Leif Erikson stepped onto the shores of North America nearly five hundred years before Christopher Columbus. While history remembers him as a great explorer, his personal life involved complex family drama and religious conflict. For instance, he earned his famous nickname not for finding a new continent, but for a completely different act of heroism at sea. Furthermore, his own mother built a church to spite his father, who refused to give up his pagan gods. Prepare to set sail with the Lucky One.
Leif Erikson
He earned the nickname “Leif the Lucky” for rescuing a shipwreck. During his return voyage to Greenland, he spotted a stranded crew on a reef. Consequently, he saved their lives and salvaged their valuable cargo, which made him instantly wealthy and earned him the title “Leif the Lucky.”
His father, Erik the Red, was a convicted murderer. Erik was banished from Norway for manslaughter and later exiled from Iceland for killing several neighbors in a feud. Therefore, Leif grew up in exile, moving further west with his volatile father until they settled in Greenland.
Leif Erikson likely had an illegitimate son before he ever married. While stopping in the Hebrides, he had a romance with a noblewoman named Thorgunna. She later sent their son, Thorgils, to live with Leif in Greenland because she believed the boy had supernatural sight.
King Olaf Tryggvason personally converted him to Christianity. Leif traveled to Norway to serve the king, who tasked him with spreading the new faith. Thus, Leif became the first missionary to bring Christianity to the Norse settlers in Greenland.
His mother built the first church in the New World to annoy his father. Thjodhild converted to Christianity immediately, but Erik the Red remained a stubborn pagan. She refused to sleep in the same bed as him until he converted, so she built a small church to pray away from him.
A horse accident stopped his father from joining the famous voyage. Erik the Red planned to sail to Vinland with his son. However, his horse stumbled on the way to the ship, which Erik interpreted as a bad omen from the gods, so he stayed behind.
He did not actually “discover” America first. A merchant named Bjarni Herjolfsson drifted off course and sighted the land years earlier but never stepped ashore. Leif bought Bjarni’s ship and retraced the route specifically to find the land Bjarni had seen.
His foster father was a German named Tyrker. This family servant looked after Leif when he was a boy and joined him on the expedition. In fact, Tyrker was the one who wandered off and discovered the wild grapes that gave Vinland its name.
The “grapes” he found might have been fermented berries. Botanists argue that wild grapes do not grow as far north as L’Anse aux Meadows. Therefore, many historians believe the “wine” came from squashberries or gooseberries, which the Vikings called “winber.”
His sister Freydis was a terrifying warrior. The sagas describe her as a ruthless woman who once scared off Indigenous attackers by slapping a sword against her bare chest. She allegedly murdered fellow Norse settlers in their sleep to seize their ship.
He never returned to North America after his first voyage. Although his brothers and sister made subsequent trips, Leif stayed in Greenland to govern the settlement. He inherited his father’s role as chieftain and had to manage the colony’s affairs.
The United States gave Iceland a statue of him in 1930. To celebrate the 1,000th anniversary of the Icelandic parliament, the US government commissioned a massive bronze statue. It stands prominently in front of the Hallgrímskirkja church in Reykjavík today.
October 9th is Leif Erikson Day, not his birthday. President Lyndon B. Johnson established the holiday in 1964. They chose this date because it marks the arrival of the first organized group of Norwegian immigrants to New York in 1825.
He named a place “Helluland,” which means “Land of Flat Stones.” This region is likely modern-day Baffin Island in Canada. He described it as a worthless land of glaciers and rock slabs before sailing south to find the forests of Markland.
Finally, no one knows exactly where Leif Erikson is buried. He died around 1020 AD in Greenland. Archaeologists believe he rests in the graveyard of Thjodhild’s Church, but they have never identified his specific grave marker among the ruins.
