Naemanson stareted what has become a very interesting thread about local places that are often overlooked by people from outside the area. Some people started writing about early North American visitor sites and I thought the topic was worth a thread of its own. Although no one is surprised any more that Columbus was not the first European to reach the North American land mass, it is suprising to me how many early contact sites are purported to exist around the US.

Of course, there is the Viking site, I believe it is in Iceland, that has been under excavation for the past decade otr so. It is a tradiing village that was inhabited for a generation or so, as I recall. I think it is uncontroversially ascribed to the Viking exploration period but there are many more sites, although their authenticity is questionable.

For instance, where I grew up in southern New Hampshire, there was some sort of edifice that was, if I recall correctly, identified as Druidic. I don't think I ever visited it so I don't know much about it.

On the shores of the Charles River that flows by Boston, Massachusetts, there is what traditionally has been regarded as a Viking long ships' mooring post although sup[porting evidence, as far as I know, has never been found.

The Charles River also flows by Harvard University. A professor there, Cyrus Gordon, who died this past spring, had spent forty years gathering proof for his theory that the Phoenecians who were famed in the ancient word for their shipbuilding expertise, their sailing ability and the courage of their merchant sailors to go anywhere to trade had not only crossed the Atlantic from their Eastern Mediterranean home, they had penetrated the rivers of North AMerica and had travelled far inland. I remember one site he discussed at length in a book of his I read fifteen or twenty years ago. It was in Tennessee. Although he was highly respected for his work on other topics, most of his colleagues only shook their heads and wondered why he had wandered so far of the beaten track.

Anyone know of any other such early contact sites or more about these particular ones?

Sourdough