It’s well established that Viking explorers hundreds of years before Recently discovered evidence, however, indicates sailors weren’t only the first Europeans to likely meet Indigenous societies—genetic analysis of DNA indicates their ivory trade routes may have been complex, expansive, and on a tight deadline. To further bolster their claims, some of the researchers even set sail in traditional Norwegian ships to showcase technology of the time. Ivory was a major luxury commodity used to make a variety of products such as jewelry and tools across Europe during the medieval era.
Norse cultures were integral for sourcing the material given their northern geographic locations, a demand that likely drove hunting parties to expand their search range. But this hunting territory appears even greater than previously believed, thanks to a study published September 27 in from an international team led by researchers at Sweden’s Lund University. Using genetic “fingerprinting,” the experts identified the origins of 31 ivory artifacts recovered from Greenland Norse settlements and other major European trading hubs.
Their findings revealed the ivory fragments came from Atlantic walruses ( ), a species that lives across vast ranges of the North Atlantic Arctic. “What really surprised us was that much of the walrus ivory exported back to Europe was originating in very remote hunting grounds located deep into the High Arctic,” Peter Jordan, study co-author and Lund University.