The Farfarers

The Farfarers: Before the Norse is a non-fiction book by Farley Mowat, setting out a theory about pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact. Mowat's thesis is that even before the Vikings, North America was discovered and settled by Europeans originating from Orkney who reached Canada after a generation-spanning migration that used Iceland and Greenland as 'stepping stones'. Mowat's ideas are controversial and have been accused of being over-speculative. The book has been published in the UK as The Alban Quest.

The 'Albans'

Mowat's premise is that North America was visited by a European pre-Celtic race. In the 7th century BC, Europe was settled by the highly successful Celtic peoples, who displaced earlier cultures about whom little is known. Mowat calls these people the 'Albans' and includes among them the Picts, Armoricans, and the 'broch-builders' of Scotland. He argues that these peoples were slowly pushed to the fringes of north-western Europe, and ultimately survived only in Orkney, off northern Scotland. There, he theorizes that, fueled by a burgeoning demand for walrus ivory in continental Europe extending as far as Rome and wealthy Slavic lands, they developed a seagoing culture that used sophisticated long-distance fishing crafts with hulls made of hide. These boats, themselves dependent on walrus-blubber tar to stay afloat, enabled them to discover and settle the North Atlantic islands around Baffin Bay, into the Hudson Bay and as far south as Labrador and possibly Newfoundland.