It was on this strip of land that the Icelanders settled at the end of the tenth century. Though barren on the outer shores and islands and on the hills, it is covered at the inner part of the fiords on the low level by a rich growth of grass together with stunted birch trees and various bushes, particularly willows. On the north side of the valleys crowberries (_Empetrum nigrum_) may be found.... Eric settled in Ericsfiord, the present Tunugdliarfik, at a place which he called Brattahlid, now Kagsiarsuk, in 985 or 986. Two distinct colonies were founded, the Eastern Settlement, extending from about Cape Farewell to a point well beyond Cape Desolation, comprising the whole of Julianehaab Bay and the coast past Ivigtut, and the Western Settlement, beginning about one hundred and seventy miles farther north at Lysufiord, [i.e. Agnafiord], the present Ameralikfiord, comprising the district of Godthaab. The fiord next Ericsfiord in the Eastern Settlement was Einarsfiord, now Igalikofiord. These fiords were separated at their head by a low and narrow strip of land, the present Igaliko Isthmus. It was here, at Gardar, that the Althing of Greenland met, and here was also found the bishop’s seat, established at the beginning of the twelfth century. There were as many as sixteen churches in Greenland, for almost every fiord had its own church on account of the long distances and difficult traveling between the fiords. [Illustration: FIG. 15--Map of the early Norse Western and Eastern Settlements of Greenland. Scale 1:6,400,000. (The inset below. 1:70,000,000, shows the relation of Norway, Iceland, and Greenland.)] The unfamiliar localities above named may be followed by the aid of the accompanying map (Fig. 15) copied from Finnur Jónsson’s maps,[189] which embody the results of the research of the best experts and scholars with the aid of relics on the ground and surviving records. It is apparent that from the first to last the heart of Greenland was about the low, fairly fertile, favorable tract near the heads of the two fiords named for Eric and his friend, Einar, and not far from Eric’s Greenland home. The Western Settlement was a comparatively small offshoot, with four churches only, yet it contrived to maintain existence for between three and four centuries, being at last obliterated, as is supposed, by the Eskimos. The main settlement was still more enduring, having a continuous record of nearly half a millennium, a history not surpassed in duration by some far more populous and powerful nations. [Illustration: FIG. 16--Section of the Clavus map of 1427 showing Greenland continuous with Europe. (After Joseph Fischer’s hand-copied reproduction.)]