The end

Over the course of this blog I've reviewed each of Diamond's (2005) factors: environmental degradation, climate change, Inuit/Norse relations, friendly trade and societal response and the roles they may have played in the collapse of Norse Greenland. 

It seems that the conclusion of caused the collapse largely depends on the authors academic background. Environmentalists argue that deforestation and soil erosion caused environmental degradation which lead to the collapse, climatologists blame decreasing temperatures, archaeologists point to evidence of conflict between the Norse and Inuits, anthropologists argue that declining economic circumstances or failure to adapt to climate change are the culprits. However, it is too simplistic to point to only one factor as the ultimate reason for the collapse. Rather it is the combination of the factors and the connections between them that provide the most coherent interpretation of the evidence. 

It is only recently with the increased multi-disciplinary research that these factors are being blended together to provide a more holistic picture of why Norse Greenland collapsed. Climate change invariably added pressure to an already stressed agricultural environment. It also made trade with Europe harder as it was more dangerous to travel by boat. consequently, decreased communication trade links with Europe  which caused support from Europe to become more infrequent. Environmental degradation of pastoral land would have lead to the need for increased hunting which may have caused conflict with the Inuits over hunting grounds. This would have soured relations with the Inuits and made it less likely that the Inuits would want to teach the Norse and help them adapt to the colder conditions. In addition the hostilities would have cemented the Norse's prejudices against the Inuits and ensured that they try and maintain their own culture and not adapt to the undesirable Inuit way of life. The social hierarchy would have resisted any changes to the status-quo as a a nomadic way of life would have undermined their power and authority both politically and religiously. As you see, each factor played a role in the collapse of Norse Greenland and further research needs to be done in examining the connections and relationships between the factors to better determine the reasons for the collapse.

Finally, and most importantly, Norse Greenland provides us with an important analogue for our society. The failures of Norse Greenland serve as a warning for the obstacles our society must overcome in order to survive the potential impacts of anthropogenically-driven climate change.

So, that's the end of it. Thank you for tuning in each week, and I hope you've found the blog interesting or at the very least make good use of the sources for your revision in the summer. 

So what?

So what's the point of it all? Who cares why people who lived on a far off island of ice over 600 years ago couldn't survive? 

The collapse of Norse Greenland can serve as an analogue for our own society. Its not too much of a stretch to see the parallels between Norse Greenland and our modern society. The Norse were reliant on timber - an unrenewable resource just the same as our society is reliant on unrenewable fossil fuels such as oil. Our high consumption of natural resources has led to the re-emergence of Malthusian views that our planet is reaching its limit. 

The Norse failed to adapt to natural climate change. The decrease in temperatures made it harder for not only the Norse to survive, but the livestock and agricultural crops. Contemporary society is also facing the threat of a change in climate with irreversible consequences. With the limited political progress made in trying to mitigate climate change, increasing emphasis is being placed on adapting to the coming impacts. Technology will invariably play a key role in this. Diamond (2005) argues over the past centuries technology has provided more problems that fixes. The is evident with the Norse analogue. The Norse created an irrigation system to improve their agricultural productivity, but in the long term it amplified and accelerated the degradation of the environment. 

The next two factors in the collapse of societies - enemy and friendly trade relations don't really translate to our world. There are only so many friends and enemies we can have, unless of course the aliens decide to get involved (Page, 2005). 

The failure to recognise issues and the failure to respond to them are two key failings that cause societies to prevent collapse. In Norse Greenland the lack of accurate historical information about past environments and climate meant that it would have been more difficult to recognise the decline in conditions, and it is evident that the Norse failed to respond successfully (Dugmore et al., 2007). Our society has a much greater wealth of information about our environment and so are able to recognise any issues much better than our Norse counterparts. However, we are fully aware of issues of deforestation, over-fishing, over-hunting, biodiversity loss, noise, air and water pollution, and yet little has actually been achieved in stopping/ reducing them. Norse Greenland was a single country that had the same culture, economy, political system and climate. Whereas our 'island' is made up of many countries with different cultures, economies and political agendas. This makes agreeing on a course of action more difficult.

These parallels between our society and that of Norse Greenland highlight some crucial factors that our society will have to confront in the future. 

How did it really end?

In a city as technologically advanced as Tokyo, you'd think it would be easier to find free wifi, nope - its virtually impossible. So just a quick post on the debate about whether the Norse actually failed in Greenland. Researchers can't seem to agree on how Norse society in Greenland actually ended. Jared Diamond (2005) puts forward the description that of a dramatic collapse of society with the remaining population freezing or starving to death, or alternatively dying in a final bloody battle with the Inuits. This rather powerful Hollywood image of the defeat of the strong warrior Vikings succumbing to defeat from the environment or the better-adapted Inuits. 

Putting a face to the name: Jared Diamond, unfortunately I couldn't find a picture of Berglund.

On the other hand, Joel Berglund (2010) argues that such theories of dramatic collapse are only mirror our contemporary fears about the end of our civilisation. He argues instead that the Norse declined slowly in Greenland with the population emigrating as conditions worsened. The Vikings were known for their tendency to migrate when conditions worsened. There is no archaeological evidence from the Norse remains that they starved or froze to death. In addition only a few of the bodies have markings associated with conflict. Even in the last decades of existence there is no evidence if panic. The clothing fashions of Europe were still being followed, there was an elaborate wedding and full Christian burials were still performed. Surely a society at the brink catastrophic collapse would not be worrying about staying on the fashion trend and putting on a (relatively) resource intense wedding. This leads to Berglund to conclude that the Norse didn't fail as Diamond suggests, but that they lived in Greenland as long as it could sustain them and when that time was over they migrated to other lands.

So the jury's still out on this one. Whilst there is little evidence found so far that supports Diamond's theory, you can't use the absence of evidence of any catastrophic events to support Berglund's theory, especially as there is no known record of the Norse leaving Greenland or better yet arriving at another Norse colony.

The man is keeping me down

It's been a while since I last posted anything, but even bloggers get Christmas off! In between last minute Christmas shopping, all my relatives asking me what I plan to do after I graduate, and the Doctor Who Christmas special, I've managed to do some more reading into the societal response in Norse Greenland. In this post I'm going to look in the reasons why the societal hierarchy and the church failed to stop the collapse.

Norse society in Greenland was highly hierarchical, operating with a rigid feudal system of chieftains.  The church in Greenland was setup in 1124 and in the next 300 years 12 large churches were built (Berglund, 1986). The ability of the church to command the resources and labour to build the churches and a cathedral indicates the significant power and influence the Norse elite had in governing the Norse community. McGovern (1980) argues that the Norse elite encouraged the maintenance of the status-quo because they were largely insulated from the deteriorating conditions. The church was the largest landowner and the elite farmed in the more favourable land in the inner fjords which were protected more from the impacts of the colder climate than those farms in the outer fjords. A diet based on sheep and cattle meant that the elites were less effected by the impact of a changing climate on seal populations. The deteriorating conditions had little negative impact on the decision makers in the beginning and so they felt less urgency to adapt and resisted changing.

As the situation in Norse Greenland worsened, the Norse should have adapted by migrating to the outer coast. This would make it easier to maintain a marine based diet and thus reduce pressure on the pastorial base. The clothes would have been made out of seal skin rather than sheep and goat wool. In addition the Norse would have to lead a more nomadic life, migrating seasonally with the marine food sources (Berglund, 1986). This did not happen, instead there was an intensification in religious activities such as church building.

The adaptive strategies outlined above had the potential to enable the Norse to survive and continue living in Greenland. However, it would result in the reorganisation of the societal structure. The power of the pastorial elite would diminish as the economic base in agriculture reduced. Furthermore,as the population became more mobile, the ability of the elite to control the politically and spiritually would decrease. The change to a hunter-gatherer way of life would be akin to the Inuit's way of life and this would have been deemed undesirable by the Norse.