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| Daily Life Greenland is a frozen land, mostly covered with glaciers. Its winters arelong, dark, and fierce. Consequently, the settlers'lives were brief,averaging between thirty and thirty-five years. Women worked hard raising children and working in the dairies. Their duties also included cooking, spinning and weaving. The Viking men were farmers. They cleared and tended their rocky fields, cared for their livestock, hunted, and occasionally sailed on trading voyages. Greenland is near the Arctic Circle and during the long winters the Sun does not rise above the horizon for months. To pass the time, the settlers would gather in the main room of their homesteads, making crafts, playing games and telling stories. Some of these stories, known as Sagas, were written down during the Middle Ages and contain many details about the Vikings'daily life. "The people are few," reports The Kings Mirror, a thirteenth century Saga, "for only a small part of the country is sufficiently free from iceto be habitable, but the people are all Christians, and have churches andpriests. It is reported that the pasturage is good and that there are largeand fine farms in Greenland. The farmers raise cattle and sheep in largenumbers, and make butter and cheese in great quantities. The people subsistchiefly on these foods, but they also eat the flesh of various kinds ofgame, such as reindeer, whales, seals and bears. That is what men live on inthat country."
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