These two voyages of Ohthere, along with another journey by a Wulfstan, were recorded and added to a document known as The Old English History of the World. This was a translation of an earlier work known as the The Seven Books of History Against the Pagans, by the Spanish monk Orosius in the 5th Century AD. That work was a Christian retelling of the history of the world to the fall of the Roman Empire. It was popular in the middle ages, but lacked geographical details about northern Europe. For this reason the Old English rendition included these voyages but was more of an adaptation than a straight translation of Orosius’s original. It is thought to have been created during the reign of King Alfred (if not translated by him). The text of Ohthere’s voyages is interestingly the first written mention of the words ‘Norway’ and ‘Denmark’ that are known to scholars. 

The First Voyage: North to the White Sea

King Alfred the Great (849-899)

Ohthere addressed King Alfred and told him about his home in the north of Norway, Halogaland. He said that the land extended far beyond his home but is desolate and sparsely populated, except for the Lapps who lived by fishing and hunting according to the season. Curious to find out how far north the land extended and whether anyone lived there, he set sail on his voyage for 15 days to the White Sea. 

 

“Then he went due north along the coast; for the whole journey he kept the wasteland on his starboard, and the open sea on his port, for three days; then he was as far north as the whale-hunters travel at their farthest.”

 

 

Ohthere continued and sailed north along the coast for another 3 days before he reached the top of Norway where the land “turned there due east”. It was here that he waited for favourable winds (westerly’s) before continuing on again. He then sailed east hugging the coast for another 4 days, and turned south, where he sailed for a further 5 days, following the coast into the White Sea, as far south as possible.

 

The White Sea (Source: Wikipedia)

 

After 15 days of sailing, Ohthere had arrived in the White Sea where he and his crew sailed inland up a mighty river. On one side of the river the land was observed to be inhabited and well cultivated. Ohthere mentioned that he refrained from going near the shore for fear of being attacked by the inhabitants. He noted this was the first time he had seen inhabited lands since he left home. 

 

“Ohthere had not previously found any inhabited country after he had left his own home; but throughout the journey the land on his starboard (right) was deserted apart from fishers and fowlers and hunters, and they were all Lapps; and on his port (left) lay always the open sea.”

 

Ohthere, his Homeland and its Neighbours

Tromso in Halogaland, where Ohthere is believed to have lived (Source: Wikipedia)

Ohthere was one of the foremost men of his region, Halogaland. There he lived by his trade in furs, Walrus tusks and hides, which he sold to distant ports. By the standards of his region, Ohthere was a wealthy man who possessed 20 head of cattle, sheep and pigs, along with horses which he used to plough his land. He also obtained revenue from the Lapps who paid tribute in the form of animals skins, “feathers of birds and the bones of whales.” 

Ohthere also mentioned to the court that he went forth to not only explore the land, but to hunt mighty sea-beasts, known as Walruses. 

 

“they [Walruses] have very fine bones in their tusks (they brought some tusks to King Alfred) and their hides are good for ships’ cables. This sea-beast is much smaller than other sea-beasts; it is no longer than seven ells long. But in his own country is the best whaling; they are forty-eight ells long, and the greatest are fifty ells long; he said that with five companions he killed sixty in two days.” 

He described Norway itself as being “very long and very narrow” with the best cultivated land along the coast; inland are the moors in which the Lapps dwell. Further south across the moor is Sweden; the land across from that is the land of the Finns. Ohthere described how the Norwegians and Finns sometimes fought each other across the moor:

 

“Sometimes the Finns harry the Norwegians across the moor, sometimes the Norwegians harry the Finns. And there are great freshwater lakes across the moors; and the Finns carry their boats overland onto these lakes and thence attack the Norwegians; they have very small and portable boats.” 

 

The Second Voyage: South to the Port of Hedeby

 

Site of Hedeby in modern times (Source: worldhistory.org)

Ohthere tells the court of another voyage he made south from his home. He says, there is a port known as Sciringesheal, which can be reached in a month by sailing south with favourable winds and resting nightly. Along the way, on the starboard (right) side is Iceland and other islands until one reaches Sciringesheal.

From here he sailed 5 days across the Baltic Sea which “flows inland”, to Jutland, Denmark and eventually the port of Hedeby in northern Germany.

 

“And he says that in five days he sailed from Sciringesheal to the port called Hedeby; it is sighted between the lands of the Wends and the Saxons and Angel, and it pays tribute to Denmark.” 

 

The text known as ‘Ohthere’s Voyage to the White Sea’ is fascinating account of early medieval seamanship and the viking desire to venture across the seas and explore unknown lands. To read the text, one gets a sense of the wonder the audience must have felt upon hearing of such far-flung and strange lands. 

 

Sources:

The Anglo-Saxon World: An Anthology, Oxford World Classics, translated by Kevin Crossley-Holland