The Vikings Didn't Discover America

Every year, on the second Monday of October, tens of millions of Americans celebrate the discovery of this continent by the Italian explorer Christopher Columbus, and have for over a century. Columbus has long been a venerated figure around whom a number of exaggerated myths have been built. However, in recent decades, the navigator has come under fire for his numerous atrocities in the New World, and many of these myths have been torn down. In the process though, several entirely new ahistorical myths have been created in opposition to him. Among them, the claim that the Western Hemisphere was discovered by the Viking Leif Erikson has grown very popular. In this video, I explain why that is not the case, and why, even though he was a deplorable man, Columbus really did discover the Americas.

0:00 Who Discovered America?
02:50 Rewriting History
04:47 The Two Faces of Christopher Columbus
06:35 Outro & Credits

[Jowjoejoe]

I like the idea that the Vikings hated Canada so much that they left and never talked about it again

[mlmeowist]

I get the point of this video, but saying that we had NO knowledge the vikings were ever in America until the 1960s is incorrect. The Saga of Erik the Red (written probably about a hundred years after the whole Vinland colony incident) describes Vikings finding new lands across the northern sea. Yeah, this didn't exactly have a huge impact as many viewed the Sagas as more of legendary tales than actual written accounts of history, but there IS some history of value in there. There were hundreds of eyewitnesses who knew about this New World, and a large portion of people in Iceland, for example, knew that lands across the Atlantic Ocean did exist.

[Smartphonekanalen]

I can agree that it's semantics. But as a Scandinavian I think that the Vikings discovered North America. Columbus rather conquered America.

[In_Our_Timeline]

R/Historymemes: my whole life I was lied too

[ArxifyYeti]

Argument against saying the natives discovered the Americas first: When they came to the land we call the Americas it was technically connected to asia, therefore it was one big landmass, therefore they discovered a new region (of an existing continent), not a continent. Truly is a matter of semantics.

[saw]

Happy thanksgiving from Canada, Arken!

[redjaypictures]

I dunno, i’d still rather give the award to another Italian explorer named “Amerigo Vespucci” who sailed to Argentina a few years after Columbus, the key difference being that while Columbus thought he found Asia, Vespucci knew immediately that it was uncharted land,

Plus a german mapmaker named the new continents after him, “America” is the Latin version of “Amerigo”

[MrCooljeppe]

This entire video is basically just a semantical argument on the meaning of the word "discovered", and honestly i find that it bores me.

[Gallalad]

And when the world needed him most, he returned

[theplasticbaron]

Just because Columbus was a bad person doesn’t mean he didn’t discover America first. Great video also vikings did bad things to so that argument of they did something bad so they didn’t do a thing is just a bad argument

[originalsonly]

So a person or group of people don't get acknowledgment because they didn't have any significant influences. That seems kinda dumb

[LiamExplainsIt]

“Alright awesome Columbus Day video!”
*checks watch*
“…2021?”

[jarlemilsrensen]

I mean the definition of discover is to find something unexpectidly or during a search... the vikings did just that, and they documented it, they found canada and separately found south america, so they most certainly did discover america, however they did return home and told stories and wrote in their sagas of newfoundland and vinland, however they did not bother to do all the work to settle there. They also documented their trades with the natives

[BrianLevine-qe]

Tough to discover a place when people are there to meet you.

[RTG_Global_Gang]

Just because the Vikings got they behind whipped you don’t want to give them credit for getting to America before Columbus.

You didn’t even examine the evidence all you did is undermine the proposed duration of their settlement. Talk about shallow research methodology! Based

[enotsnavdier]

I mean, this is purely just an argument over what "discovering" something really means. Is something not considered discovered if it doesn't become widely known. If I myself found out how to travel faster than Light but decided for whatever reason did I discover FTL? I'd argue yes, so I'd also argue that the Vikings discovered America. But they discovered America in the same way that Hero of Alexandria invented a steam engine. He invented something that would long in the future become revolutionary to the world, but it wasn't revolutionary in his hands. While Columbus discovered the New World in the way that Thomas Savery invented the steam engine.

[sylviamontaez]

Another annoying myth tied to columbus is the idea that people thought the world was flat, until columbus proved otherwise. This isn't true, as the earth being round was known to the ancient Greeks and other civilizations. (Although the earth's shoe wouldn't have mattered much to a medieval peasant)

[phoenixshadow]

You posted this one day after Leif Erickson Day (Hinga Dinga Durgen).

[ArTorrPresents]

It's funny, I'm behind on your videos, but I looked over at YouTube, saw your video, and absent-mindedly clicked it. And I gotta say, this was short, sweet, and came together in a simple, yet thought-provoking manner by the end. Well done. I appreciate your tight editing, subtle humor, the use of the LOTR font, and the Witcher 3 dock at the end. I knew what channel you got that from when I saw it too :P Keep it up man!

[bigmacintosh]

1492 – Martin Behaim’s Globe had the western coast of the northern Americas on it, and several of the islands between Russia and Alaska. Christopher Columbus did NOT discover a singular individual thing. Every single thing he found had already been explored BY OTHER PEOPLE FROM SPAIN!