Introduction

Abstract

From the 15th to the early 18th century the Baltic Sea was not only a highway for the physical transport of basic goods, it also functioned as the channel for the import and local and regional transfer of foreign cultural artifacts, artisans, artists and a wide range of media for cultural diffusion. Established commercial transportation, especially to the Low Countries and the British Isles, of grain, timber and iron ore from Denmark, Sweden and the eastern Baltic states brought wealth to the social and political elites within the Baltic region. The economic prosperity of the higher social layers among the Baltic States allowed them as customers and patrons to import a wide range of objects of art and artifacts belonging to prestige culture. The contributors to this volume of the Scandinavian Journal of History address the cultural traffic outlined above. The volume's ten articles are revised versions of papers read at the conference Cultural Traffic and Cultural Transformation around the Baltic Sea, 1450–1720, a conference held in the Carlsberg Academy in Copenhagen in early spring 2003. The conference participants reflected upon and discussed questions relating to the nature, scope, origin, direction and impact of the cultural interaction taking place in the late medieval and Early Modern Baltic region with examples drawn especially, but not exclusively, from elite culture. The conference Cultural Traffic and Cultural Transformation around the Baltic Sea, 1450–1720 (Carlsberg Academy, Copenhagen, 21–22 March 2003,) was made possible by substantial grants from the Carlsberg Foundation (Denmark) and the Danish Research Council for the Humanities. Organizers Dr Badeloch Noldus (Instituut Pallas, Leiden University, The Netherlands) and Dr Stephen Turk Christensen (Department for History and Social Theory, Roskilde University Centre (RUC), Denmark) thank the following for their support: Dr David Gaimster (Ministry for Culture, UK), Curator Hugo Johannsen (Danish National Museum), Curator Steffen Heiberg (National Historical Museum Frederiksborg Castle), Dr Juliette Roding (Leiden University), Accounts Department (RUC), Department for History and Social Theory (RUC), the staff at Carlsberg Academy, Conference Assistant Thea Pedersen (RUC) and Dr Ole Meyer (University of Florence). For recent studies dealing with Early Modern cultural relations between mostly the Low Countries and areas within the western Baltic, see articles in J. J. van Baak, L. Honti & A. H. Huussen, eds. The Baltic. Languages and Cultures in Interaction (Proceedings NOMES-Conference, 19–20 May 1994); Tijdschrift voor Scandinavistiek, vol. 16 (1995); J. Roding & L. Heerma van Voss, eds., The North Sea and Culture (1550–1800). Proceedings of the International Conference held in Leiden, 21–22 April 1995 (Hilversum, 1996). An interesting, but uneven, treatment of the eastern Baltic within a wider context of cultural exchange can be found in M. Klinge, Östersjövälden. Et illustrerat historisk utkast (Borgå, 1985). Rather dispersed, and occasionally too categorically formulated, relevant information and contextualization concerning Baltic cultural interaction can be found in the general history of the territories of the western Baltic power states by D. Kirby, Northern Europe in the Early Modern Period. The Baltic World 1492–1772 (London & New York, 1990), especially in the section “Migrants, Aliens and the Problem of Religious Diversity”.