Vikings having made the islands the headquarters of their buccaneering expeditions (carried out indifferently against their own Norway and the coasts and isles of Scotland), Harold Hårfagre ("Fair Hair") subdued the rovers in 875 and annexed both Orkney and Shetland to Norway.
There is a legend that Henry Sinclair, 1st Earl of Orkney may have sailed to Newfoundland in 1398, returning in 1400.