The first people to set foot in Greenland arrived around 4-5000 years ago from the North American continent via Canada when the sea froze in the narrow strait at Thule in northern Greenland.
No less than six different Inuit cultures have immigrated in several waves. Greenland's population today is descended from the last immigration, the Thule culture, which arrived here in around the 9th century AD.
THE NORSE SETTLERS AND THE VIKING PERIOD IN GREENLAND
This final Inuit immigration took place at around the same time as the arrival in Greenland of the Norse settlers and Erik the Red, which was in 982 AD. This is described in detail in the Icelandic sagas.
The Norse population disappeared from Greenland in around 1500 AD for reasons that have never been fully explained - although countless well-founded theories about their disappearance still flourish today. Many of the Norse settlers' ruins are still visible on plains and mountainsides in South Greenland and at Nuuk.
They are therefore popular destinations that attract tourists wishing to gain an insight into an exciting culture from the Viking period.
THE ENCOUNTER WITH DANES, NORWEGIANS AND WHALERS
Following the disappearance of the Norse population, expeditions from England and Norway came to Greenland throughout the 16th and 17th centuries and from the 17th and 18th centuries it was primarily the European whalers who came into contact with the Inuits.
This resulted in extensive trade, and the Inuits were particularly taken with the Europeans' small glass beads, which today are used in the national costume.
The missionary Hans Egede from the joint kingdom of Denmark-Norway arrived in what is today known as Nuuk in 1721 in his search for the Norse settlers. He never found them, but instead converted the Inuits to the Christian faith. The Inuits today are Lutheran evangelists.
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