Duchies Of Schleswig Research Articles

Multilingual memory albums in Wisconsin and the Duchy of Schleswig

Memory albums, sometimes known as poetry albums or autograph books (German Stammbuch; Danish stambog), have existed in some form for centuries, and by the 19th century, the practice was common among many members of society and were often kept by school-aged children or young adults. Such albums are considered to have been kept for the purposes of group affiliation and for collecting personal memories for the future. Because of this, they are a useful source in historical sociolinguistic research, particularly regarding the reconstruction of social networks and understanding community of practice. By focusing on memory albums created during the same time period in two distinct locations by bi- or multilingual social groups, this chapter aims to shed light on differences and similarities of the communities of practice taking part in memory album creation; one in Wisconsin, the other in the Duchy of Schleswig. Results from this chapter show that for each location, a dominant language is apparent, and similarities arise according to the sex of the album owner.

Schleswig and Non-Territorial Autonomy – The Territorial Trap?

AbstractNon-territorial autonomy (NTA) is a concept to ensure political and cultural participation of national minorities in society and thus a tool to manage diversity without challenging territorial integrity. This article relates to the experience of Schleswig, which is widely perceived as a model of successful border-delineation based on national self-determination and subsequent reconciliation and accommodation of national, linguistic, and cultural binarity in a majority-minority framework. Minority membership is based on subjective self-identification and not registered.The principle of subjective self-identification and its fluidity challenge attempts to implement a legitimate, democratic structure of minority self-government. The non-definition of “minority” based on objective, measurable criteria is due to the apparent social integration of the Schleswig society: today, it is socially more divided by the national border drawn 100 years ago than by respective majority-minority divisions. It has become apparent that the territorial restriction to the boundaries of the former Duchy of Schleswig does not cohere with social practices and mobility frameworks and thus questions the present NTA infrastructure, which is restricted to a historic territory no longer relevant in contemporary administrative frameworks or in patterns of social practices.

A Brief History of Medieval Monasticism in Denmark (with Schleswig, Rügen and Estonia)

Monasticism was introduced to Denmark in the 11th century. Throughout the following five centuries, around 140 monastic houses (depending on how to count them) were established within the Kingdom of Denmark, the Duchy of Schleswig, the Principality of Rügen and the Duchy of Estonia. These houses represented twelve different monastic orders. While some houses were only short lived and others abandoned more or less voluntarily after some generations, the bulk of monastic institutions within Denmark and its related provinces was dissolved as part of the Lutheran Reformation from 1525 to 1537. This chapter provides an introduction to medieval monasticism in Denmark, Schleswig, Rügen and Estonia through presentations of each of the involved orders and their history within the Danish realm. In addition, two subchapters focus on the early introduction of monasticism to the region as well as on the dissolution at the time of the Reformation. Along with the historical presentations themselves, the main and most recent scholarly works on the individual orders and matters are listed.

A Deviation from the Historically Given Foundation? Gendarmeries in Denmark through History

From 1838, the border between the Danish duchy of Holstein and the German <em>Länder</em> was patrolled by a corps of border gendarmes with a mixture of duties: as policemen, as customs officials, and as soldiers.^{<a id="xrn1" href="#n1">1</a>} Following the Second Schleswig War in 1864, in which the Monarchy was defeated by the German <em>Bund</em>, the duchies were ceded to the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria, and the Danish-German border was accordingly moved north from the Elbe to the Kongeå. So were the gendarmes. Although differently configured and under different names, the institution of a border gendarmerie continued to exist until 1969. A gendarmerie force was likewise set up in the duchy of Schleswig in 1851 as a means to subdue the political unrest in the duchy following the First Schleswig War (the Three Years’ War 1848–1851). The Schleswig gendarmes were disbanded after the Second Schleswig War (1864). Lastly, the Blue Gendarmes existed 1885–1894 to assist the police in domestic security matters. The pros and cons of a gendarmerie were discussed on several occasions in the Kingdom of Denmark during the 19^th century. On the one hand, a gendarmerie force would undoubtedly increase the police powers in general and might, in particular, serve as an alternative to having military personnel assisting the police in coping with riots and mass events. On the other hand, setting up a gendarmerie would incur large expenses, and the idea has traditionally been considered undemocratic and “Un-Danish”. This paper outlines the history of gendarmeries in Denmark and discusses this question of “Un-Danishness” from a historical as well as a contemporary, comparative perspective, drawing on recent studies of gendarmeries in other countries. We argue that the history of the Danish gendarmeries shows that establishing a Danish gendarmerie force today would indeed be “Un-Danish” and just as contrary to democratic traditions as it was in the 19^th century. It would thus represent a “deviation from the historically given foundation”.

The “Normative Forces” of Difference: Ecology, Economy and Society during Cattle Plagues in the Eighteenth Century

One of the recurring themes in the public perception of containment policies during the current COVID-19 pandemic are the supposedly uneven and everchanging measures taken up by international, national and local authorities. This is especially the case in countries with a federal structure, like Germany. Not surprisingly, historical containment policies and strategies of coping with epidemics have been varied too and were also discussed intensely. This short essay will analyse the communication between farmers, artisans, merchants, physicians and local as well as higher level administration during outbreaks of cattle plague in eighteenth century Northern Germany / Denmark. The duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, geographically located between the Baltic and the North Sea, are especially well suited for such a study because of their characteristically distinct regional differences in geomorphology and the varied economic practices, property rights and political organisation which directly or indirectly resulted from one another. Environmental factors clearly influenced administrative measures as well as public responses or demands regarding these policies.

Foreign Policy Contacts Interpreted by Icelandic Sagamen (Marriage of Ingibjörg Haraldsdóttir and Knútr Lávarðr According to “Knýtling Saga”)

The article is dedicated to the concluded between 1115 and 1123 marriage between the Russian princess Ingibjörg Mstislavna (unknown to the Russian sources) and the Danish prince, Duke of Schleswig, and king of the Obodrites, Knútr lávarðr, as reflected in the Icelandic “Knýtlinga saga” (mid-13th century). A detailed story of Knútr lávarðr’s matchmaking and his marriage to one of the daughters of the Russian Prince Mstislav Vladimirovich is contained only in this source. At the same time, the three compendia of the Icelandic kings’ sagas include very detailed genealogical references, demonstrating the intertwining of the ruling clans of all three Scandinavian countries and the inclusion of the Russian rulers into this “community”. Following Finnur Jónsson, the author singles out a fragment of the aforementioned saga (chapters 84–92) as the “Þáttr of Knútr lávarðr”. This text, as, in essence, any other saga, does not give exact dates, details, motivations of actions, and the descriptions of certain events here are not credible. Years separating an event and its recording, as well as the distance between Denmark and Iceland, the participation of numerous “mediators” in the process of information transmission, and the “creative participation” of the author of the saga significantly distorted the original story, while it could initially have been quite subjective. What is of interest here, is the “indirect information” conveyed by the text: the saga illustrates the fact that the Duchy of Schleswig had been under the administration of Knútr, his close ties with both the German emperor and the rulers of the Old Russian state, as well as his obvious interest in the Baltic trade. The marriage of Knútr lávarðr and the daughter of Mstislav Vladimirovich fits well into the context of trade and political interests of the Duke of Schleswig and into the established by his father, Eiríkr the Good, Danish-Russian relations.

'Getting to Denmark': The Role of Elites for Development

We explore the role of elites for development and in particular for the spread of cooperative creameries in Denmark in the 1880s, which was a major factor behind that country's rapid economic catch-up. We demonstrate empirically that the location of early proto-modern dairies, so-called hollaenderier, introduced onto traditional landed estates as part of the Holstein System of agriculture by landowning elites from the Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein in the eighteenth century, can explain the location of cooperative creameries in 1890, more than a century later, after controlling for other relevant determinants. We interpret this as evidence that areas close to estates which adopted the Holstein System witnessed a gradual spread of modern ideas from the estates to the peasantry. Moreover, we identify a causal relationship by utilizing the nature of the spread of the Holstein System around Denmark, and the distance to the first estate to introduce it, Sofiendal. These results are supported by evidence from a wealth of contemporary sources and are robust to a variety of alternative specifications.

The Resurrection of the Body

This article analyses visual and written materials which indicate some of the interesting changes that the authoritative, Christian doctrine of bodily resurrection underwent in modernity. These materials document a growing gap between the authoritative creed and people’s beliefs, which cannot, I argue, be attributed solely to intellectual changes, but which was also highly reliant on changes in material living conditions and medical and hygienic progress. The article suggests that the belief in the resurrection of the body was quite firm in the general population even in the eighteenth century - the century of the Enlightenment, but that it faded towards the end of the nineteenth century due to changes in the material life conditions, such as medical progress and a decline in child mortality. My sources are gathered from the predominantly Lutheran former Duchy of Schleswig, and particularly from northern Friesland, and consist of personal letters, sermons, and visual sources such as church paintings and gravestone images. By means of selected examples, I investigate what the authoritative dogma of belief in the resurrection of the body meant to ordinary people. I trace the causes of this belief, and I discuss why it faded towards the end of the nineteenth century.

Building the Nation: N. F. S. Grundtvig and Danish National Identity. Edited by John A. Hall, Ove Korsgaard, and Ove K. Pedersen (Montreal, McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2015) 453 pp. $100.00 cloth $34.95 paper

Centuries ago, Denmark ruled from Greenland to Russia and northern Germany, including the later countries of Sweden, Finland, Norway, and Iceland. It was the major European power. Then it lost wars and territory, first relinquishing Sweden (and Finland) in the sixteenth century, and, having been on the wrong side in the Napoleonic wars, forfeiting Norway to Sweden in 1814. Finally, Prussia took the Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein in 1864, and Denmark became the small, compact country that we know today.Along the way, the Danes became a singular nation with impressive social cohesion, high levels of reciprocal trust, and miniscule amounts of corruption. But it supported an absolute, if benevolent, monarchy from 1660 to 1849. Several of its most important nineteenth-century political thinkers assert, however, that because Danish kings ruled for, and on behalf of, their people (rather than by divine right), that they listened to the voices of their people (their constituents), and that they consciously sought to “do good” rather than to be rapacious, monarchical traditions actually contributed positively to the successful state that Denmark has become.These influential nineteenth-century Danish thinkers argued that the country’s identity was established only after the Napoleonic wars, as more and more of Denmark’s core inhabitants began to converse in Danish, to receive their education in Danish, to worship in Danish, and to consider themselves a collection of persons and estates with common interests, all belonging to a single community, not as subjects of a king. The peasant estate, reasonably content under a succession of kings, spawned a new political party after 1849, and soon controlled the new Danish Parliament.This book is profoundly about how many of Denmark’s finer attributes emerged from profoundly nondemocratic roots, and how the retreat from major territorial hegemony to provincial and peripheral autonomy proved fundamental to the nation-building enterprise. Admittedly, Prussia (and Otto von Bismarck) coveted Jutland as well as the north German duchies, compelling the Danes to strengthen their embryonic internal political mechanisms and accelerate nation-building. By the 1860s, the Danes were also educating themselves intensively, creating novel folk high schools, developing Protestant congregational and evangelical forms of worship alongside the established state church, trading openly and widely, shipping grain profitably to the United States, and developing their nascent democracy.This intricate and unique story adds measurably to the literature on national identity formation. It also helps significantly to explain why Denmark and the other Nordic nations have been ranked the globe’s least corrupt polities since such measures were first compiled and published in 1995. Building the Nation, especially its most engaging chapters, focus on Nikolai Frederik Severin Grundtvig’s massive contribution to these major accomplishments as something of a founding father. Grundtvig was a thinker, a writer, and a polemicist, as well as a Lutheran preacher and a compiler and composer of hymns, who became a member of the Danish parliament after 1849. He was also, by turns, a monarchist and a reluctant democrat, a conservative theorist, and a modernizing activist. Grundtvig wrote a number of influential books that extolled the Danish people’s Nordic heritage, articulated a growing sense of “national” sensibility, and helped to merge the “estates” into a people.This book is neither especially methodological nor intrinsically interdisciplinary, but it contains twenty-three thoughtful chapters by political scientists, political theorists, sociologists, social historians, economic historians, and theologians—predominantly Danish—who each enrich our understanding of how and why Danish exceptionalism emerged and how and why little Denmark became a paragon of governance virtue in the twenty-first century.

Clashing cultural nationalisms: the 19th-century Danish-German intellectual debate, the Schleswig wars (1848-1864), and some reflections on the cultural roots of National Socialism

Romantic culture, far from only being an intellectual phenomenon, was a pivotal element in the 19th-century nation-building processes experienced in Europe, and it ended up influencing and being influenced by contemporary political events. The wars waged between Denmark and the German Confederation (1848-1864) are a foremost example of it, as the political claims for the control of the duchies of Schleswig, Holstein and Lauenburg intertwined with the intellectual polemics between some prominent German scholars (Jacob Grimm, Karl Müllenhoff etc.) who intended to prove the German nature of the duchies’ cultural heritage and of Scandinavian cultures in general, and some Danish intellectuals (Nicolai Grundtvig, Rasmus Rask etc.) who strove to undo what they perceived as a politically-charged cultural aggression. The relevance of the Schleswig Wars and their related intellectual debate is not restricted to 19th-century studies, as some authors of the second half of the 20th century have suggested that the German-Danish intellectual conflict over the heritage of the Old North was actually a prelude to what would eventually be Nazi Germany’s totalitarian ideology. Unfortunately, little has been written so far on the relationship between the Schleswig Wars and the then-contemporary scholarly debate. This article is intended to be an effective contribution in this direction.

The monetary reform of 1854 in the Duchy of Schleswig: a case of attempted state-building

This article is a survey of the monetary reform of 1854 in the Duchy of Schleswig, then part of the Danish monarchy. The reform can be seen as the third of three major attempts to overcome the economic and political difficulties associated with a heterogeneous and divided monetary system within the Danish state in the period from the end of the eighteenth to the middle of the nineteenth century. Informed by theories of institutional economics and state-building and based on contemporary sources, the article critically examines the problematic implementation of a single currency in a nineteenth-century region torn by ethno-political tensions and upheaval. The national split between German and Danish in the Duchy seriously hampered the dissemination of the new currency, thus obstructing the reform and the fulfilment of its underlying ambition: to transform Schleswig into a more harmonious polity within the institutional framework of the Danish composite monarchy.

(Un)Familiarity? Labor Related Cross-Border Mobility in Sønderjylland/Schleswig Since Denmark Joined the EC in 1973

This article presents an analysis of recent developments in labor-related mobility (cross-border commuting) in the Danish–German border region of Sønderjylland-Schleswig. The region had an integrated labor market, until today's German–Danish border was drawn in 1920, dividing the historic Duchy of Schleswig. Until Denmark joined the EC in 1973, the Danish–German border was practically closed to labor-related mobility. Since then, commuting remained at very low levels until the mid-2000s, even though unemployment figures north and south of the border developed unevenly, and two national minorities had strong social and cultural ties across the border. From about 2005–2008 there was a drastic increase in commuting from Germany to Denmark, while commuting in the other direction has remained at a very low level. Here, the article comes up with some explanations for this development using the concept of (Un)Familiarity as developed by Bas Spierings and Martin van der Velde.

Kongemordet i 1286

Kongemordet i 1286

The discourse of historical legitimization: a comparative examination of Southern Jutland and the Slovenian language area

This article analyzes the discourse of historical legitimacy in the duchy of Schleswig and in the Slovenian-speaking regions of Carniola, Styria, and especially Carinthia in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The question as to who had arrived in the area first was never far from the surface, because in an era of national romanticism, duration of stay seemed to allot special claims to possession. Rather than challenging this rationale, all sides tended to focus their efforts on enhancing their local genealogy. Yet the national conflicts of the period were not about political and linguistic history, but about contemporary interests and identities. In both Jutland and the southeastern Alps, national movements tended to focus on select moments in time that corresponded most closely to their modern-day political aspirations. The comparative analysis of two otherwise fairly divergent European regions reveals the pragmatic similarities of historical nation-building.

Samuel Reyher und sein In Teutscher Sprache vorgestellter Euclides

In 1665 in the city of Kiel there was founded a new university called Christiana Albertina or Alma mater Chiloniensis. It was the only one in the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein. One of the leading scientists of this academy was the mathematician Samuel Reyher (1635–1714) who didn’t teach mathematics only but also physics, and astronomy, and engineering, and jurisprudence. He was the author of a comprehensive Historia iurium universalis (1711) and of an extraordinary work Mathesis Mosaica (1679). But he was best known for his In Teutscher Sprache vorgestellter Euclides (1697, 1699), one of the earliest translations of Euclid’s Elements into German. In this book Samuel Reyher tried to prove the euclidean 5th postulate (the postulate [axiom] of parallels) - believing that he was successful.

Grundtvigs bidrag til udvikling af danske nationale symboler

Grundtvigs bidrag til udviklingen a f danske nationale symboler[Grundtvig ’s contribution to the development of Danish national symbols]By Inge AdriansenBroadly speaking, all Danish national symbols, both official and unofficial, are to be found in Grundtvig’s authorship. However, it is difficult to specify in what way and to what degree Grundtvig inspired the dissemination of the various symbols. The most important routes of dissemination were through Den Danske Salmebog [The Danish Hymnal] and Folkehøjskolens Sangbog [The Folk-highschool Songbookl. since the corrmosition of songs weighs heaviest in Grundtvig’s literary production. This is owing to his strong belief in the significance of song in educating the people, and to his talent for bringing to life the message of song in oral form. Since both the Hymnal and the Highschool Songbook continue to be published in revised editions, they have contributed to securing Grundtvig’s significance.Grundtvig’s hymns have often been perceived as the expression of something very Danish. Therefore he was almost entirely excluded from the first hymnal produced for the Danish-speaking congregations in the Duchy of Schleswig after its incorporation into Prussia in 1867. Some of Grundtvig’s hymns were characterised by Bishop Theodor Kaftan of Schleswig-Holstein as politically dubious and having Danish national colouring.After North Slesvig’s reunification with Denmark in 1920, Grundtvig’s hymn Den signede Dag [The blessed day] gained a special status. It was sung both at the meetings in January and February before the plebiscite and at the reunification festivities over the spring and summer. When, after the summer vacation, the schools reopened under Danish leadership, Den signede Dag was everywhere sung as the first moming-hymn. The children of Slesvig were in no doubt that Grundtvig was referring to Denmark in the final verse, which begins: “Nu rejser vi til vort Fadreland” [Now journey we to our fatherland]. In Grundtvigian homes in Slesvig the hymn was often sung at family festivities, and here it was that the tradition developed of standing up during the final verse - out of respect for the homecoming to fatherland and nation.The most significant contribution to the history of folk-education in Denmark is Grundtvig’s unitary view over hymn, historical ballad, and songs of fatherland and of folk-life. This achieves its expression in the Highschool Songbook which was first published in 1894 and has ever since helped set the norms for other Danish songbooks. The latest edition of the Highschool Songbook (from 1989) is the seventeenth, and here there are 119 songs by Grundtvig. This is 21% of the songbook’s 572 songs, and it shows that Grundtvig’s image-world continues to put its stamp upon representations of Danishness. This 17th edition was printed in over 500,000 copies, and thereby the Highschool Songbook became the Danish songbook published in the largest impression.Grundtvig has been the most significant generator of historical consciousness in Denmark, but it is a problem that only a small part of his enormous authorship and complex world of ideas is usually presented to us. At certain periods of his life Grundtvig was what many today would perceive as nationalistic. But it should be emphasised that he always stressed that Danishness has an historical and a geographical delimitation. Unfortunately there is little space within national symbolism for such complexity, and his metaphorical language was so multivalent that it has not been suited to being transposed into easily grasped symbols.Even so, this obscure metaphorical language has had a decisive significance in the development of Danish national symbolism. This is attributable in particular to the fact that Grundtvig managed to create that special interweaving of Christian, national and social identities which many Danes experience as being a matter of course and more or less of natural origin, something which has been here since the dawn of time.[Editors' note: Such terms as folkeopdragelse and folkeliv, here rendered as ‘folk-education’ and ‘folk-life’, confront Gr's translators with a special difficulty. The element folk- has little to do with the English term ‘folk-’, as in ‘folk-song’ and ‘folk-art’ with its implication of rustic or peasant provenance. Nor can it always be satisfactorily translated as ‘national’ or ‘popular’ though these can be aspects of its meaning. It essentially relates, in Grundtvigcontexts, to Gr's concept of folkelighed [‘folkliness’]: a form of social cohesion achieved by way of thinking and of conducting one's life in an enlightened and benevolent awareness of the mutual obligations and shared commitments and aspirations of a people or community identifiable by such cultural markers as a common history and a common language. In principle an inclusive concept, it nevertheless always had a potential to become exclusive in practice.]

Giving the Spirit a National Form: From Rousseau's advice to Poland to Habermas’ advice to the European Union

Rousseau's philosophy of education is contained not only in Emile (1762), but also in The Government of Poland (1772). In each of them he emphasises different aspects of education: How to be a human being? And: How to be a citizen? The main theme investigated by Rousseau in The Government of Poland, is how a minor nation surrounded by such major powers as Russia, Prussia and Austria can ensure its survival? Not having the option of defending itself against its powerful neighbours by military means, Rousseau's advice is to found the Polish nation in the hearts of the Polish people, primarily through citizenship education. However, Poland was finally divided between its neighbours in 1795. Rousseau's writing The Government of Poland can shed some light on the Danish situation after losing the war to Prussia and Austria in 1864. With its defeat Denmark did not disappear, as did Poland, but the territory of the United Monarchy was almost halved by the loss of the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein. After the war some of the same defence strategies and educational ideas as Rousseau had recommended to Poland became important in Denmark. In light of Rousseau's ideas about citizenship education this article will explore the Danish way of trying to establish the nation in the hearts of the people throughout the 20th century. Today the question is: How to understand the conception of self‐determination in the context of establishing European political unity? In his analysis Habermas directs our attention to some of the same dilemmas that Rousseau had dealt with 200 years earlier. Habermas’ advice is to give the European spirit a republican form.

Folk, dannelse og styreform: En anmeldelse af Ove Korsgaard, Kampen om folket (2004)

Folk, dannelse og styreform: En anmeldelse af Ove Korsgaard “Kampen om folket” (2004).[People, Education and Government: A Review of Ove Korsgaard ‘The Battle over the People’ (2004) ]By Vagn WåhlinOve Korsgaard, Kampen om folket. Et dannelsesperspektiv på dansk historie gennem 500 år [The Battle over the People: A Perspective of Education through 500 years of Danish History] (Gyldendal, Copenhagen, 2004), 672 p.From the day of its publication, Ove Korsgaard’s brilliant dissertation has had much influence on the Danish understanding of Denmark’s 500-year process of establishing the concepts of individual, society, people, and democracy. The author distinguishes between demos, the general population of the state, and ethnos, that part of the population which has inherited and accepted rights and obligations as far as and beyond a constitution and written laws. These latter are folket, the people.This primary division leads to a similar distinction between state and nation as well as a parallel distinction in government between representative government and democratic, self-organization of the citizens. A special focus of the book is the interaction and mutual dependency of the specified categories in an historical perspective of change from a late feudal society to a modem democratic welfare state. Essential institutions in this long societal process have been (a) the Lutheran Church; (b) from 1814, the municipal local schools for all, including girls; (c), for centuries, the patriarchal household; and (d) the rising centralized power of king and state. These four institutions formed the ideological and practical base of society until, through the slow effect of the Enlightenment, the individual and the people as such, within a national and democratic framework, took over in the period 1870-1900 and became the ideological basis of society with special and defined rights and duties attaching to every adult male and, from 1920, female. After the pre-1814 ethnic and cultural Danish-Norwegian-German conglomerate state finally broke down with the loss (1814) of Norway to Sweden and (1864) the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein to Pmssia, Denmark became the most ethnically and linguistically homogeneous state of Europe. Not until then could the ethnic concept of ‘the p e o p l folket, finally take over the indisputable role as the rock of the Danish society - a role which was further strengthened by the German occupation of Denmark 1940-45.Before 1870, 75% of all cultivated land was worked by the owners of medium-sized family farms, and some 75% of the population made their living in the agrarian sector of society. Agriculture produced the necessary surplus to pay for Denmark’s imports. From 1870, when the farmers began to organize effectively, they gained a higher economic, cultural and political status in Danish class-structured society which they were able to maintain for a hundred years. Up to 1870-90 Copenhagen was the only urban-industrial centre of any great significance, and from the 1890s the organized industrial capital and its workforce rose in influence; but not until the 1960s and 70s did these succeed in outdoing the fundamental influence of the agrarian sector on a national scale. Regrettably, this economic perception of the lower middle-class appearance of Danish society has been under evaluated in Korsgaard’s book, and the reader may thus miss a vital factor in the development of the democratic understanding of the Danish ethnos.The labour unions and the labour movement in politics never became revolutionary to any great extent and from 1916-29 renounced any such tendency and won a national position as a trustworthy partner in a coalition with other political and social forces. They graduated from expressing purely class interests to representing the whole population of Denmark. This led to the formation of a general welfare state for all after the Second World War. All political parties and national movements took part in building a welfare provision from cradle to grave, covering 80-90% of the population, which led to an embracing of both ethnos and demos.From the post-industrial and post-modern society of 1970 until today no leading classes in coalition with other groups have been able to formulate a common ideology and political guidelines for the future. So the Danes collectively are insecure about the future, and divided as to whether they want globalisation, Muslim newcomers, the EUconstitution etc.All in all, this book is a fascinating and well-written contribution to the current debate: Where do we come from? Who are we? And where are we heading?

Peasants and Danes: The Danish National Identity and Political Culture

From a cultural and historical-sociological perspective, the Danish nationstate of today represents a rare situation of virtual identity between state, nation, and society, which is a more recent phenomenon than normally assumed in Denmark and abroad. Though one of the oldest European monarchies, whose flag came ‘tumbling down from heaven in 1219’—ironically enough an event that happened in present-day Estonia—Denmark's present national identity is of recent vintage. Until 1814 the word, Denmark, denominated a typical European, plurinational or multinational, absolutist state, second only to such powers as France, Great Britain, Austria, Russia, and perhaps Prussia. The state had succeeded in reforming itself in a revolution from above in the late eighteenth century and ended as one of the few really “enlightened absolutisms” of the day (Horstbøll and østergård 1990; østergård 1990). It consisted of four main parts and several subsidiaries in the North Atlantic Ocean, plus some colonies in Western Africa, India, and the West Indies. The main parts were the kingdoms of Denmark proper and Norway, plus the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein. How this particular state came about need not bother us here.

Grundtvigs indflydelse på den tidlige danske nationalisme

Grundtvig’s Position in Early Danish NationalismBy Lorenz RerupThe article deals with Grundtvig’s important position in Early Danish nationalism, i.e., in the decades from about 1800 to 1830. The background is the Danish Monarchy from the prosperous years at the turn of the century to the disastrous war 1807-1814, the loss of Norway in 1814, and the following needy postwar time. After 1814 the Danish Monarchy consisted of the Kingdom of Denmark, the Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, the North-Atlantic Islands (the Faeroes and Greenland) and some minor colonies. The ideology which integrated the higher ranks of these heterogeneous ethnic groups of the Monarchy into one society was a patriotism underlining peace and order in the realm, the importance of just government and - before 1807 - the protection provided by the Danish navy.The patriotism of the Monarchy was compatible with various feelings of identity which bred in different parts of it from about 1750. The Danes, living in an old kingdom, equipped with a written language, with a complete educational system, and with a history of their own, of course, had a feeling of a Danish identiy, as the German speaking population of the Duchies had a corresponding feeling of an identity of their own. Clashes of these different identities might happen but were not connected with political ideas. The state was run by the king, not by the people, and a public opinion about politics was not allowed - and was almost non-existent - before the announcement of the Advisory Estates Assemblies in 1831. Now nationalism spread and soon undermined the supranational Monarchy, which finally disintegrated in 1864.However, in the first decades of the 18th century and influenced by the ideas of Romanticism a few poets, first of all Grundtvig, developed a literary national movement without political aims. In the writings of these poets the Danes - the whole people - have a real chance to make history if they abandon their superficial life and revive the virtues and piety of the great periods in Danish history. Like political nationalists these poets propagate this kind of revival. Their attempt failed. People were still divided into a ’high’ and a ’broad’ culture and some decades had to pass until the latter one felt the need of an ideology in order to be integrated into society. Nevertheless, Grundtvig seems to be a kind of link between the patriotic ideology of the 18th and the political nationalism of the 19th century.