Leiv Erikson is a Norwegian record breaker.He was the first white man who discovered America.Many europeans mean that Columbus was the first, but we Norwegians are so patriotic that we insist on that Erikson was the first.

Leiv Erikson was born at Iceland in 973.He was very wild and curious as a child, and he was close to death because many times because of his be- haviour.His father was called Eirik Raude and he was very wild, too. He had to escape from Norway, because he had killed a man in a single com- bat.Therefore, he went to Iceland, where he now was threatened by a man whose relative had been killed by Eirik.Because of that, he looked for another place to live.

In 982 Eirik and his family had to go somewhere.He was banished from Iceland, and he decided to go towards west.He hoped to find a land where he could live, and he discovered Greenland.At that time, Greenland was actually green.That means, it was much warmer then. Later, in 986 Leiv heard about a man who had seen some rocks west of Greenland.This was Newfoundland, but no-one knew about that then.Leiv was curious about these rocks, and he wondered if this could be an undiscover- ed land.

Much later, Leiv sailed to Norway, where he was christened and he got a new life philosophy.He meant that people shouldn’t kill each other, but rather do good things.Afterwards, he went back to Greenland, and from there he sailed to America.

After Leiv and his men had been sailing for five days, they detect- ed land.The place thay came to was almost without life.It was just grey sand and tundra.Then they sailed to the south, and here it was pretty warm, so it seemed very strange to the vikings.But among the men who were with Leiv, there were also German slaves, and these discovered the grape plant, which they recognized from Germany.In Vinland, which Leiv called America,there were a lot of things which the vikings never had seen before for example; grapes, huge trees, deers, wolfs and strange birds.

After a winter in Vinland, Leiv and his men sailed back to Greenland where they were heartly receipt by Leiv`s family and friends.A lot of vik- ings tried to settle down in Vinland, but they met a new thing which Leiv Erikson and his men and never had met;the Indians.The Indians always attacked the white men who had planned to settle down. The Vinland became never a Norwegian colony,but Leiv Erikson got the honour of discovering America.He died at Greenland in 1020.