The Vinland Map: Walter McCrone's Other Big Mistake

This page is best understood by first reading the page, Some Say the Image on the Shroud of Turin was Painted.

In 1972, Walter McCrone, using microscopy, determined that the Vinland Map, reputed to be a rendering of the New World as discovered by Leif Ericson in the 11th Century, was a fake. 

Scientists over the years have challenged McCrone’s conclusions about the Vinland Map, which depicts North America. This map was believed to have been drawn before Columbus’ voyage. McCrone concluded that the ink on the map contained a significant amount of a titanium anatase, a substance discovered after 1920.  Thus he concluded it must be a forgery.  

In 1985, Thomas Cahill, at the University of California at Davis, analyzed the map and the ink with a method known as PIXE or Particle Induced X-ray Emission. Cahill found only a minute presence of titanium anatase, an amount that was consistent with medieval green vitriol ink. But that didn’t end the controversy.  

In 1996, Harry Gove, the famed particle physicist who was a co-developer of the use of the Accelerator Mass Spectrometry for carbon 14 dating, wrote in his book, “Relic, Icon or Hoax? Carbon Dating the Turin Shroud,” (Institute of Physics Publishing):  

I sometimes think that McCrone dreamed of becoming history's greatest iconoclast. Having, in his view, demolished the authenticity of the Vinland Map, he saw a chance to do the same to the Turin Shroud…As far as the Vinland map is concerned, I would put my money on Cahill and PIXE.

In 2002, scientists from the University of Arizona, the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory, and the Smithsonian Institution used carbon 14 dating to show that the parchment of the Vinland map originated in approximately 1434 CE.  It had already been determined that, from watermarks, that the ancient book, The Tartar Revelations, in which the maps had been bound, originated between 1431 and 1449. That the map was bound in the book was certain from patterns of wormholes in the paper.

In 2003, Jacqueline S. Olin of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., published an article in Analytical Chemistry, in which she explained how Walter McCrone would find or not find something in his microscope and draw a conclusion without considering other possibilities. For instance, she wrote:

McCrone carried out infrared spectroscopy on the ink of the map and identified the presence of gelatin. He did not attempt to explain how the forger would have made an ink containing gelatin nor how it could be used to draw the map. He did not address the possibility of gelatin being present as a result of hydrolysis of the collagen of the parchment by the acid present due to the deterioration of an iron gallotannate ink. In addition, no consideration was given to the gelatin being present as a proteinaceous binder for the suspension of the metal complexes of gall ink.

The Vinland Map housed in Yale University's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library is almost certainly genuine. Absolute proof may be elusive but it is certain that Walter McCrone’s assessment lacks scientific credulity.