Saqqaq (old spelling: ''Sarqaq'') is a settlement in the

Avannaata Avannaata (, da, Det Nordlige, lit=The Northern) is a municipality of Greenland created on 1 January 2018 from the bulk of the former Qaasuitsup municipality. It encompasses an area of 522,700 km2 and has 10,726 inhabitants. Geography In ...

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the ...

in western

Greenland Greenland ( kl, Kalaallit Nunaat, ; da, Grønland, ) is an island country in North America that is part of the Kingdom of Denmark. It is located between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans, east of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago. Greenland ...

. Founded in 1755 as Solsiden, Saqqaq had 132 inhabitants in 2020. The village's

Kalaallisut Kalaallisut may refer to: * Greenlandic language * West Greenlandic West Greenlandic ( da, vestgrønlandsk), also known as Kalaallisut, is the primary language of Greenland and constitutes the Greenlandic language, spoken by the vast majority of ...

name is a translation of the Danish meaning "Sunny Side", in reference to its position relative to Livets Top. It is the site name for the

Saqqaq culture The Saqqaq culture (named after the Saqqaq settlement, the site of many archaeological finds) was a Paleo-Eskimo culture in southern Greenland. Up to this day, no other people seem to have lived in Greenland continually for as long as the Saqqaq ...

Geography

It is located in the southwestern part of the

Nuussuaq Peninsula Nuussuaq Peninsula (, old spelling: ''Nûgssuaq'') is a large (180x48 km) peninsula in western Greenland. Geography The waters around the peninsula are that of Baffin Bay. To the south and southwest the peninsula is bounded by Disko Bay, ...

, on the northern shore of

Sullorsuaq Strait Sullorsuaq Strait (old spelling: ''Suvdlorssuaq'', da, Vaigat) is a strait on the western coast of Greenland. Geography The strait separates Nuussuaq Peninsula in the northeast from Qeqertarsuaq Island in the southwest. The strait waterway ...

, northwest of

Ilulissat Ilulissat, formerly Jakobshavn or Jacobshaven, is the municipal seat and largest town of the Avannaata municipality in western Greenland, located approximately north of the Arctic Circle. With the population of 4,670 as of 2020, it is the thi ...

. Immediately northeast of Saqqaq is the Livets Top mountain (1150 m).

History

Archaeological excavations in

Qilakitsoq Qilakitsoq is an abandoned settlement and an important archaeological site in Greenland. It became known as the discovery location of eight mummified corpses from the Thule period. The Inuit mummies of Qilakitsoq offer important insights in ...

on the other side of

on the shores of

Uummannaq Fjord Uummannaq Fjord is a large fjord system in the northern part of western Greenland, the largest after Kangertittivaq fjord in eastern Greenland. It has a roughly south-east to west-north-west orientation, emptying into the Baffin Bay in the nor ...

revealed the existence of an ancient Arctic culture, later named the

, which inhabited the area of west-central Greenland between 2500 BCE and 800 BCE. Recent DNA samples from human hair suggest that the ancient Saqqaq people came from

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part ...

about 5,500 years ago and independent of the migration that gave rise to the modern Native Americans and the

Inuit Inuit (; iu, ᐃᓄᐃᑦ 'the people', singular: Inuk, , dual: Inuuk, ) are a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic and subarctic regions of Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwest Territorie ...

Transport

Air Greenland serves the village as part of government contract, with winter-only helicopter flights between Saqqaq Heliport and Ilulissat Airport. Settlement flights in the

Disko Bay Disko Bay ( kl, Qeqertarsuup tunua; da, DiskobugtenChristensen, N.O. & al.Elections in Greenland. ''Arctic Circular'', Vol. 4 (1951), pp. 83–85. Op. cit. "Northern News". ''Arctic'', Vol. 5, No. 1 (Mar 1952), pp. 58–59.) is a large ...

are unique in that they are operated only during winter and spring. During summer and autumn, when the waters of the bay are navigable, communication between settlements is by sea only, serviced by Diskoline.Diskoline timetable
/ref> The ferry links Saqqaq with Qeqertaq, Oqaatsut, and Ilulissat.

Population

The population of Saqqaq has increased by 60 percent relative to the 1990 levels, stabilizing in the following decade. Saqqaq is one of the very few demographically stable settlements in the Disko Bay region.Statistics Greenland

References

External links

Historical images from Saqqaq

Saqqaq projectile points
National Museum of the American Indian {{DEFAULTSORT:Saqqaq Villages of Ilulissat Disko Bay Populated places in Greenland Populated places of Arctic Greenland 1755 establishments in North America