The term is thought to have first been used by in his work , also called "The Book of the Icelanders", written well after the period in which Norse explorers made their first contacts with indigenous Americans. By the time these sources were recorded, was the common term Norse Greenlanders used for the Thule people, the ancestors to the modern Inuit. The Thule first arrived in Greenland from the North American mainland in the 13th century and were thereafter in contact with the Greenlanders. The "Greenlanders' Saga" and the "Saga of Erik the Red", which were written in the 13th century, use this same term for the people of the area known as Vinland whom the Norse met in the early 11th century. The word subsequently became well known, and has been used in the English language since the 18th century.