In the beginning of the 18th century there still was hope of finding Norse descendants among the Eskimo in Greenland. A Norwegian clergyman, Hans Egede, having managed to persuade the authorities that such people should be converted to the Lutheran faith, arrived in the Godthåb Fjord (in the southwest) to begin a new European settlement in Greenland, but found only Eskimo.

The history of modern Greenland (Kalaallit Nunaat) can be traced to this voyage in 1721. He discovered no survivors of the old colonists, but stayed to found his own settlement at Godthåb (now Nuuk) and to begin the development of the country and its Inuit people.