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...detailing the explorations of Leif Eriksson, who had discovered America in the 11th century and named it Vinland. I've deleted this as it's incorrect. See the article. Wetman 01:32, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)
But something very like this is correct. Bjarni Herjolfsson is the first European to SEE North America, though he didn't land. Leif Eriksson in 1000 or shortly after landed an may reasonably be called the first European discoverer. He is responsible for the name Vinland, though quite what partof NA it applies to is open to debate. 213.122.49.32 20:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
Can we pare down or move the external links? It's getting rather excessive, and polemical. I'll do it if I can get some agreement.
I don't know who made the above point, but I've just added references to most of the primary sources for information on the V.M., so I'm inclined to agree that the links to news items etc. should be trimmed. David Trochos 18:27, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
The strangest thing about this map is not Americas, but rather that it intends to show how large rivers like the Nile are merging and originating inside the deepest deep of Black Africa. That area of massive jungle was definitely not explored pre-Columbus and in fact the origin of the Nile was only found by Victorian explorers. The cold climate norsemen are unlikely to have wandered into near-equatorial Africa. 195.70.32.136 22:39, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
I know this argument has been made, but it is very weak. The cartographic style of the map is to "close" land - if only one coast is known the other is guessed at. So Greenland becomes an island, Africa is likewise shown as a finite area rather than open to the south. The style encourages guessing at things like where a river might go, and some guesses will be right. 213.122.49.32 20:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
If the map is drawn after a globe as I mentioned below then Africa is actually presented in its entirety. Note the small rise in Africa under the Arabian peninsula. If the map is drawn after a globe this is potentially a visually accurate depiction of an incredibly accurate rendering of Somalia on a globe, while the large point to the right of the map is a visually accurate depiction of the southern tip of Africa. If there's any accuracy to this then little about the contours of Africa is guessed at, but is in fact very accurately depicted, though not as a conventional projection. This is very much the kind of thing I would expect to see from an early map drawn after a globe, where the cartographer producing a copy doesn't understand spherical geometry sufficiently to produce a conventional projection. Paperflight 17:16, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
The argument against the historicity of the map based on the drawing of inner-African rivers is not convincing because a connection between the Atlantic Ocean and the sources of the Nile was postulated even in Antiquity (see Ptolemy maps with its connection of Nile, Nigir, Chremes and Daras), in Medieval Mappae Mundi and in Arabic Maps of that time. Nethertheless the projection is unique for Antique and Medieval maps - not a proof, but a serious objection againt historicity of the map.
-- 213.55.131.22 23:56, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
Straying dangerously close to original research, I would draw your attention to the Bianco world map with which, as was recognised by the early Vinland Map researchers in the 1950s, the V.M. shares many place-names and, in a distorted form, the outline of the Old World (yet not, mysteriously, any of the rivers except the Nile). Print it out, and chop it off at the discoloured line caused by the page-fold... David Trochos 18:38, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
I watched the Nova episode on PBS about the Vinland Map, and according to this documentary it seemed to me that scientists had by the early 2000s pretty much determined to the satisfaction of most objective observers that the map was indeed a forgery (20th-century ink on medieval or renaissance-era "paper"). However, this Wikipedia article currently presents the subject as though the matter is still largely up in the air. Is it, or has the matter been laid to rest? If the latter, I think the article should make a more decisive statement in support of "forgery". -- Skb8721 16:57, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
Television documentaries often like to "prove" something. Very many specialists have pronounced on both sides of the argument, and it is the specialists we should be listening to, not PBS. It still remains that we don't know. A consensus is something like: this is original parchment (with something written on it) which was tampered with in the 1950s, including addition of a modern ink. This might in theory be a forger creating the map from scratch (but if so he was brilliant, as many specialists have pronounced it genuine). More likely it is a dealer employing someone to make a document more marketable by "improving" it. This is likely to include cleaning, resurfacing, and may well include re-inking of parts damaged by over-zealous cleaning. This is a document which includes non-authentic material, but which may be authentic in its key parts. The jury is still out. Wikipedia should sit on the fence. 213.122.49.32 20:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
The 2003 loophole on ink analysis [1] was disputed shortly afterwards [2]. A quick search for sources seem to indicate the consensus leaning to forgery and the unwillingness of Yale U, the owner, to let a complete assessement occur, as the reason for the question still not settled completely. -- Pjacobi 00:42, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
Most professionals are split on the map and Wikipedia has correctly labeled this judgement as "unknown". As an amatuer historian and map scholar, I believe the map to be authentic.
I don't see anywhere mention of the fairly striking possibility that the map is drawn after a globe. To check this for yourself grab a globe with a diameter of about 12-18 inches, set it a couple feet from your face and turn it so you can just see Australia and the northeastern most tip of Canada. Note now how Africa appears flattened on this globe orientation just as in the vinland map. This also accounts for the curved boundaries and odd relative orientations of Europe and Asia. Paperflight 16:32, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
"Vinlanda" on the map looks rather like a long head wearing spectacles, the "eye" being in the position of the Hudson bay. There is a photograph of Josef Fischer wearing a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles, sat in his chair next to a table with a world globe on it. http://www.companysj.com/v203/makinghistory.htm. Fischer is suspected by writer Kersten Seaver of drawing the map in the 1930s. 9 March 2008. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.148.86.143 ( talk) 00:49, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
I have a problem here, of the proving-a-negative type. If you look at books about the Norse exploration of the North Atlantic, published since the 1970s, you will find that most of them do the same as the near-definitive Smithsonian volume "Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga": if they mention the Vinland map at all, it is only to comment on the likelihood that it is a fake. For example, the standard English version of the Vinland Sagas, by Magnus Magnusson and Hermann Pálsson ( ISBN 0140441549) ignores the Vinland Map, and Magnusson deals with it only in a book titled "Fakers, Forgers & Phoneys: Famous Scams and Scamps" ( ISBN 1845961900). Thus when I insist on reverting to the claim that "most scholars believe the Vinland Map to be a fake" I am doing so not on the basis that there is a published source making that claim (although Seaver's book, which includes 80 pages of notes and bibliography, effectively does so in terms of scholars who have actually studied aspects of the map- not just chemists, but specialists across a wide range of disciplines) but on the basis that scholars for whom it ought to be a relevant resource almost unanimously choose to ignore it. David Trochos ( talk) 23:57, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
For "some" to be true, there just have to be a number of scholars who fit the description, and your refs would be appropriate in establishing that, but to say "many", now you're qualifying the number as being significant, and you do that either by posting *many* refs, or by quoting someone who's done a survey and has evidence to support the claim. To say "most" is even harder to prove – now you have to have a count, and show the there's a majority who fit the description.
So, either the statement needs to be removed, or made neutral in another way, or revert back to "some". If you want to say "many" or "most", you need a citation to back it up. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) ( talk / cont) 01:39, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Who are the scholarly advocates of the authenticity of the map to the extent they are refuting the evidence of forgery uncovered by Seaver and others? I can't prove there's been a capitulation, but, folks, how long do we Wikipedians have to wait for one? patsw ( talk) 20:14, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
I'm going to try and find a form of words to explain how remarkably handy the Skalholt Map was for the finding of l'Anse aux Meadows- on that map, the word "Winlandiae" occurs at the tip of a long north-trending promontory on the west coast of the American continent, that tip being at the same latitude as the south coast of Ireland. The Ingstads used the map to help them narrow the search area, and found their Norse settlement at the tip of a long north-trending promontory (etc.) David Trochos ( talk) 23:07, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm also going to reword the sentence about the stray black particle containing chromite, but I'm going to have to explain why here, rather than in the references. I have very unofficially been given the following quotation from Table 2 of the private report sent by the McCrone labs to Yale at the end of 1973, which describes each particle they analysed; particle 9-C-2 (the chromite-rich oddity) is a "Loose black particle (maybe artifact)". The public reports at the time were just short summaries, concentrating on the anatase, and it was not until challenged by Cahill's 1987 report that McCrone dug out his old notes to compile a fully detailed paper, in which he featured 9-C-2 prominently because it was the only pure black particle, failing to notice the note in his old Table 2. The second edition of Yale's official book gave Cahill the opportunity to reply to this, and featured the heavy hint about stray particles- but the Cahill team never specifically explained what lay behind the hint. Science can be a cruel business. David Trochos ( talk) 23:07, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
I changed that last word in the article from "Karakoram", a mountain range, to "Karakorum", the ancient capital. I am unfamiliar with the subject and am not certain it's correct, but it seems likely. Tempshill ( talk) 19:10, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
Re the "chromium" particle found "sticking loosely to the surface of the ink line": is it a "20th century" particle? is it the same composition as any of the "many other particles" found in the fold? 26 March 2008. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.150.162.104 ( talk) 18:05, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
I think it is absurd that there is an argument over this obvious forgery. If this manuscript had not been "discovered" and published by a rich Yale alumnus it would have been ignored from the beginning. Anyone with even passing familiarity with real 14th-century maps can attest this as an obvious forgery. For one thing it is in a Mercator projection (a 16th-century invention). The draftsmanship is also nothing like any real 14th-century map. For example, if you compare it to the Gough map or the Hereford map the forgery is obvious. Its embarrassing that there is a "controversy". John Chamberlain ( talk) 23:07, 20 November 2008 (UTC)
Edits by Facts107 on 10 Mar 2009 have highlighted the possibility that Greenland could have been circumnavigated "at least once" during the Medieval Warm Period. Technically speaking, this is absolutely correct in the sense that it's impossible to disprove- but such medieval evidence as exists makes it quite clear that if there was a circumnavigation (with a skilled navigator/surveyor aboard), no geographer EXCEPT the possible medieval author of the Vinland Map was told of it. The introduction of such arguments is a perennial problem of articles about possible fake artifacts, so I'm not sure how we should treat this particular example. David Trochos ( talk) 18:49, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
This article contains the assertion that the dealer of the Vinland map, Larry Witten, is quoted in the Skelton book to the effect that he had lied regarding the map's provenance. I have not read the Skelton book but I would like to see that statement footnoted to the text on here, if in fact Witten made such statements, of which I am unaware. MarmadukePercy ( talk) 04:39, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
Rene Larsen at the School of Conservation, Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts has just completed a 5 year study of the map, and has announced that it is genuine.
Larsen said his team carried out studies of the ink, writing, wormholes and parchment of the map, which is housed at Yale University in the United States.
He said wormholes, caused by wood beetles, were consistent with wormholes in the books with which the map was bound.
He said claims the ink was too recent because it contained a substance called anatase titanium dioxide could be rejected because medieval maps have been found with the same substance, which probably came from sand used to dry wet ink.
http://www.newsdaily.com/stories/tre56g583-us-map-america/
scope_creep ( talk) 16:45, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
Re: wormholes: What sense does it make to "guide" worms along paths to form a pattern that does not match that of The Tartar Relation? How does that comport with "TOO" consistency? Fotoguzzi ( talk) 23:51, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
The purpose of our Vinland Map research has been and is to provide scientific data and fact which may help to clarify the authenticity of the card. We do not have any prejudiced attitude or belief in relation to the question of authenticity. Our interest as professionals is solely to help determine the authenticity of the based on scientific facts.
In our paper (Larsen, R. and Sommer D.V.P.: Facts and Myths about the Vinland Map and its Context, Zeitschrift für Kunsttechnologie und Konservierung vol. 2, 2009. Pp. 196-205.) which is written in English and is accessible trough most libraries, we conclude and recommends the following:
Based on our experiments and studies we can conclude that the worm holes in the Vinland Map are most likely to be of natural origin formed after the writing and drawing. In relation to earlier statements that the wormholes pattern of the Vinland Map may be linked to the Yale Speculum Historiale, in front of which it may have been placed, we add that we are able find a similar pattern on a photo of the bookbinding board of the book.
Based on our experiments with hypo chlorite bleaching we can conclude that this treatment may have been used on the Vinland Map and that it produces similar damages to the ink as observed on the Vinland Map. The damage is characterized by a severe loss of the overlying black ink pigment leaving fragments of this within the boarder lines of the underlying lighter yellow to brownish line of ink pigments and binding media fixed in the parchment surface. This characteristic damage is produced on both the carbon ink and the iron gall inks used in the experiment. This shows that the characteristics of ink damages cannot be used as a criterion for identification of the ink type as we did earlier. However, the ink damage is typical and very similar to those that we have observed on parchment manuscripts originating from the 4th century to 18th century. Together with the fact, that it is impossible to produce ink lines in two steps with the same precision of match of overlying ink fragments with the underlying ink line, this finally proofs that the ink of the Vinland Map has been applied in one step and that its characteristic damage is due to a drastic water based treatment.
Moreover, based on our experience with the dynamic of transport of components like calcite onto the surface of parchment, especially in connection with humid treatment, we suggest that the presence of anatase and calcite-anatase detected in the ink lines of the Vinland Map most possible are due to accumulation and fixation of these components caused by the wet treatment of Vinland Map. The sources of the components may very well be the river water and lime bath use in the parchment production which in several regions of Switzerland contains titanium dioxide components as well as heavy metals also found in the ink of Vinland Map. Additional sources of anatase may be its natural occurrence in the ink and/or dust from anatase containing ink drying sand. In this connection, it should be taken into consideration the chemical processes and transformations taking place in the parchment over time. These will be accelerated by wet treatment of the parchment. This is also the case with the deterioration of the parchment which may be transformed into gelatine as we have observed on the surface of Vinland Map in an earlier study. This deterioration process starts on the surface of the parchment and is accelerated by acid from the ink and not least when it is exposed to a bleaching treatment. This is undoubtedly the reason why the Vinland Map ink is embedded in gelatine.
With respect to the earlier studies of the watermarks in Speculum Historiale and Tartar Relation we have found a further matching mark in Piccards catalogue with the motif of the head of an ox with bespectacled eyes. We can conclude that the watermarks with high probability date the Speculum Historiale and Tartar Relation papers to 1437-1441 and the most possible place of production to the Oberhein region (in Switzerland or close to Switzerland).
Finally our preliminary palaeographic study of the texts of Vinland Map and the Tartar Relation shows a convincing similarity between the style of the letters and how these are combined in the individual words supporting the possible link between these.
Based on the above results we recommend the following further experiments and studies are carried out:
More recent scientific research on the ink can be found in the following two papers:
Olin, J. S. (2012) Evidence that the Vinland Map was drawn using an iron gall ink: The continuing need for further research, Advances in Chemical Engineering and Science, 2012, 2, 514-518
Olin, J. S. (2013) The Vinland Map: Transmission electron micrograph of the ink, International Journal of Advances in Chemistry (IJAC) Vol.1, No.1, November 2013
In the latter paper Olin concludes: "Evidence that the Map is a modern forgery based on the shape of the antase particles in the ink of the Map is shown in this paper as less clear cut than has been formerly proposed. It has been proposed that a modern forger of the Vinland Map obtained parchment of the correct date for the Council of Basle, but no evidence has been presented to confirm that." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.161.59.196 ( talk) 20:38, 29 January 2015 (UTC)
See [3] (Kirsten Seaver posted this to a list). Dougweller ( talk) 19:10, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
There have been a couple of editors who seem intent on having the text of the intro declare who is currently "winning" the debate about the map's authenticity. Their edit summaries betray their agendas, by declaring how important it is to rule upon this question. It is not the role of Wikipedia articles to ensure that people reach the "correct" conclusion. I have no dog in this particular hunt (having come to the article only out of curiosity), and propose that rather than introducing time-sensitive descriptions such as "the most recent" (discouraged by MOS) we simply give dates. It is NPOV, and it is responsible, sober encyclopedia writing that will stand the test of time. - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 19:36, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia is supposed to be based on Reliable Sources, preferably peer-reviewed or at least published by reputable academic publishers. Can anybody name one source supporting the authenticity of the Vinland Map which meets those criteria- and has also not been discredited by later research of equal academic standing? David Trochos ( talk) 19:41, 21 July 2009 (UTC) [Slightly revised for clarity, 30 July 2009; if there's no response by 8 August 2009, I'll amend the article as appropriate. David Trochos ( talk) 19:49, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm surprised you are ignoring this http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSTRE56G58320090717 (you can hardly get a more reliable source than reuters) Mathmo Talk 00:42, 15 September 2009 (UTC)
I've changed wording on a reference to the Greenland settlement, as it seemed grudging in conceeding that there were Viking settlements in Greenland. In fact about 160 have been excavated - there is no possible doubt on the Vikings in Greenland, nor has there ever been. Graemedavis ( talk) 23:22, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
Also a query about description of L'Anse aux Meadows: "was a Viking settlement which, while admittedly unsuccessful and short-lived" - why unsuccessful? and why admittedly? The building style of L'Anse aux Meadows gave a life of 20-30 years to the buildings, after which they would be evacuated - and this sort of life span and an evacuation is exactly what we see at L'Anse aux Meadows. It was a successful settlement that continued for the full life of the buildings. The model of Greenland is that the settlement would be re-sited a few miles away. Graemedavis ( talk) 00:03, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
I've got the impression that in the past history of the editing of this article (from reading over the talk page) there was a suitable balance between those who believed the map to be fake ( User:David Trochos)and those who believe the evidence shows it is genuine. But in recent times (this year?) I believe the balance of editing has swung way in favor of those who believe it to be a fake. The lead sentence is a blatant example of this, called it an "imitation" (i.e. fake). Anybody who reads this article (either just superficially the first paragraph, or all the way through to the end) will be left with the false impression that this was an open and shut case in which the map was found to be a forgery. Mathmo Talk 01:10, 15 September 2009 (UTC)
I don't do this very often, but I think it's worth explaining my reasons for not restoring some material from Thomas A. Cahill's recent edits: The first basic problem is that under Wikipedia's policy on reliable sources, the current view on the 1985 PIXE tests of the map (published in 1987) now rests with the paper by Towe et al. (2008) which added further evidence, based on the work of later PIXE analysts, to show that the 1985 tests were mistaken in their "headline" claim that the Vinland Map ink contains only 0.0062% titanium. The reference by Thomas A. Cahill to elemental standards and quality assurance is irrelevant, because the evidence shows that somehow, perhaps due to a simple decimal point error, the figures are consistently wrong.
Although the figures in the 1987 report are internally consistent, I have modified Thomas's claims about the concentrations of zinc and potassium in the ink, because, as I noted, zinc is only more concentrated in the inked samples than in adjacent bare parchment in a minority of cases; the potassium concentration in a transect across a line is "much higher" only because elements such as potassium are present in relatively high concentrations throughout the map, mostly in the bare parchment- whereas the titanium concentration was below the minimum detectable limit for the apparatus in the vast majority of bare parchment samples. Unfortunately, the 1987 report did not include potassium figures for the 33 paired samples which form the core of the analysis.
The 2008 paper by Towe et al. did not contest the data of the 2008 paper by Garmon Harbottle, but his interpretation of the data, which, as noted in the article, was based on misunderstandings.
The 1995 edition of the Yale book by Skelton et al. did not seriously address the controversy, making little reference to the scores of articles in academic journals across various disciplines which had exposed weaknesses in the case for authenticity (a bibliography of articles up to about 1970 appears in the Proceedings of the Vinland Map Conference, 1971). The story of how the 1974 analyst Walter McCrone, and Smithsonian expert Kenneth Towe, only discovered the existence of the 1995 book after they were invited to the launch (which was promoted as a "conference") has been told in more than one publication. David Trochos ( talk) 23:18, 21 September 2009 (UTC)
I followed this story closely about ten years ago, even going to the extent of exchanging a few emails with Walter McCrone. He seemed like a genuinely nice guy and he very kindly sent me a copy of a report on his research on the map.
I left this story at a time before any of the Cahill results had been refuted. I wrote Cahill a note suggesting that he and McCrone should work together to try to understand the discrepancy. He also was very kind to reply to me, but my sense of it was that he thought he had done all he could and that his results were correct.
I suppose that McCrone died before the information came out that refuted Cahill's results. That's too bad, I would like to have seen him live to see his results vindicated.
Anyway, congratulations to all the people that worked on this article. It was excellent.
[Just a note to say that four years later, the article reads a lot better to me. I would like to thank those who have worked so hard on improvements to this article. I think the balance is a lot better than in 2010 while it still effectively puts a blot on the subject / suspect map. Fotoguzzi ( talk) 04:01, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
The term marketing campaign seems more hostile than necessary. I don't know why the term publicity campaign could not be used. It would also seem to be as accurate to say that the map is well known because if genuine it would cause revolutions in thinking in the history of the Americas, cartography, navigation, and printing. It would also seem accurate to say that the map is well known because of the controversy over its authenticity.
If the term marketing campaign is desired, couldn't the term marketing campaign for a book be used to clarify what was being marketed? (fotoguzzi) 76.105.160.69 ( talk) 11:32, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
This statement is factually wrong as it pre-judges the still-on-going debate. As it stands it means that this Wikipedia article is calling the map a fake. Perhaps "began to suspect that it might be a fake". Graemedavis ( talk) 22:46, 22 May 2010 (UTC)
If it were fake, then the culprit must have had a blank piece of pargement which was about 500 years old, and that is simply not possible. Papers that old are only preserved to this day because they have writing on them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.162.73.46 ( talk) 04:35, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
WIKIPEDIA REMOVES IT PLEASE FOR CRYING OUT LOUD! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.168.79.152 ( talk) 18:16, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
A bit tangential, but this seems for now to be the best place to address the editing comment "I don't understand how your comment applies to the edit. It's a fact of history that Cabot landed on the island NFL, not the continental mainland." For some years, this article has carried the assertion that the proven Norse voyages to Vinland predate "John Cabot's landing on the North American continental mainland in 1497". This has recently, but in my view incorrectly, been changed to refer to a landing on Newfoundland, with the above reason given for reverting after I changed it back on the peculiar grounds that "Newfoundland is further north than Bordeaux". The "facts of history" were changed somwehat in 1956 when the text John Day's letter of about December 1497 to "the Lord Grand Admiral" (which would be Columbus) was published, after it had been found in Spain's Archivo General de Simancas.
Day states that Cabot landed at the first place he found after his 35-day voyage, then spent a month sailing along the coastline (without further landings) after turning back towards Europe. The southernmost point mentioned, the south tip of the "Island of the Seven Cities" is on the latitude of "Bordeaux River" (45.4 degrees N), which poses two problems- it's too far south for Newfoundland, but not far enough south for Cape Sable. Further confusion is added by the detail that on his return to Europe he mistakenly landed in Brittany (which IS on the latitude of central Newfoundland) rather than England or Ireland (he crossed from what he thought was the latitude of Dursey Head 51.6 degrees N), suggesting that faulty equipment may have been telling him he was further north than he really was throughout the voyage.
To cut a long story short, although Newfoundland remains the "official" site of the landing, the latitudes and the long easterly cruise along the coast AFTER the landing suggest a point in Nova Scotia as more likely. I'm going to try to find a compromise wording. David Trochos ( talk) 06:38, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
The article claims that in 1965 "many academic reviewers of the book took the opportunity to point out evidence that the Map was likely to be a fake", and that this is what led to the 1966 Vinland Map Conference. But how many published academic reviews from 1965-66 actually expressed the view that the map was "likely to be a fake"? It is one thing to express reservations and call for further research (as many writers did) and another to denounce the map as a probable forgery (which very few did). 194.105.165.178 ( talk) 13:23, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
The provenance of the map is so highly suspect that consideration may be a waste of time:
1. If the original owner of the volume (whose identifying marks were removed) had known that it owned a map of great significance, this would have been revealed, so the original owner did not know of the map (if it existed in the volume), or somehow did not know its significance and was never informed by any expert observer. So we may conclude that the original owner could not have informed the thief of the parchment/map of its significance. 2. Therefore either the thief was informed by an expert in the map significance, or merely stole the parchment acquired by an expert forger. 3. Therefore a highly dishonest expert was involved at the time of theft of the parchment/map (or later produced a forgery). This is the essential conclusion on provenance of this item. 4. It is most likely that an honest expert would find a map of the highest importance than a dishonest one, and least likely that a highly dishonest expert would forge a map of lesser significance. 5. A highly dishonest expert need not to wait until a genuine article is found to produce something salable to a less expert buyer. 6. If the map were genuine, a highly dishonest expert could have purchased it at a favorable price from a non-expert unaware of its significance, much more easily than he could produce a forgery.
So reasoning on the provenance really establishes such a low probability on any claim of authenticity, that the analytical evidence of forgery should be taken as conclusive. It appears that the amount of effort expended in analyzing and reporting on this item has given those involved a motive for keeping it in the public view by failing to quite accept their own evidence that it is not worth public consideration. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jbarth2 ( talk • contribs) 15:50, 10 July 2012 (UTC)
The article includes a rather large illustration showing how damage at the foot of the map could have been created deliberately, with the aim of disguising the join between two parchment leaves of different sizes. While the suggestion is certainly ingenious and may well be correct, I haven't been able to find any reliable source that mentions this possibility. Since Wikipedia isn't the proper venue for advancing personal theories, I really think that the image needs some sort of reference to back it up. 82.132.214.163 ( talk) 15:35, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
Not suggesting a direct connection - but the vellum of the Voynich Manuscript is also dated to the same period as that of the Vinland Map: and they are both now at Yale (what is its buying policy?). Jackiespeel ( talk) 21:56, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
Looking at the two prominent 'water' features of the Vinland map it seems to be it resembles Lake Melville to the north and Sandwich bay to the south on the Newfoundland/Labrador coast. If the Norse were in conflict with the skraelings (and they were) is it not logical to suppose that the locals would have thorougly destroyed any evidence of Norse settlemetns after the Norse left or were killed? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.176.23.161 ( talk) 10:31, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
There ia an article on page 5 of The Sunday Times' main section of 2 June 2013 on the Vinland map if someone will put in the link. Jackiespeel ( talk) 17:30, 3 June 2013 (UTC) (correcting again)
... or it may have been Quest TV channel. Jackiespeel ( talk) 21:48, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
'Category of channels one watches occasionally and which have the same feel' :)
Is it agreed that 'the sheet of vellum' belongs with the other two documents - even if the map itself is of uncertain origin.
If the map had surfaced after the discovery of the Viking site attitudes towards it might have been rather different. Jackiespeel ( talk) 09:13, 7 June 2013 (UTC)
I recall reading the proverbial somewhere that Columbus became aware that the Bristol merchants/fishermen in their ships had reached the American coastal areas, and so knew that the journey was feasible (even if they did not know it was not Asia).
I think this is veering towards OR - if you wish we can continue the discussion here [6] and return to WP with a summary. Jackiespeel ( talk) 21:32, 8 June 2013 (UTC)
I have moved Floyd's WP:SPS press release to the External Links section, and have removed the section in the text based on it, per above discussion. The fact that the press release was picked up by various newspapers does not make it any less self-published. I look forward to seeing Floyd's book, if and when it appears. HuMcCulloch ( talk) 17:01, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
I wonder if I might come in at this point to give my own take on this debate... I can honestly say I have been scrupulous about not adding anything to the article to promote myself or my findings. I have to agree that my 2013 press release cannot really be considered a "reliable source," and as such might be better relegated to the External Links section rather than cited as a reference. However, I think the proposal to remove the entire paragraph is unjustified, as it is mostly based upon the Sunday Times article. In justice to the journalist who wrote that article, it cannot be dismissed as a mere regurgitation of my press release ("churnalism"). I know that he took great care to fact-check the story, including contacting Yale and the British Library (and he had previously reported on Kirsten Seaver's work). So I would say the Sunday Times report can certainly be considered "RS enough for WP". The reason I have not attempted to have my findings published in an academic article is simple: I am not an academic, and do not crave academic recognition. I do not pretend to have any expertise in the fields of cartography or manuscript studies. I put forward my findings simply because I thought they were interesting, and felt that people might like to know about them. I wasn't going to mention my book here at all, but I hope I may be allowed to correct the statement that it has not been published. It was actually "independently published" (OK... self-published!) at the end of last month as A Sorry Saga: Theft, Forgery, Scholarship... and the Vinland Map (ISBN-13: 978-1719979788). I have intentionally set the price of the paperback version prohibitively high, to discourage people from buying it until I have fixed some issues with the index. I appreciate that, as a self-published work by a non-expert author, it will not qualify for inclusion as a reference in the main article. - J.P. Floyd 90.241.110.235 ( talk) 13:11, 13 September 2018 (UTC)
I've added a reference to Floyd's book. I think the problem on 9/28/18 was that I mentioned the Amazon link where it was for sale, which flagged it as commercial. This time I just give the ISBN number. HuMcCulloch ( talk) 20:13, 6 June 2022 (UTC)
I know that the article is very much about an image, but large image sizes are not friendly to readers with small monitors. See Wikipedia:Image_use_policy#Displayed_image_size. -- SmokeyJoe ( talk) 04:07, 12 August 2014 (UTC)
Enzo Ferrajoli de Ry was not an italian-spanish dealer but a thief. He stole more than 110 books from Biblioteca Capitular in Zaragoza. He was imprisioned for eight years. It could be interesting to add this information. Thank you. Jelenca ( talk) 19:12, 18 January 2015 (UTC)Jelenca
It is in the article: "he had no idea where the map came from, beyond Ferrajoli (who was convicted of theft shortly after the sale, and died shortly after release from prison)" - and of course Ferrajoli was a dealer as well as a thief. 90.246.231.1 ( talk) 20:56, 20 January 2015 (UTC)
It seems to me that at least some mention should be made of Kristen Seaver's theory that the map could have been forged by Father Josef Fischer (1858-1944). Whether or not her theory can be substantiated, the claim has been made and discussed in a number of articles and books. It's a part of the history of the debate. Mary Mark Ockerbloom ( talk) 00:46, 3 September 2015 (UTC)
In 2004, Kirsten A. Seaver published Maps, myths, and men : The story of the Vinland map, a wide-ranging review of the arguments and evidence presented to that date. Seaver was hailed as the Vinland map's "most thorough and outspoken critic in recent years" for her "exemplary interdisciplinary study". In addition to arguing that the map was a forgery, she also proposed a new theory: that the forger could have been Father Josef Fischer (1858-1944), an Austrian cartographer and Jesuit scholar who was knowledgeable about Norse exploration in America. Seaver argued that Father Fischer had the knowledge, motivation (to undermine Nazi ideology) and means (access to parchment of the appropriate age) to have forged the Vinland Map, possibly in the 1930s. However appealing her theory, she lacked hard evidence to connect Fischer to the Vinland Map. Subsequent research identifying the source of the actual parchment used (see below) suggests that the map was likely created after Fischer's death, confuting this theory.
There's an interesting piece about the Vinland Map at the end of this 1966 BBC production (it starts around the 38-minute mark). I don't know if it's viewable outside the UK. It may be blocked for copyright reasons, in which case it probably shouldn't be added to the main article.
Here's the link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p017j146/chronicle-vikings-in-north-america
85.255.234.123 ( talk) 09:56, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
I'm not going to re-revert the removal of a passage about Jacqueline Olin's most recent papers on the Vinland Map (published in journals of very dubious repute), but I'd like to put in a plea for its re-instatement. Mrs Olin, who I believe has been involved with the Vinland Map longer than anybody else, stands as a symbol of one of the two main sources of failure in the Vinland Map investigation (the other being fraud by the likes of Enzo Ferrajoli and Laurence Witten).
Appointed as the Smithsonian's official scientific investigator of the Vinland Map following a 1966 conference, she has been promoting essentially the same idea (that the Vinland Map ink is degraded from an ordinary medieval iron-gall recipe, in which titanium-rich ilmenite was used to make the requisite iron sulfate) for nearly 50 years, despite all evidence that not only was such a scenario impossible, all chemical studies pointed to the ink being the other main medieval type, based on carbon. That a highly respected Smithsonian scientist should ultimately be reduced to publishing in "vanity" journals says a great deal about the effect the Vinland Map has had on a number of fine minds. 92.18.183.37 ( talk) 18:16, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
Studying the map, I came across a landmass in the far-east of this map. The landmass in question is marked with what I have interpreted as Latin infute sub *agedo?e, the first two words meaning 'legally below' and an unidentifiable third word. I think that it could be the case that this landmass, or that immediately south of it, is supposed to represent the northern part of the Australian Continent. This judgement is based on the landmass' shape location in relation to what seems to be Indonesia. Any insight here would be very much welcome! JoeyofScotia ( talk) 01:32, 8 May 2017 (UTC)
I was aware, thank you. It just strikes me really that nobody has noticed that yet. JoeyofScotia —Preceding undated comment added 17:47, 8 May 2017 (UTC)
Yale sent me a link to this today. Doug Weller talk 19:08, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
I see the symposium at the Mystic Seaport Museum on 21 September is going to be live-streamed on YouTube, which is great for those of us who cannot attend. Presumably the footage will be available afterwards as well, so it should be a permanent resource. Is it worth adding the URL as an external link? 90.241.110.235 ( talk) 13:02, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
Somebody has added a tag to indicate that they find the article confusing in some respects (they don't say which!). I have reworded the "Possible source identifications, 2013" section slightly in an attempt to address this. Hopefully the tag can be removed, if there are no objections. 90.253.205.141 ( talk) 04:37, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
Someone has helpfully added a picture of the Cantino planisphere with caption. However, the only reference to this map in the article is in the "Academic controversies" section, regarding the shape of Greenland. Wouldn't the image be better moved to that section - perhaps with the addition of a sentence or two about its Vinland-like island - or alternatively, omitted altogether? As things stand, it clutters the text of "Yale's position on the map," where it isn't even mentioned. 90.253.205.141 ( talk) 11:05, 21 February 2019 (UTC)
I've just added a paragraph regarding a recent article by Dr Raymond Clemens. For the record, I'd like to add that I am using a public library computer, and that other Wikipedia comments made using this IP address are emphatically not mine. 88.151.223.210 ( talk) 15:23, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
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...detailing the explorations of Leif Eriksson, who had discovered America in the 11th century and named it Vinland. I've deleted this as it's incorrect. See the article. Wetman 01:32, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)
But something very like this is correct. Bjarni Herjolfsson is the first European to SEE North America, though he didn't land. Leif Eriksson in 1000 or shortly after landed an may reasonably be called the first European discoverer. He is responsible for the name Vinland, though quite what partof NA it applies to is open to debate. 213.122.49.32 20:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
Can we pare down or move the external links? It's getting rather excessive, and polemical. I'll do it if I can get some agreement.
I don't know who made the above point, but I've just added references to most of the primary sources for information on the V.M., so I'm inclined to agree that the links to news items etc. should be trimmed. David Trochos 18:27, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
The strangest thing about this map is not Americas, but rather that it intends to show how large rivers like the Nile are merging and originating inside the deepest deep of Black Africa. That area of massive jungle was definitely not explored pre-Columbus and in fact the origin of the Nile was only found by Victorian explorers. The cold climate norsemen are unlikely to have wandered into near-equatorial Africa. 195.70.32.136 22:39, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
I know this argument has been made, but it is very weak. The cartographic style of the map is to "close" land - if only one coast is known the other is guessed at. So Greenland becomes an island, Africa is likewise shown as a finite area rather than open to the south. The style encourages guessing at things like where a river might go, and some guesses will be right. 213.122.49.32 20:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
If the map is drawn after a globe as I mentioned below then Africa is actually presented in its entirety. Note the small rise in Africa under the Arabian peninsula. If the map is drawn after a globe this is potentially a visually accurate depiction of an incredibly accurate rendering of Somalia on a globe, while the large point to the right of the map is a visually accurate depiction of the southern tip of Africa. If there's any accuracy to this then little about the contours of Africa is guessed at, but is in fact very accurately depicted, though not as a conventional projection. This is very much the kind of thing I would expect to see from an early map drawn after a globe, where the cartographer producing a copy doesn't understand spherical geometry sufficiently to produce a conventional projection. Paperflight 17:16, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
The argument against the historicity of the map based on the drawing of inner-African rivers is not convincing because a connection between the Atlantic Ocean and the sources of the Nile was postulated even in Antiquity (see Ptolemy maps with its connection of Nile, Nigir, Chremes and Daras), in Medieval Mappae Mundi and in Arabic Maps of that time. Nethertheless the projection is unique for Antique and Medieval maps - not a proof, but a serious objection againt historicity of the map.
-- 213.55.131.22 23:56, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
Straying dangerously close to original research, I would draw your attention to the Bianco world map with which, as was recognised by the early Vinland Map researchers in the 1950s, the V.M. shares many place-names and, in a distorted form, the outline of the Old World (yet not, mysteriously, any of the rivers except the Nile). Print it out, and chop it off at the discoloured line caused by the page-fold... David Trochos 18:38, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
I watched the Nova episode on PBS about the Vinland Map, and according to this documentary it seemed to me that scientists had by the early 2000s pretty much determined to the satisfaction of most objective observers that the map was indeed a forgery (20th-century ink on medieval or renaissance-era "paper"). However, this Wikipedia article currently presents the subject as though the matter is still largely up in the air. Is it, or has the matter been laid to rest? If the latter, I think the article should make a more decisive statement in support of "forgery". -- Skb8721 16:57, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
Television documentaries often like to "prove" something. Very many specialists have pronounced on both sides of the argument, and it is the specialists we should be listening to, not PBS. It still remains that we don't know. A consensus is something like: this is original parchment (with something written on it) which was tampered with in the 1950s, including addition of a modern ink. This might in theory be a forger creating the map from scratch (but if so he was brilliant, as many specialists have pronounced it genuine). More likely it is a dealer employing someone to make a document more marketable by "improving" it. This is likely to include cleaning, resurfacing, and may well include re-inking of parts damaged by over-zealous cleaning. This is a document which includes non-authentic material, but which may be authentic in its key parts. The jury is still out. Wikipedia should sit on the fence. 213.122.49.32 20:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
The 2003 loophole on ink analysis [1] was disputed shortly afterwards [2]. A quick search for sources seem to indicate the consensus leaning to forgery and the unwillingness of Yale U, the owner, to let a complete assessement occur, as the reason for the question still not settled completely. -- Pjacobi 00:42, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
Most professionals are split on the map and Wikipedia has correctly labeled this judgement as "unknown". As an amatuer historian and map scholar, I believe the map to be authentic.
I don't see anywhere mention of the fairly striking possibility that the map is drawn after a globe. To check this for yourself grab a globe with a diameter of about 12-18 inches, set it a couple feet from your face and turn it so you can just see Australia and the northeastern most tip of Canada. Note now how Africa appears flattened on this globe orientation just as in the vinland map. This also accounts for the curved boundaries and odd relative orientations of Europe and Asia. Paperflight 16:32, 18 August 2007 (UTC)
"Vinlanda" on the map looks rather like a long head wearing spectacles, the "eye" being in the position of the Hudson bay. There is a photograph of Josef Fischer wearing a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles, sat in his chair next to a table with a world globe on it. http://www.companysj.com/v203/makinghistory.htm. Fischer is suspected by writer Kersten Seaver of drawing the map in the 1930s. 9 March 2008. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.148.86.143 ( talk) 00:49, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
I have a problem here, of the proving-a-negative type. If you look at books about the Norse exploration of the North Atlantic, published since the 1970s, you will find that most of them do the same as the near-definitive Smithsonian volume "Vikings: The North Atlantic Saga": if they mention the Vinland map at all, it is only to comment on the likelihood that it is a fake. For example, the standard English version of the Vinland Sagas, by Magnus Magnusson and Hermann Pálsson ( ISBN 0140441549) ignores the Vinland Map, and Magnusson deals with it only in a book titled "Fakers, Forgers & Phoneys: Famous Scams and Scamps" ( ISBN 1845961900). Thus when I insist on reverting to the claim that "most scholars believe the Vinland Map to be a fake" I am doing so not on the basis that there is a published source making that claim (although Seaver's book, which includes 80 pages of notes and bibliography, effectively does so in terms of scholars who have actually studied aspects of the map- not just chemists, but specialists across a wide range of disciplines) but on the basis that scholars for whom it ought to be a relevant resource almost unanimously choose to ignore it. David Trochos ( talk) 23:57, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
For "some" to be true, there just have to be a number of scholars who fit the description, and your refs would be appropriate in establishing that, but to say "many", now you're qualifying the number as being significant, and you do that either by posting *many* refs, or by quoting someone who's done a survey and has evidence to support the claim. To say "most" is even harder to prove – now you have to have a count, and show the there's a majority who fit the description.
So, either the statement needs to be removed, or made neutral in another way, or revert back to "some". If you want to say "many" or "most", you need a citation to back it up. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) ( talk / cont) 01:39, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
Who are the scholarly advocates of the authenticity of the map to the extent they are refuting the evidence of forgery uncovered by Seaver and others? I can't prove there's been a capitulation, but, folks, how long do we Wikipedians have to wait for one? patsw ( talk) 20:14, 7 April 2009 (UTC)
I'm going to try and find a form of words to explain how remarkably handy the Skalholt Map was for the finding of l'Anse aux Meadows- on that map, the word "Winlandiae" occurs at the tip of a long north-trending promontory on the west coast of the American continent, that tip being at the same latitude as the south coast of Ireland. The Ingstads used the map to help them narrow the search area, and found their Norse settlement at the tip of a long north-trending promontory (etc.) David Trochos ( talk) 23:07, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm also going to reword the sentence about the stray black particle containing chromite, but I'm going to have to explain why here, rather than in the references. I have very unofficially been given the following quotation from Table 2 of the private report sent by the McCrone labs to Yale at the end of 1973, which describes each particle they analysed; particle 9-C-2 (the chromite-rich oddity) is a "Loose black particle (maybe artifact)". The public reports at the time were just short summaries, concentrating on the anatase, and it was not until challenged by Cahill's 1987 report that McCrone dug out his old notes to compile a fully detailed paper, in which he featured 9-C-2 prominently because it was the only pure black particle, failing to notice the note in his old Table 2. The second edition of Yale's official book gave Cahill the opportunity to reply to this, and featured the heavy hint about stray particles- but the Cahill team never specifically explained what lay behind the hint. Science can be a cruel business. David Trochos ( talk) 23:07, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
I changed that last word in the article from "Karakoram", a mountain range, to "Karakorum", the ancient capital. I am unfamiliar with the subject and am not certain it's correct, but it seems likely. Tempshill ( talk) 19:10, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
Re the "chromium" particle found "sticking loosely to the surface of the ink line": is it a "20th century" particle? is it the same composition as any of the "many other particles" found in the fold? 26 March 2008. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.150.162.104 ( talk) 18:05, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
I think it is absurd that there is an argument over this obvious forgery. If this manuscript had not been "discovered" and published by a rich Yale alumnus it would have been ignored from the beginning. Anyone with even passing familiarity with real 14th-century maps can attest this as an obvious forgery. For one thing it is in a Mercator projection (a 16th-century invention). The draftsmanship is also nothing like any real 14th-century map. For example, if you compare it to the Gough map or the Hereford map the forgery is obvious. Its embarrassing that there is a "controversy". John Chamberlain ( talk) 23:07, 20 November 2008 (UTC)
Edits by Facts107 on 10 Mar 2009 have highlighted the possibility that Greenland could have been circumnavigated "at least once" during the Medieval Warm Period. Technically speaking, this is absolutely correct in the sense that it's impossible to disprove- but such medieval evidence as exists makes it quite clear that if there was a circumnavigation (with a skilled navigator/surveyor aboard), no geographer EXCEPT the possible medieval author of the Vinland Map was told of it. The introduction of such arguments is a perennial problem of articles about possible fake artifacts, so I'm not sure how we should treat this particular example. David Trochos ( talk) 18:49, 10 March 2009 (UTC)
This article contains the assertion that the dealer of the Vinland map, Larry Witten, is quoted in the Skelton book to the effect that he had lied regarding the map's provenance. I have not read the Skelton book but I would like to see that statement footnoted to the text on here, if in fact Witten made such statements, of which I am unaware. MarmadukePercy ( talk) 04:39, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
Rene Larsen at the School of Conservation, Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts has just completed a 5 year study of the map, and has announced that it is genuine.
Larsen said his team carried out studies of the ink, writing, wormholes and parchment of the map, which is housed at Yale University in the United States.
He said wormholes, caused by wood beetles, were consistent with wormholes in the books with which the map was bound.
He said claims the ink was too recent because it contained a substance called anatase titanium dioxide could be rejected because medieval maps have been found with the same substance, which probably came from sand used to dry wet ink.
http://www.newsdaily.com/stories/tre56g583-us-map-america/
scope_creep ( talk) 16:45, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
Re: wormholes: What sense does it make to "guide" worms along paths to form a pattern that does not match that of The Tartar Relation? How does that comport with "TOO" consistency? Fotoguzzi ( talk) 23:51, 7 September 2014 (UTC)
The purpose of our Vinland Map research has been and is to provide scientific data and fact which may help to clarify the authenticity of the card. We do not have any prejudiced attitude or belief in relation to the question of authenticity. Our interest as professionals is solely to help determine the authenticity of the based on scientific facts.
In our paper (Larsen, R. and Sommer D.V.P.: Facts and Myths about the Vinland Map and its Context, Zeitschrift für Kunsttechnologie und Konservierung vol. 2, 2009. Pp. 196-205.) which is written in English and is accessible trough most libraries, we conclude and recommends the following:
Based on our experiments and studies we can conclude that the worm holes in the Vinland Map are most likely to be of natural origin formed after the writing and drawing. In relation to earlier statements that the wormholes pattern of the Vinland Map may be linked to the Yale Speculum Historiale, in front of which it may have been placed, we add that we are able find a similar pattern on a photo of the bookbinding board of the book.
Based on our experiments with hypo chlorite bleaching we can conclude that this treatment may have been used on the Vinland Map and that it produces similar damages to the ink as observed on the Vinland Map. The damage is characterized by a severe loss of the overlying black ink pigment leaving fragments of this within the boarder lines of the underlying lighter yellow to brownish line of ink pigments and binding media fixed in the parchment surface. This characteristic damage is produced on both the carbon ink and the iron gall inks used in the experiment. This shows that the characteristics of ink damages cannot be used as a criterion for identification of the ink type as we did earlier. However, the ink damage is typical and very similar to those that we have observed on parchment manuscripts originating from the 4th century to 18th century. Together with the fact, that it is impossible to produce ink lines in two steps with the same precision of match of overlying ink fragments with the underlying ink line, this finally proofs that the ink of the Vinland Map has been applied in one step and that its characteristic damage is due to a drastic water based treatment.
Moreover, based on our experience with the dynamic of transport of components like calcite onto the surface of parchment, especially in connection with humid treatment, we suggest that the presence of anatase and calcite-anatase detected in the ink lines of the Vinland Map most possible are due to accumulation and fixation of these components caused by the wet treatment of Vinland Map. The sources of the components may very well be the river water and lime bath use in the parchment production which in several regions of Switzerland contains titanium dioxide components as well as heavy metals also found in the ink of Vinland Map. Additional sources of anatase may be its natural occurrence in the ink and/or dust from anatase containing ink drying sand. In this connection, it should be taken into consideration the chemical processes and transformations taking place in the parchment over time. These will be accelerated by wet treatment of the parchment. This is also the case with the deterioration of the parchment which may be transformed into gelatine as we have observed on the surface of Vinland Map in an earlier study. This deterioration process starts on the surface of the parchment and is accelerated by acid from the ink and not least when it is exposed to a bleaching treatment. This is undoubtedly the reason why the Vinland Map ink is embedded in gelatine.
With respect to the earlier studies of the watermarks in Speculum Historiale and Tartar Relation we have found a further matching mark in Piccards catalogue with the motif of the head of an ox with bespectacled eyes. We can conclude that the watermarks with high probability date the Speculum Historiale and Tartar Relation papers to 1437-1441 and the most possible place of production to the Oberhein region (in Switzerland or close to Switzerland).
Finally our preliminary palaeographic study of the texts of Vinland Map and the Tartar Relation shows a convincing similarity between the style of the letters and how these are combined in the individual words supporting the possible link between these.
Based on the above results we recommend the following further experiments and studies are carried out:
More recent scientific research on the ink can be found in the following two papers:
Olin, J. S. (2012) Evidence that the Vinland Map was drawn using an iron gall ink: The continuing need for further research, Advances in Chemical Engineering and Science, 2012, 2, 514-518
Olin, J. S. (2013) The Vinland Map: Transmission electron micrograph of the ink, International Journal of Advances in Chemistry (IJAC) Vol.1, No.1, November 2013
In the latter paper Olin concludes: "Evidence that the Map is a modern forgery based on the shape of the antase particles in the ink of the Map is shown in this paper as less clear cut than has been formerly proposed. It has been proposed that a modern forger of the Vinland Map obtained parchment of the correct date for the Council of Basle, but no evidence has been presented to confirm that." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.161.59.196 ( talk) 20:38, 29 January 2015 (UTC)
See [3] (Kirsten Seaver posted this to a list). Dougweller ( talk) 19:10, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
There have been a couple of editors who seem intent on having the text of the intro declare who is currently "winning" the debate about the map's authenticity. Their edit summaries betray their agendas, by declaring how important it is to rule upon this question. It is not the role of Wikipedia articles to ensure that people reach the "correct" conclusion. I have no dog in this particular hunt (having come to the article only out of curiosity), and propose that rather than introducing time-sensitive descriptions such as "the most recent" (discouraged by MOS) we simply give dates. It is NPOV, and it is responsible, sober encyclopedia writing that will stand the test of time. - Jason A. Quest ( talk) 19:36, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia is supposed to be based on Reliable Sources, preferably peer-reviewed or at least published by reputable academic publishers. Can anybody name one source supporting the authenticity of the Vinland Map which meets those criteria- and has also not been discredited by later research of equal academic standing? David Trochos ( talk) 19:41, 21 July 2009 (UTC) [Slightly revised for clarity, 30 July 2009; if there's no response by 8 August 2009, I'll amend the article as appropriate. David Trochos ( talk) 19:49, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm surprised you are ignoring this http://www.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUSTRE56G58320090717 (you can hardly get a more reliable source than reuters) Mathmo Talk 00:42, 15 September 2009 (UTC)
I've changed wording on a reference to the Greenland settlement, as it seemed grudging in conceeding that there were Viking settlements in Greenland. In fact about 160 have been excavated - there is no possible doubt on the Vikings in Greenland, nor has there ever been. Graemedavis ( talk) 23:22, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
Also a query about description of L'Anse aux Meadows: "was a Viking settlement which, while admittedly unsuccessful and short-lived" - why unsuccessful? and why admittedly? The building style of L'Anse aux Meadows gave a life of 20-30 years to the buildings, after which they would be evacuated - and this sort of life span and an evacuation is exactly what we see at L'Anse aux Meadows. It was a successful settlement that continued for the full life of the buildings. The model of Greenland is that the settlement would be re-sited a few miles away. Graemedavis ( talk) 00:03, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
I've got the impression that in the past history of the editing of this article (from reading over the talk page) there was a suitable balance between those who believed the map to be fake ( User:David Trochos)and those who believe the evidence shows it is genuine. But in recent times (this year?) I believe the balance of editing has swung way in favor of those who believe it to be a fake. The lead sentence is a blatant example of this, called it an "imitation" (i.e. fake). Anybody who reads this article (either just superficially the first paragraph, or all the way through to the end) will be left with the false impression that this was an open and shut case in which the map was found to be a forgery. Mathmo Talk 01:10, 15 September 2009 (UTC)
I don't do this very often, but I think it's worth explaining my reasons for not restoring some material from Thomas A. Cahill's recent edits: The first basic problem is that under Wikipedia's policy on reliable sources, the current view on the 1985 PIXE tests of the map (published in 1987) now rests with the paper by Towe et al. (2008) which added further evidence, based on the work of later PIXE analysts, to show that the 1985 tests were mistaken in their "headline" claim that the Vinland Map ink contains only 0.0062% titanium. The reference by Thomas A. Cahill to elemental standards and quality assurance is irrelevant, because the evidence shows that somehow, perhaps due to a simple decimal point error, the figures are consistently wrong.
Although the figures in the 1987 report are internally consistent, I have modified Thomas's claims about the concentrations of zinc and potassium in the ink, because, as I noted, zinc is only more concentrated in the inked samples than in adjacent bare parchment in a minority of cases; the potassium concentration in a transect across a line is "much higher" only because elements such as potassium are present in relatively high concentrations throughout the map, mostly in the bare parchment- whereas the titanium concentration was below the minimum detectable limit for the apparatus in the vast majority of bare parchment samples. Unfortunately, the 1987 report did not include potassium figures for the 33 paired samples which form the core of the analysis.
The 2008 paper by Towe et al. did not contest the data of the 2008 paper by Garmon Harbottle, but his interpretation of the data, which, as noted in the article, was based on misunderstandings.
The 1995 edition of the Yale book by Skelton et al. did not seriously address the controversy, making little reference to the scores of articles in academic journals across various disciplines which had exposed weaknesses in the case for authenticity (a bibliography of articles up to about 1970 appears in the Proceedings of the Vinland Map Conference, 1971). The story of how the 1974 analyst Walter McCrone, and Smithsonian expert Kenneth Towe, only discovered the existence of the 1995 book after they were invited to the launch (which was promoted as a "conference") has been told in more than one publication. David Trochos ( talk) 23:18, 21 September 2009 (UTC)
I followed this story closely about ten years ago, even going to the extent of exchanging a few emails with Walter McCrone. He seemed like a genuinely nice guy and he very kindly sent me a copy of a report on his research on the map.
I left this story at a time before any of the Cahill results had been refuted. I wrote Cahill a note suggesting that he and McCrone should work together to try to understand the discrepancy. He also was very kind to reply to me, but my sense of it was that he thought he had done all he could and that his results were correct.
I suppose that McCrone died before the information came out that refuted Cahill's results. That's too bad, I would like to have seen him live to see his results vindicated.
Anyway, congratulations to all the people that worked on this article. It was excellent.
[Just a note to say that four years later, the article reads a lot better to me. I would like to thank those who have worked so hard on improvements to this article. I think the balance is a lot better than in 2010 while it still effectively puts a blot on the subject / suspect map. Fotoguzzi ( talk) 04:01, 5 September 2014 (UTC)
The term marketing campaign seems more hostile than necessary. I don't know why the term publicity campaign could not be used. It would also seem to be as accurate to say that the map is well known because if genuine it would cause revolutions in thinking in the history of the Americas, cartography, navigation, and printing. It would also seem accurate to say that the map is well known because of the controversy over its authenticity.
If the term marketing campaign is desired, couldn't the term marketing campaign for a book be used to clarify what was being marketed? (fotoguzzi) 76.105.160.69 ( talk) 11:32, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
This statement is factually wrong as it pre-judges the still-on-going debate. As it stands it means that this Wikipedia article is calling the map a fake. Perhaps "began to suspect that it might be a fake". Graemedavis ( talk) 22:46, 22 May 2010 (UTC)
If it were fake, then the culprit must have had a blank piece of pargement which was about 500 years old, and that is simply not possible. Papers that old are only preserved to this day because they have writing on them. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.162.73.46 ( talk) 04:35, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
WIKIPEDIA REMOVES IT PLEASE FOR CRYING OUT LOUD! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.168.79.152 ( talk) 18:16, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
A bit tangential, but this seems for now to be the best place to address the editing comment "I don't understand how your comment applies to the edit. It's a fact of history that Cabot landed on the island NFL, not the continental mainland." For some years, this article has carried the assertion that the proven Norse voyages to Vinland predate "John Cabot's landing on the North American continental mainland in 1497". This has recently, but in my view incorrectly, been changed to refer to a landing on Newfoundland, with the above reason given for reverting after I changed it back on the peculiar grounds that "Newfoundland is further north than Bordeaux". The "facts of history" were changed somwehat in 1956 when the text John Day's letter of about December 1497 to "the Lord Grand Admiral" (which would be Columbus) was published, after it had been found in Spain's Archivo General de Simancas.
Day states that Cabot landed at the first place he found after his 35-day voyage, then spent a month sailing along the coastline (without further landings) after turning back towards Europe. The southernmost point mentioned, the south tip of the "Island of the Seven Cities" is on the latitude of "Bordeaux River" (45.4 degrees N), which poses two problems- it's too far south for Newfoundland, but not far enough south for Cape Sable. Further confusion is added by the detail that on his return to Europe he mistakenly landed in Brittany (which IS on the latitude of central Newfoundland) rather than England or Ireland (he crossed from what he thought was the latitude of Dursey Head 51.6 degrees N), suggesting that faulty equipment may have been telling him he was further north than he really was throughout the voyage.
To cut a long story short, although Newfoundland remains the "official" site of the landing, the latitudes and the long easterly cruise along the coast AFTER the landing suggest a point in Nova Scotia as more likely. I'm going to try to find a compromise wording. David Trochos ( talk) 06:38, 28 July 2011 (UTC)
The article claims that in 1965 "many academic reviewers of the book took the opportunity to point out evidence that the Map was likely to be a fake", and that this is what led to the 1966 Vinland Map Conference. But how many published academic reviews from 1965-66 actually expressed the view that the map was "likely to be a fake"? It is one thing to express reservations and call for further research (as many writers did) and another to denounce the map as a probable forgery (which very few did). 194.105.165.178 ( talk) 13:23, 21 March 2012 (UTC)
The provenance of the map is so highly suspect that consideration may be a waste of time:
1. If the original owner of the volume (whose identifying marks were removed) had known that it owned a map of great significance, this would have been revealed, so the original owner did not know of the map (if it existed in the volume), or somehow did not know its significance and was never informed by any expert observer. So we may conclude that the original owner could not have informed the thief of the parchment/map of its significance. 2. Therefore either the thief was informed by an expert in the map significance, or merely stole the parchment acquired by an expert forger. 3. Therefore a highly dishonest expert was involved at the time of theft of the parchment/map (or later produced a forgery). This is the essential conclusion on provenance of this item. 4. It is most likely that an honest expert would find a map of the highest importance than a dishonest one, and least likely that a highly dishonest expert would forge a map of lesser significance. 5. A highly dishonest expert need not to wait until a genuine article is found to produce something salable to a less expert buyer. 6. If the map were genuine, a highly dishonest expert could have purchased it at a favorable price from a non-expert unaware of its significance, much more easily than he could produce a forgery.
So reasoning on the provenance really establishes such a low probability on any claim of authenticity, that the analytical evidence of forgery should be taken as conclusive. It appears that the amount of effort expended in analyzing and reporting on this item has given those involved a motive for keeping it in the public view by failing to quite accept their own evidence that it is not worth public consideration. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jbarth2 ( talk • contribs) 15:50, 10 July 2012 (UTC)
The article includes a rather large illustration showing how damage at the foot of the map could have been created deliberately, with the aim of disguising the join between two parchment leaves of different sizes. While the suggestion is certainly ingenious and may well be correct, I haven't been able to find any reliable source that mentions this possibility. Since Wikipedia isn't the proper venue for advancing personal theories, I really think that the image needs some sort of reference to back it up. 82.132.214.163 ( talk) 15:35, 17 November 2012 (UTC)
Not suggesting a direct connection - but the vellum of the Voynich Manuscript is also dated to the same period as that of the Vinland Map: and they are both now at Yale (what is its buying policy?). Jackiespeel ( talk) 21:56, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
Looking at the two prominent 'water' features of the Vinland map it seems to be it resembles Lake Melville to the north and Sandwich bay to the south on the Newfoundland/Labrador coast. If the Norse were in conflict with the skraelings (and they were) is it not logical to suppose that the locals would have thorougly destroyed any evidence of Norse settlemetns after the Norse left or were killed? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.176.23.161 ( talk) 10:31, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
There ia an article on page 5 of The Sunday Times' main section of 2 June 2013 on the Vinland map if someone will put in the link. Jackiespeel ( talk) 17:30, 3 June 2013 (UTC) (correcting again)
... or it may have been Quest TV channel. Jackiespeel ( talk) 21:48, 6 June 2013 (UTC)
'Category of channels one watches occasionally and which have the same feel' :)
Is it agreed that 'the sheet of vellum' belongs with the other two documents - even if the map itself is of uncertain origin.
If the map had surfaced after the discovery of the Viking site attitudes towards it might have been rather different. Jackiespeel ( talk) 09:13, 7 June 2013 (UTC)
I recall reading the proverbial somewhere that Columbus became aware that the Bristol merchants/fishermen in their ships had reached the American coastal areas, and so knew that the journey was feasible (even if they did not know it was not Asia).
I think this is veering towards OR - if you wish we can continue the discussion here [6] and return to WP with a summary. Jackiespeel ( talk) 21:32, 8 June 2013 (UTC)
I have moved Floyd's WP:SPS press release to the External Links section, and have removed the section in the text based on it, per above discussion. The fact that the press release was picked up by various newspapers does not make it any less self-published. I look forward to seeing Floyd's book, if and when it appears. HuMcCulloch ( talk) 17:01, 7 September 2018 (UTC)
I wonder if I might come in at this point to give my own take on this debate... I can honestly say I have been scrupulous about not adding anything to the article to promote myself or my findings. I have to agree that my 2013 press release cannot really be considered a "reliable source," and as such might be better relegated to the External Links section rather than cited as a reference. However, I think the proposal to remove the entire paragraph is unjustified, as it is mostly based upon the Sunday Times article. In justice to the journalist who wrote that article, it cannot be dismissed as a mere regurgitation of my press release ("churnalism"). I know that he took great care to fact-check the story, including contacting Yale and the British Library (and he had previously reported on Kirsten Seaver's work). So I would say the Sunday Times report can certainly be considered "RS enough for WP". The reason I have not attempted to have my findings published in an academic article is simple: I am not an academic, and do not crave academic recognition. I do not pretend to have any expertise in the fields of cartography or manuscript studies. I put forward my findings simply because I thought they were interesting, and felt that people might like to know about them. I wasn't going to mention my book here at all, but I hope I may be allowed to correct the statement that it has not been published. It was actually "independently published" (OK... self-published!) at the end of last month as A Sorry Saga: Theft, Forgery, Scholarship... and the Vinland Map (ISBN-13: 978-1719979788). I have intentionally set the price of the paperback version prohibitively high, to discourage people from buying it until I have fixed some issues with the index. I appreciate that, as a self-published work by a non-expert author, it will not qualify for inclusion as a reference in the main article. - J.P. Floyd 90.241.110.235 ( talk) 13:11, 13 September 2018 (UTC)
I've added a reference to Floyd's book. I think the problem on 9/28/18 was that I mentioned the Amazon link where it was for sale, which flagged it as commercial. This time I just give the ISBN number. HuMcCulloch ( talk) 20:13, 6 June 2022 (UTC)
I know that the article is very much about an image, but large image sizes are not friendly to readers with small monitors. See Wikipedia:Image_use_policy#Displayed_image_size. -- SmokeyJoe ( talk) 04:07, 12 August 2014 (UTC)
Enzo Ferrajoli de Ry was not an italian-spanish dealer but a thief. He stole more than 110 books from Biblioteca Capitular in Zaragoza. He was imprisioned for eight years. It could be interesting to add this information. Thank you. Jelenca ( talk) 19:12, 18 January 2015 (UTC)Jelenca
It is in the article: "he had no idea where the map came from, beyond Ferrajoli (who was convicted of theft shortly after the sale, and died shortly after release from prison)" - and of course Ferrajoli was a dealer as well as a thief. 90.246.231.1 ( talk) 20:56, 20 January 2015 (UTC)
It seems to me that at least some mention should be made of Kristen Seaver's theory that the map could have been forged by Father Josef Fischer (1858-1944). Whether or not her theory can be substantiated, the claim has been made and discussed in a number of articles and books. It's a part of the history of the debate. Mary Mark Ockerbloom ( talk) 00:46, 3 September 2015 (UTC)
In 2004, Kirsten A. Seaver published Maps, myths, and men : The story of the Vinland map, a wide-ranging review of the arguments and evidence presented to that date. Seaver was hailed as the Vinland map's "most thorough and outspoken critic in recent years" for her "exemplary interdisciplinary study". In addition to arguing that the map was a forgery, she also proposed a new theory: that the forger could have been Father Josef Fischer (1858-1944), an Austrian cartographer and Jesuit scholar who was knowledgeable about Norse exploration in America. Seaver argued that Father Fischer had the knowledge, motivation (to undermine Nazi ideology) and means (access to parchment of the appropriate age) to have forged the Vinland Map, possibly in the 1930s. However appealing her theory, she lacked hard evidence to connect Fischer to the Vinland Map. Subsequent research identifying the source of the actual parchment used (see below) suggests that the map was likely created after Fischer's death, confuting this theory.
There's an interesting piece about the Vinland Map at the end of this 1966 BBC production (it starts around the 38-minute mark). I don't know if it's viewable outside the UK. It may be blocked for copyright reasons, in which case it probably shouldn't be added to the main article.
Here's the link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p017j146/chronicle-vikings-in-north-america
85.255.234.123 ( talk) 09:56, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
I'm not going to re-revert the removal of a passage about Jacqueline Olin's most recent papers on the Vinland Map (published in journals of very dubious repute), but I'd like to put in a plea for its re-instatement. Mrs Olin, who I believe has been involved with the Vinland Map longer than anybody else, stands as a symbol of one of the two main sources of failure in the Vinland Map investigation (the other being fraud by the likes of Enzo Ferrajoli and Laurence Witten).
Appointed as the Smithsonian's official scientific investigator of the Vinland Map following a 1966 conference, she has been promoting essentially the same idea (that the Vinland Map ink is degraded from an ordinary medieval iron-gall recipe, in which titanium-rich ilmenite was used to make the requisite iron sulfate) for nearly 50 years, despite all evidence that not only was such a scenario impossible, all chemical studies pointed to the ink being the other main medieval type, based on carbon. That a highly respected Smithsonian scientist should ultimately be reduced to publishing in "vanity" journals says a great deal about the effect the Vinland Map has had on a number of fine minds. 92.18.183.37 ( talk) 18:16, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
Studying the map, I came across a landmass in the far-east of this map. The landmass in question is marked with what I have interpreted as Latin infute sub *agedo?e, the first two words meaning 'legally below' and an unidentifiable third word. I think that it could be the case that this landmass, or that immediately south of it, is supposed to represent the northern part of the Australian Continent. This judgement is based on the landmass' shape location in relation to what seems to be Indonesia. Any insight here would be very much welcome! JoeyofScotia ( talk) 01:32, 8 May 2017 (UTC)
I was aware, thank you. It just strikes me really that nobody has noticed that yet. JoeyofScotia —Preceding undated comment added 17:47, 8 May 2017 (UTC)
Yale sent me a link to this today. Doug Weller talk 19:08, 1 March 2018 (UTC)
I see the symposium at the Mystic Seaport Museum on 21 September is going to be live-streamed on YouTube, which is great for those of us who cannot attend. Presumably the footage will be available afterwards as well, so it should be a permanent resource. Is it worth adding the URL as an external link? 90.241.110.235 ( talk) 13:02, 14 September 2018 (UTC)
Somebody has added a tag to indicate that they find the article confusing in some respects (they don't say which!). I have reworded the "Possible source identifications, 2013" section slightly in an attempt to address this. Hopefully the tag can be removed, if there are no objections. 90.253.205.141 ( talk) 04:37, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
Someone has helpfully added a picture of the Cantino planisphere with caption. However, the only reference to this map in the article is in the "Academic controversies" section, regarding the shape of Greenland. Wouldn't the image be better moved to that section - perhaps with the addition of a sentence or two about its Vinland-like island - or alternatively, omitted altogether? As things stand, it clutters the text of "Yale's position on the map," where it isn't even mentioned. 90.253.205.141 ( talk) 11:05, 21 February 2019 (UTC)
I've just added a paragraph regarding a recent article by Dr Raymond Clemens. For the record, I'd like to add that I am using a public library computer, and that other Wikipedia comments made using this IP address are emphatically not mine. 88.151.223.210 ( talk) 15:23, 8 June 2019 (UTC)
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