History of Greenland Paddle

No one knows how old the Greenland paddle is, but it is unlikely to be the thousands of years that are sometimes claimed. The ancestors of today’s Greenlanders, known as the Thule culture, moved east from Alaska and northern Canada only about a thousand years ago, about the same time that Eric the Red was settling southwest Greenland. Since a different style of paddle with a longer loom and much shorter, leaf-shaped blades was used until recently by many Inuit west of Greenland, the Greenland paddle may have evolved after the Thule Inuit reached Greenland. There is one ambiguous clue that the Greenland paddle may be only a few hundred years old. The oldest known surviving Greenland kayak, collected in 1613, has been on display at Trinity House in Hull, Humberside, England since the early 17th century; however, the paddle that accompanies it is of the older leaf-bladed style. John Brand, who took the lines of the kayak and documented it in his Little Kayak Book, speculates that the development of the Greenland paddle may have been influenced by the shape of European oars. However, the oars used with Greenland umiaks, or open boats, have relatively wide blades, unlike either European oars or Greenland paddles, and I question whether the European example would influence one and not the other. My own guess is that the Greenland paddle and the sliding stroke evolved together. The unadorned shape and dimensions of the paddle make it easy to slide the paddle back and forth in the hands, and in fact, Greenlanders typically slide both hands out onto one blade for leverage when bracing, rolling, and making sweep turns. Also, many Greenlanders incorporate a sliding stroke into their forward stroke.

 

by Chuck Holst