It appears from Othere's simple and very clear narrative that he undertook a veritable voyage of discovery in order to explore the unknown lands and sea lying to the north-east. This voyage was also very rich in results, as in the course of it the northernmost part of Europe was circumnavigated. Nor perhaps is there any doubt that during this voyage Othere penetrated as far as to the mouth of the Dwina or at least of the Mesen in the land of the Beormas.[27] We learn from the narrative besides, that the northernmost part of Scandinavia was already, though sparsely, peopled by Lapps, whose mode of life did not differ much from that followed by their descendants, who live on the coast at the present day.
The Scandinavian race first migrated to Finmark and settled there in the 13th century, and from that period there was naturally spread abroad in the northern countries a greater knowledge of those regions, which, however, was for a long time exceedingly incomplete, and even in certain respects less correct than Othere's. The idea of the northernmost parts of Europe, which was current during the first half of the 16th century, is shown by lithographed copies of two maps of the north, one dated 1482, the other 1532,[28] which are appended to this work. On the latter of these Greenland is still delineated as connected with Norway in the neighbourhood of Vardoehus. This map, however, is grounded, according to the statement of the author in the introduction, among other sources, on the statements of two archbishops of the diocese of Nidaro,[29] to which Greenland and Finmark belonged, and from whose inhabited parts expeditions were often undertaken both for trade and plunder, by land and sea, as far away as to the land of the Beormas. It is difficult to understand how with such maps of the distribution of land in the north the thought of the north-east passage could arise, if voices were not even then raised for an altogether opposite view, grounded partly on a survival of the old idea, we may say the old popular belief, that Asia, Europe and Africa were surrounded by water, partly on stories of Indians having been driven by wind to Europe, along the north coast of Asia.[30] To these was added in 1539 the map of the north by the Swedish bishop OLAUS MAGNUS,[31] which for the first time gave to Scandinavia an approximately correct boundary towards the north. Six hundred years,[32] in any case, had run their course before Othere found a successor in Sir Hugh Willoughby; and it is usual to pass by the former, and to ascribe to the latter the honour of being the first in that long succession of men who endeavoured to force a passage by the north-east from the Atlantic Ocean to China.
Here however it ought to be remarked that while such maps as those of Ziegler were published in western Europe, other and better knowledge of the regions in question prevailed in the north. For it may be considered certain that Norwegians, Russians and Karelians often travelled in boats on peaceful or warlike errands, during the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth century, from the west coast of Norway to the White Sea, and in the opposite direction, although we find nothing on record regarding such journeys except the account that SIGISMUND VON HERBERSTEIN[33] gives, in his famous book on Russia, of the voyage of GREGORY ISTOMA and the envoy DAVID from the White Sea to Trondhjem in the year 1496.