Introduction
In the 14the century, Norsemen living around the fjords of Grønland were living under harsh conditions. The climate that had been fairly generous around 1000 a.d. had been cooling down since. In the late 14th century the Inuït skrælings were attacking settlements on a regular basis and the last few thousand Norsemen saw no other way than move to more hospitable lands. Markland and Vinland, to the west, had vast resources of wood, and lots of fertile meadows respectively.
The Vinland Vikings were devote catholics, and the nobles ruled the nation. They had elected a noble Prince at the thing (assembly) every eight years, for the last 32 years. Since crops had not been very successful that many times, smaller land owners were forced more often than not to sell their land to bigger landproprietors and enlist as clients of that land owner. That way, most of the land got concentrated in the hands of the merry few. The nobles' basis of power was this factual injustice.
However, although that the new colonies were thriving, it seemed that the northern area of the Vinlandic sphere of influence was threatened by Inuït skrælings aswell. In fact, Hvalvik and its surrounding area was plundered and ransacked by them.
The rivalry between the nobles over who should be the next prince had already damaged the country. None of the nobles felt like supporting a rival for the throne. That's how the Wermund II Leifsson got to power. He was an economical failure and had lost more of his possessions to the skræling lootings than any other noble. His economical insignificance and thus non-existing political incluence was the main reason for the other nobles to let this compromise figure to govern.
Wermund II Leifsson
His only apparant quality was his military leadership. He had the insight of keeping the skrælings at bay , while the small fleet of a few ships guarded a safe retreat over the Hvalvik Channel to Vestr Vinland.
In order to take the initiative successfully, structural changes to the state of Vinland were needed, because once the skrælings could find a way to get rid of those four ships blocking the way, the Norsemen were on the brink of extinction.
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Originally Posted by Enewald
this is what was found in sunken ships:
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