Nuuk ivory, and wood, with many items collected by archaeologists. Ilisimatusarfik, the University of Greenland, is in Nuuk and is the national university of Greenland. Most courses are taught in Danish, although a few are in Kalaallisut as well. , the university had approximately 150 students (almost all Greenlanders), around 14 academic staff, and five administrators. Its library holds approximately 30,000 volumes. The National Library of Greenland in Nuuk is the largest reference library in the country, devoted to the preservation of Greenland's cultural heritage and history. The library holdings are split between the public library in the town centre and
Nuuk occupied by the Dorset culture around the former settlement of Kangeq but they disappeared from the Nuuk district before AD 1000. The Nuuk area was later inhabited by Viking explorers in the 10th century (Western Settlement), and shortly thereafter by Inuit peoples. Inuit and Norsemen both lived with little interaction in this area from about 1000 until the disappearance of the Norse settlement for uncertain reasons during the 15th century. The city proper was founded as the fort of Godt-Haab in 1728 by the royal governor Claus Paarss, when he relocated the missionary and merchant Hans Egede's earlier Hope Colony