This is John Batchel. Conversation with the author Martin Wittick, his new book American Vikings,

How the North Sailed into the Lands and Imaginations of America.

Lee Farquson is the man, around a thousand in the common era.

The mystery is, he names landing places, how you land, Markland, and Vinland.

Vinland is not found, I learned from Martin, and he explains where it might be, as far south as, as far west as, still looking for Vinland.

Associated with grapes, that is a clue. It may be a good clue.

Here's Martin to explain. Much longer conversation later tonight. American Vikings.

But there is, nevertheless, there's strong evidence from the sagas that it was grapes that they were talking about.

They certainly said we found grapes. And the possibility is that maybe the fox grape or some other form of wild growing grape.

Now, that's not going to be found alongside self-sown wheat north of New Brunswick.

We could be talking about Maine.

We could be talking about further south in the coast of New England.

So although our archaeological evidence we'll talk about in a moment

doesn't take us further than Newfoundland,

which itself is extraordinary,

the evidence found at Newfoundland

and the evidence from the sagas

suggests that Vinland actually lies

further to the west and further to the south, and thereby hangs the

most extraordinary tale, because at that point we really are talking about Vikings who may have

reached areas that we would now describe as the United States of America and not only Arctic,

sub-Arctic Canada.

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