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

Avannaata Avannaata (, ) 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 the south, Avannaata is flanked ...

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

in western

Greenland Greenland is an autonomous territory in the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark. It is by far the largest geographically of three constituent parts of the kingdom; the other two are metropolitan Denmark and the Faroe Islands. Citizens of Greenlan ...

. Founded in 1755 as Solsiden, Saqqaq had 132 inhabitants in 2020. The village's Kalaallisut 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 was a Paleo-Eskimo culture in southern Greenland. It was named after the settlement of Saqqaq, the site of many archaeological finds. The Saqqaq were the longest-residing residents of Greenland in all of history. Timeframe T ...

Geography

It is located in the southwestern part of the

Nuussuaq Peninsula Nuussuaq Peninsula (, old spelling: ''Nûgssuaq'') is a large () 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, an inlet ...

, on the northern shore of Sullorsuaq Strait (known in Danish as Vaigat Strait), northwest of

Ilulissat Ilulissat, also known as Jacobshavn or Jakobshav, is the municipal seat and largest town of the Avannaata municipality in western Greenland, located approximately north of the Arctic Circle. With a population of 4,670 as of 2020, it is the ...

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

History

Archaeological excavations in Qilakitsoq 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 Scoresby Sund, Kangertittivaq fjord in eastern Greenland. It has a roughly south-east to west-north-west orientation, emptying into the Baffin ...

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 ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...

around 3,500 BCE and independent of the migration that gave rise to the modern Native Americans and the

Inuit Inuit (singular: Inuk) are a group of culturally and historically similar Indigenous peoples traditionally inhabiting the Arctic and Subarctic regions of North America and Russia, including Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwe ...

. On 21 November 2000 a large landslide at Paatuut, from Saqqaq, generated a

megatsunami A megatsunami is an incredibly large wave created by a substantial and sudden displacement of material into a body of water. Megatsunamis have different features from ordinary tsunamis. Ordinary tsunamis are caused by underwater tectonic activi ...

in Sullorsuaq (or Vaigat) Strait. Energy from the

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from , ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and underwater explosions (including detonations, ...

refracted after it struck

Disko Island Disko Island (, ) is a large island in Baffin Bay, off the west coast of Greenland. It has an area of ,strait A strait is a water body connecting two seas or water basins. The surface water is, for the most part, at the same elevation on both sides and flows through the strait in both directions, even though the topography generally constricts the ...

, generating a wave with a run-up height of which destroyed boats at Saqqaq.

Transport

Air Greenland Air Greenland Aktieselskab, A/S (formerly named Grønlandsfly and Greenlandair) is the flag carrier of Greenland, owned by the Naalakkersuisut, Greenlandic Government. It operates a fleet of 28 aircraft, including a single Airbus A330-800 airli ...

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 (; Christensen, 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 bay on the western coast of Greenland. ...

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