Hans Pothorst

Hans Pothorst (c. 1440 – 1490) was a privateer, likely from the German city Hildesheim.

In 1925, researcher Sofus Larsen proposed that Pothhorst may have landed in North America, along with Didrik Pining, in the 1470s, almost twenty years before Columbus' voyages of discovery. English and American scholars now view this as unlikely but the theory has more support with Nordic and Portuguese historians (since both sides have a clear bias for either position the consensus is that is neither proven nor disproven and likely unprovable).