curdle the blood! fantastic!
I loved the way you moved us to Pelamis via sea monster lore. I think we all just wonder if there isn’t some prehistoric holdover in the deep! But I am really interested in this modern monster of energy production. I’ve never heard of this technology and how wonderful! We have some interesting “wind farms” in California I might take a picture sometime. Thousands of windmills–giant ones out in the desert harnessing energy. Some great minds out there! Debra
Goodness, Kate – your post sent me to Pelamis’s web site – they say, “On average one machine will provide sufficient power to meet the annual electricity demand of approximately 500 homes.” That’s quite remarkable given the small size of the machine – an utterly fascinating prospect