LL-L 'History' 2006.07.31 (03) [E]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 31 July 2006 * Volume 03
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From: clarkedavid8 at aol.com
Subject: LL-L 'History' 2006.07.31 (02) [E]

 "On 31/07/2006, at 9:48 AM, Sandy Fleming
> http://scotstext.org/wrote:

> They do seem to parallel the early reports of "Welsh Indians" which, as
>
> I said seem likely to be an attempt by the British to lay prior claim to
>
> the Americas over the Spanish."
 
It is certainly the case that the Klu Klux Klan and many old-fashioned (white)
inhabitants of the former Confederacy claim Celtic ancestry in general and
descent from Mel Gibson in 'Braveheart' in particular. The KKK's practice of
burning crosses is an old Scottish custom.
 
David Clarke

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: History

Tom:

> He probably found both sources at and near Iceland only to be
> done in by The Hanseatic League who claimed exclusive rights 
> to those items. 

Yes, or the fish all the way up near the coast of Southern Greenland, which was
common already then.

The Hanseatic League had established itself at crucial ports along the Norwegian
coast.  This is where Norwegian fishermen delivered to it the dry cod
(_stokvisch_) made from fish caught in those northern waters, and this is from
where the League tried to control access to the rich northern fishing grounds. 
There was a fair bit of competition, not only from Britain but also from as far
afield as Northern Iberia.

Much of this history went unrecorded, no doubt.  Let's remember that written
records were relatively rare and selective and had to conform to the views and
wishful thinking of the powers that be as well as to those of the church
autorities, were thus little more than edited history and propaganda.  "Rogue"
competition tended to have no formal education, so reports about it are scarce
and antagonistically biased.  People might be branded "pirates" and "privateers"
that merely tried to get a foothold on someone's supposed turf.

Colonization attempts by early Icelanders seem to show that, unless you come with
massive force as Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, French and British powers did later,
you'd better not separate yourself from the indigenous polulation but rather take
its advice and adapt to its survival strategies.  There are lots of indications
that those early Icelanders settling in Greenland and on Canada's northeastern
coast failed to do that and that their colonies were therefore shortlived.  Both
before and after adoption of Christianity they had very chauvinistic attitudes
toward indigenous populations (_skrælingers_), fought them off or simply stayed
away from them.  As we know from later encounters, the Inuit and Northeast
American peoples were on the whole peaceable and helpful to newcomers.  Had the
Europeans befriended them they would have learned how to survive in those
regions, as bands of French and British trappers preceding colonial forces did
later on in history.  Contemporary Nordic reports about these events are scarce;
archeological finds have added much knowledge in recent decades.

So who knows how many unreported failed colonization attempts there have been? 
However, this is not to suggest that we ought to jump on the bandwagon of every
new "revelation" that comes along.  We ought to remember that, consciously or
subconsciously, people are sceptical regarding official history, and they refuse
to accept that all has been said and done.  Our need for romantic adventure
stories that fly in the face of official history makes such tales very tempting,
especially if some sort of achievement of "the little guy" is involved and the
supposed evidence comes accross as very surprising and exotic (such as Basque and
Welsh Indians).

This is my take on it.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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