This video is sponsored by Audible.

Vikings fans sign up for your free book using the link below.

But more on that at the end of the video.

In the summer of 986, a solitary trading vessel plied out into the deep waters of the North Atlantic. Dwarfed by immense

columns of ice looming over the frosted seaways. Bombarded by waves as tall as the sky.

Dishveled, frozen to their very bones, and constantly wet from

the salt and foam permeating the air, soddening even the hardy, waterproof animal pelts

worn by the crew. The captain of the ship had promised a mighty reward once his men pulled into port,

though that goal seemed ever remote to those unfortunate sailors.

For the most part, they were Norwegians, hailing directly from the fjords and valleys their ancestors

had inhabited for time immemorial. Though some likely hailed from the colonies in Scotland

and Ireland, a few even Iceland, that vast open land of fiery mountains and frozen plains.

These men were used to enduring the elements.

They'd been journeying on the high seas since their early teens.

This voyage, however, had pushed them to the very limits of human endurance.

Little did they know it at the time, but they may well have travelled farther than any other Europeans before them.

The name of their leader was Biani Hurljolfsson.

And several weeks before, he had promised his men a relatively easy journey to the new colony of Greenland.

In truth, that newest addition to the Norse world was a frosted wasteland.

Named as such by its discoverer, the exiled Icelander Eric the Red,

in order to attract the much needed lifeblood of settlers from the other Norse lands.

Now, long after they were supposed to have come into port,

...