In 1960, the archaeological remains of Norse buildings were discovered at L’Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland. Until recently the settlement date was estimated within about a sixty-year span around 1000 CE. On Wednesday, scientists published a study in the journal Nature pinpointing the arrival date to 1021 CE, or 470 years before Christopher Columbus reached the Bahamas in 1492.

Archaeologists identified three trees at the site that were cut with metal tools, which the Norse had, while indigenous peoples did not. The archaeologists were able to accurately date when the trees were cut based on markings on the tree rings from a rare solar storm — called a Miyake event — that took place in 992 or 993 A.D. With the date of that inner ring fixed, “all you need to do is count to when you get to the cutting edge,” said Michael Dee, a study co-author from the University of Groningen. 

Until now, the dates for when L’Anse aux Meadows was settled were “guesstimates,” Sturt Manning, an archeologist and director of the Cornell Tree Ring Laboratory, told The New York Times. “Here’s hard, specific evidence that ties to one year.”

The Norse voyages to Newfoundland are mentioned in two Icelandic sagas, which indicate L’Anse aux Meadows was a temporary home for explorers who arrived in up to six expeditions. 

The first was led by Leif Erikson, known as Leif the Lucky — a son of Erik the Red, the founder of the first Norse settlement in Greenland.

L’Anse aux Meadows, too, was expected to be a permanent settlement, but the sagas indicate it was abandoned due to infighting and conflicts with indigenous people, whom the Norse called skræling — a word that probably means “wearers of animal skins.”

Vikings settled in North America in 1021AD study says