Kangeq

Kangeq stands at the mouth of Nuup Kangerlua, where Inuit coastal journeys intersected with the first Danish-Norwegian colony of the eighteenth century. Hans Egede landed on the island on 3 July 1721 and named his settlement the Colony of Hope. His party came from Bergen with workers and supplies, expecting to combine missionary activity with trade. Inuit visitors watched the construction and sometimes helped the newcomers.

This was already a busy Indigenous landscape. Egede's diary recorded about five hundred people passing north in forty skin boats in April 1722. Families also gathered near Kangeq to catch lumpfish, trade and meet one another. The Bergen company's commerce struggled against Inuit trading relations with European whalers; the company ceased operating in 1726 and the crown took over. In 1728 the colonial settlement moved from the island to the mainland site of present-day Nuuk. Kangeq's early colonial episode thus lasted seven years within a much older world of seasonal movement and exchange.