Tree-ring dating shows Norse (Viking) explorers were felling timber at a settlement called L'Anse aux Meadows in present-day Newfoundland, Canada, in the year 1021 CE. Roughly how much earlier was this than Christopher Columbus's first Atlantic voyage in 1492?
- About 470 years earlier
- About 150 years earlier
- About 20 years earlier
- They actually arrived after Columbus, not before
Why A? And why not the others?
Correct answer: A. About 470 years earlier
Wood from the Norse settlement at L'Anse aux Meadows has been dated, using tree rings matched to a known spike in radiocarbon caused by a solar storm, to the exact year 1021 CE — nearly five centuries (about 470 years) before Columbus reached the Caribbean in 1492. This makes L'Anse aux Meadows the only confirmed site of pre-Columbian European contact with the Americas outside Greenland, and it quietly overturns the popular idea that Columbus was the first European to reach the continent. The '150 years earlier' and '20 years earlier' options both understate just how large the true gap actually is; the real story is more surprising than either suggests, not less. The option claiming the Norse arrived after Columbus reverses the entire timeline and ignores the physical, datable evidence (felled and worked timber) recovered from the site.
Source: Britannica: 'L'Anse aux Meadows'; Nature (2021), 'Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021'