Which Norse explorer was the first to sight Greenland?

Gunnbjörn Ulfsson is traditionally credited as the first Norse explorer to sight Greenland.

According to the medieval Book of Settlement of Iceland, Gunnbjörn was sailing westward from Norway toward Iceland when storms drove his ship off course. He and his crew saw islands or skerries west of Iceland, later associated with Gunnbjörn’s Skerries. He apparently did not land, and the precise location of the islands remains uncertain.

The date is also unclear. Modern summaries place the sighting somewhere between about 876 and 932, with many accounts favoring the late ninth or early tenth century. Some researchers have even suggested that the reported skerries could have been a superior mirage of Greenland rather than actual islands.

Gunnbjörn is often confused with Erik the Red, who explored and colonized Greenland, or Bjarni Herjólfsson, who later sighted the North American coast after being blown off course in 986. Leif Erikson followed Bjarni’s reports and led the better-known voyage to Vinland, but neither man is the traditional answer to the first sighting of Greenland.