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Greenland

1796

Country codes:GL

Introduction

Greenland (Kalaallisut: Kalaallit Nunaat meaning "Land of the Greenlanders"; Danish: Grønland) is an autonomous country within the Kingdom of Denmark, located between the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Though physiographically a part of the continent of North America, Greenland has been politically and culturally associated with Europe (specifically Norway and Denmark) for about a millennium. The largest island in Greenland is also named Greenland, and makes up most of the country's land area.

Greenland has been inhabited, though not continuously, by Inuit peoples via Canada for 4500-5000 years. In the 10th century, Norsemen settled on the uninhabited southern part of Greenland. In the 13th century, the Inuit arrived, and in the late 15th century the Norse colonies were abandoned. In the early 18th century contact between Scandinavia and Greenland was re-established and Denmark established rule over Greenland.

Greenland became a Danish colony in 1814 after being under the rule of Denmark-Norway for centuries. With the Constitution of Denmark of 1953, Greenland became a part of the Kingdom of Denmark in a relationship known in Danish as Rigsfællesskabet (Commonwealth of the Realm).

In 1979 Denmark granted home rule to Greenland, and in 2008 Greenland voted to transfer more power from the Danish royal government to the local Greenlandic government. This became effective the following year, with the Danish royal government in charge of foreign affairs, security (defence-police-justice), and financial policy, and providing a subsidy of DKK 3.4 billion, or approximately $11,300 per Greenlander, annually.

Greenland is, by area, the world's largest island that is not a continent. With a population of 56,615 (January 2011 estimate) it is the least densely populated dependency or country in the world.

History

Early Paleo-Eskimo cultures

In prehistoric times Greenland was home to several successive Paleo-Eskimo cultures known primarily through archaeological findings. The earliest entry of the Paleo-Eskimo into Greenland is thought to have occurred about 2500 BC. From around 2500 BC to 800 BC, southern and western Greenland was inhabited by the Saqqaq culture. Most findings of Saqqaq period archaeological remains have been around Disko Bay. From 2400 BC to 1300 BC the Independence I culture existed in northern Greenland. It was a part of the Arctic small tool tradition.

Around 800 BC, the Saqqaq culture disappeared and the Early Dorset culture emerged in western Greenland and the Independence II culture in northern Greenland. The Dorset culture was the first culture to extend throughout the Greenlandic coastal areas, both on the west and east coasts, and it lasted until the arrival of the Thule culture in 1500 AD. The Dorset culture population lived primarily from whale hunting. The Thule culture people are the ancestors of the current Greenlandic population. They started migrating from Alaska around 1000 AD, reaching Greenland around 1300 AD. The Thule culture was the first to introduce to Greenland such technological innovations as dog sleds and toggling harpoons.

Norse settlement

From 986 AD, Greenland's west coast was colonised by Icelanders and Norwegians in two settlements on fjords near the southwestern-most tip of the island. They shared the island with the late Dorset culture inhabitants who occupied the northern and eastern parts, and later with the Thule culture arriving from the north. Norse Greenlanders submitted to Norwegian rule in the 13th century, and the kingdom of Norway entered into a personal union with Denmark in 1380 and from 1397 was a part of the Kalmar Union.

The settlements, such as Brattahlíð, thrived for centuries but disappeared some time in the 15th century, perhaps at the onset of the Little Ice Age. Interpretation of ice core and clam shell data suggests that between 800 and 1300 AD the regions around the fjords of southern Greenland experienced a relatively mild climate several degrees Celsius higher than usual in the North Atlantic, with trees and herbaceous plants growing and livestock being farmed. Barley was grown as a crop up to the 70th degree. What is verifiable is that the ice cores indicate Greenland has experienced dramatic temperature shifts many times over the past 100,000 years. Similarly the Norse Book of Settlements records famines during the winters in which "the old and helpless were killed and thrown over cliffs". (Arnold 2010)

These Icelandic settlements vanished during the 14th and 15th centuries, probably as a result of famine and increasing conflicts with the Inuit. The condition of human bones from this period indicates that the Norse population was malnourished, probably due to soil erosion resulting from the Norsemen's destruction of natural vegetation in the course of farming, turf-cutting, and wood-cutting, pandemic plague, a decline in temperatures during the Little Ice Age, and/or armed conflicts with the Inuit.

Jared Diamond suggests that cultural practices, such as rejecting fish as a source of food and relying solely on livestock ill-adapted to Greenland's (deteriorating) climate, resulted in recurring famine which led to abandonment of the colony. However, isotope analysis of the bones of inhabitants shows that marine food sources supplied more and more of the diet of the Norse Greenlanders, making up between 50% and 80% of their diet by the 14th century.

1500–1814

In 1500, King Manuel I of Portugal sent Gaspar Corte-Real to Greenland in search of a Northwest Passage to Asia which, according to the Treaty of Tordesillas, was part of the Portuguese area of influence. In 1501 Corte-Real returned with his brother, Miguel Corte-Real. Finding the sea frozen, they headed south and arrived in Labrador and Newfoundland. Upon their return to Portugal the cartographic information supplied by Corte-Real was incorporated into a new map of the world which was presented to the Ercole I d'Este, Duke of Ferrara by Alberto Cantino in 1502. The Cantino planisphere, made in Lisbon, accurately depicts the southern coastline of Greenland.

King Christian IV's Expeditions to Greenland was a series of expeditions in the years 1605–1607 to Greenland and Arctic waterways in order to locate the lost Eastern Norse Settlement and assert Danish sovereignty over Greenland. The expeditions were mostly unsuccessful, partly due to leaders lacking experience with the difficult arctic ice and weather conditions, and partly because the expedition leaders were given instructions to search for the Eastern Settlement on the east coast of Greenland just north of Cape Farewell, which is almost inaccessible due to southward drifting ice. The pilot on all three trips was English explorer James Hall.

However, after the Norse settlements died off, the area was de facto controlled by various Inuit groups; but the Danish government never forgot or relinquished the claims to Greenland that it had inherited from the Norwegians, and when contact with Greenland was re-established in the early 18th century, Denmark asserted its sovereignty over the island. In 1721 a joint mercantile and clerical expedition led by Danish-Norwegian missionary Hans Egede was sent to Greenland, not knowing whether a Norse civilisation remained there. The expedition can be seen as part of the Danish colonisation of the Americas. After 15 years in Greenland, Hans Egede left his son Paul Egede in charge of the mission in Greenland and returned to Denmark where he established a Greenland Seminary. This new colony was centred at Godthåb ("Good Hope") on the southwest coast. Gradually, Greenland was opened up to Danish merchants, and closed to those from other countries.

Treaty of Kiel to World War II

Eventually, when the union between Denmark and Norway was dissolved in 1814 (Treaty of Kiel), the originally officially Norwegian dependencies of Greenland, Iceland and the Faroe Islands became part of the reorganised "Kingdom of Denmark".

Norway occupied and claimed parts of the then-uninhabited eastern Greenland (also called Erik the Red's Land) in July 1931, claiming that it constituted terra nullius. Norway and Denmark agreed to submit the matter in 1933 to the Permanent Court of International Justice, which decided against Norway.

Greenland's connection to Denmark was severed on 9 April 1940, early in World War II, when Denmark was occupied by Nazi Germany. On April 8, 1941, the United States occupied Greenland in order to defend it against a possible invasion by Germany. The United States occupation of Greenland continued until 1945. Greenland was able to buy goods from the United States and Canada by selling cryolite from the mine at Ivittuut. During this war, the system of government changed: Governor Eske Brun ruled the island under a law of 1925 that allowed governors to take control under extreme circumstances; Governor Aksel Svane was transferred to the US to lead the commission to supply Greenland. A sledge patrol (in 1942, named the Sirius Patrol), guarding the northeastern shores of Greenland using dog sleds, detected several German weather stations and alerted American troops who then destroyed them. After the collapse of the Third Reich, Albert Speer briefly considered escaping in a small aeroplane to hide out in Greenland, but changed his mind and decided to turn himself in to the United States Armed Forces.

Greenland had been a protected and very isolated society until 1940. The Danish government, which governed Greenland as its colony, had been convinced that this society would face exploitation from the outside world or even extinction if the country were opened up. Therefore, it maintained a strict monopoly of Greenlandic trade, allowing only small scale troaking with Scottish whalers. Nevertheless, wartime Greenland developed a sense of self-reliance through self-government and independent communication with the outside world.

Despite this change, in 1946 a commission (with the highest Greenlandic council, the Landsrådene, as a participant) recommended patience and no radical reform of the system. Two years later, the first step towards a change of government was initiated when a grand commission was established. A final report (G-50) was presented in 1950: Greenland was to be a modern welfare state with Denmark as sponsor and example. In 1953, Greenland was made an equal part of the Danish Kingdom. Home rule was granted in 1979.

Post World War II

Following World War II, the United States developed a geopolitical interest in Greenland, and in 1946 the United States offered to buy Greenland from Denmark for $100,000,000, but Denmark refused to sell. However, in 1950 Denmark did agree to allow the United States to establish the Thule Air Base, construction of which was begun in 1951 and completed in 1953, as part of a unified NATO Cold War defense strategy.

Greenland became an integral part of the Kingdom of Denmark in 1953. It was granted home rule by the Parliament of Denmark in 1979. The law came into effect on 1 May 1979. The Queen of Denmark, Margrethe II, remains Greenland's Head of State. In 1985, Greenland left the European Economic Community (EEC) upon achieving self-rule, in view of the EEC's commercial fishing regulations and a EEC ban on seal skin products. A referendum on greater autonomy was approved on 25 November 2008.

On 21 June 2009, Greenland assumed self-determination with responsibility for self-government of judicial affairs, policing, and natural resources. Also, Greenlanders were recognised as a separate people under international law. Denmark maintains control of foreign affairs and defence matters. Denmark upholds the annual block grant of 3.2 billion Danish kroner, but as Greenland begins to collect revenues of its natural resources the grant will gradually be diminished. It is a step toward full independence from Danish rule. Greenlandic became the sole official language of Greenland at the historic ceremony.

Culture

Greenland's culture began with settlement in the second millennium BC by the Dorset Inuit, shortly after the end of the ice age.

In the 10th century, Norwegian Vikings settled in the southern part of the island, while the Thule Inuit culture was introduced in the north of the island and expanded southward. The culture clash between two peoples is attested by the discovery of a fragment of chain mail Viking at high latitude of the island, while a figurine carved from walrus ivory Inuit clear assignment was found in Bergen, Norway. Both objects must be understood as a clear testimony of the trade between the two peoples.

Inuit culture dominated the island from the end of the Middle Ages to the recolonisation in the early 18th century, where European culture was reintroduced.

Today Greenlandic culture is a blending of traditional Inuit (Kalaallit) and Scandinavian culture. Inuit, or Kalaallit, culture has a strong artistic tradition, dating back thousands of years. The Kalaallit are known for an art form of figures called tupilak or an "evil spirit object." Traditional art-making practices thrive in the Ammassalik. Sperm whale ivory remains a valued medium for carving.

Greenland also has a successful, albeit small, music culture. Some popular Greenlandic bands and artists include Chilly Friday (rock), Siissisoq (rock), Nuuk Posse (hip hop) and Rasmus Lyberth, who performed in the 1979 Eurovision Song Contest, performing in Greenlandic. The music culture of Greenland also includes traditional Inuit music, largely based around singing and drums.

Sport

Association football is the national sport of Greenland. The governing body, the Football Association of Greenland (Kalaallit Nunaanni Arsaattartut Kattuffiat), is not yet a member of FIFA because it cannot grow grass for regulation grass pitches. However it is the 17th member of the N.F.-Board ([2]).

In January 2007, Greenland took part in the World Men's Handball Championship in Germany, finishing 22nd in a field of 24 national teams.

Greenland competes in the biennial Island Games, as well as the biennial Arctic Winter Games. In 2002 Nuuk hosted the AWG in conjunction with Iqaluit, Nunavut. Also in 2002 and previously in 1994 they won the Hodgson Trophy for fair play.

Inforamtion above from the Wikipedia article Greenland, licensed under CC-BY-SA full list of contributors here.

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