Upernavik ( Kalaallisut : "Springtime Place") is a small town in the Avannaata municipality in northwestern Greenland , located on a small island of the same name . With 1,064 inhabitants as of 2024, it is the twelfth-largest town in Greenland. It contains the Upernavik Museum .
16-489: The town was founded as Upernavik in 1772. From the former name of its island, it was sometimes known as Women's Island; its name was also sometimes Anglicized to "Uppernavik". In 1824, the Kingittorsuaq Runestone was found outside the town. It bears runic characters left by Norsemen , probably from the late 13th century. The runic characters list the names of three Norsemen and mention the construction of
32-528: A notation for presenting numbers, usually by inscribing in wood or stone. The notation has been used in Scandinavia , usually in conjunction with runic calendars and inscriptions in runes . The notation is similar to the older Roman numerals for numbers 1 to 9 (I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX). Unlike the Roman notation, there are only symbols for numbers one ("I") and five ("U"), protruding off
48-485: A rock cairn nearby. This is the furthest north that any Norse artifacts have been found, other than those small artifacts that could have been carried north by Inuit traders, and marks the northern known limit of Viking exploration. Sailors searching for lost polar expeditions sometimes used the city as a staging ground. Upernavik is served by Air Greenland , with scheduled flights from Upernavik Airport to Qaanaaq , Qaarsut , and Ilulissat . Most settlements in
64-531: Is located within Upernavik Archipelago , a vast archipelago of small islands on the coast of northeastern Baffin Bay . The archipelago extends from the northwestern coast of Sigguup Nunaa peninsula in the south at approximately 71°50′N 56°00′W / 71.833°N 56.000°W / 71.833; -56.000 to the southern end of Melville Bay ( Greenlandic : Qimusseriarsuaq ) in
80-675: Is unknown if they were in use in the Middle Ages , let alone in the Viking Age . On older runic calendars, a different notation for representing the Golden Numbers was used; the 16 runes of Younger Futhark represented the numbers from 1 to 16 and three ad hoc , runes were improvised for the numbers 17, 18, and 19. For example, the Computus Runicus manuscript, originally from 1328, but collected and published by
96-526: The Americas . The authors of the North American rune stones do not seem to understand the positional notation or the concept of zero . The rune for 10 is used interchangeably for 0, 10 , and <1,0> with little consistency. The inscription stone from Spirit Pond contains the sequences ahr:011 and ahr:00 , which have been read as year 1011 and year 1010 respectively. It is unclear if
112-606: The Dane Ole Worm (1588–1654), uses this futhark notation, and not the pentadic numerals under discussion here. In some peculiar instances runic numbers have been used as numerals in a base ten positional system , replacing the Arabic numerals . It is unknown if this use existed before the 19th century. The oldest authenticated use of this notation is in the notes of an 18 year-old journeyman tailor, Edward Larsson, that are dated to 1885 in pentadic runes. A copy of
128-453: The archipelago are served during weekdays with the Bell 212 helicopter. AUL ferries have ceased passenger services north of Ilulissat, leaving Upernavik totally dependent on Air Greenland services, which are frequently cancelled due to weather conditions. Cargo arrives several times a year on Royal Arctic Line when sea ice permits, usually beginning in early to mid May annually. Upernavik
144-507: The archipelago helping keep the population level stable. Cyclist Hanne Malmberg was born in Upernavik. She represented Denmark at the 1992 Summer Olympics . Upernavik has a tundra climate ( Köppen climate classification ET ). Winters are very cold and snowy and summers are quite cool. With a mean of just 6.4 °C (43.5 °F) in July, trees are unable to grow. Autumn and winter are
160-771: The historian Finn Gad has pointed out, the date given on the stone can be interpreted in various ways. As such, it cannot, as previously thought, be taken as evidence for the three hunters named on the stone in this region. ⁓ el^likr Erlingr · sikuaþs Sighvats : so^n:r sonr · ok ok · baan^ne Bjarni : torta^r Þórðar son sonr : ¶ ⁓ ok ok : enriþi Eindriði · os Odds son sonr : laukardak·in Pentadic numerals Pentadic numerals ( Swedish : Pentadiska siffror/runor/talsystemet ) are
176-721: The letter "P" in combination with the stem. 10 is represented by two turned U's opposing each other. More numbers up to 19 or 20, can be represented by a combination of I's and U's branching off of a stem, similar to how Roman numerals are represented by combinations of I's and V's. The widest use of the notation is in presenting the Golden Numbers , 1–19 on Runic calendars ( Danish : kalenderstave , Swedish : runstavar , Norwegian : kalenderstavar , also known as clogs ). The numbers are commonly found in Modern Age and possibly Early Modern Age calendar sticks . It
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#1732780330331192-547: The mountain on Kingittorsuaq Island in the south-central part of the Upernavik Archipelago . The stone is now located at the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen . The stone has been dated to the Middle Ages . The Catholic Encyclopedia states the date as April 25, 1135. William Thalbitzer dates the stone to 1314 using pentadic numerals . Others have dated the stone between 1250 and 1333. However, as
208-466: The north at approximately 74°50′N 57°30′W / 74.833°N 57.500°W / 74.833; -57.500 . With 1,092 inhabitants as of 2020, Upernavik is the third-largest town in the Avannaata municipality. The population has been relatively stable over the last two decades and has increased by more than 28% relative to the 1990 levels, with migrants from the smaller settlements in
224-644: The note was first published by the Institute for Dialectology, Onomastics and Folklore Research in Umeå in 2004. This positional notation however appears on two unrelated sets of rune stones allegedly discovered in North America . The first is the Kensington Runestone found in 1898; the second are the three Spirit Pond runestones found in 1971. All refer to pre-Columbian Norse exploration of
240-417: The side of a vertical stroke, or stem, which has no numeric value by itself. In some inscriptions the notches are placed horizontally on a vertical stem or stav of the rune; on other inscriptions the stave is horizontal and the "I" and inverted "U" rise off of it. The number 4 is represented by four vertical lines on the horizontal stem, 5 is represented by what looks like a half-turned letter U , resembling
256-502: The wettest time of the year and spring is the driest. Kingittorsuaq Runestone The Kingittorsuaq Runestone (old spelling: Kingigtorssuaq ), listed as GR 1 in the Rundata catalog, is a runestone that was found on Kingittorsuaq Island , an island in the Upernavik Archipelago in northwestern Greenland . The Kingittorsuaq Runestone was found in 1824 in a group of three cairns that formed an equilateral triangle on top of
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