This book examines the Danish Empire, which for over four hundred years stretched from Northern Norway to Hamburg and was feared by small German principalities to the South. Evolving over time, it has included most of Scandinavia and the North Atlantic, has shifted from a Western orientation under the Vikings to an Eastern one in the Middle Ages, and from a North Sea Empire to a Baltic Empire. From the seventeenth to the early twentieth century, it comprised small overseas colonies in India, Africa and the Caribbean. Exploring the rise and fall of Denmark's Kingdom, from 9 AD to the present, this textbook considers how such vast empires were kept together through ideology and symbols, military force, transport systems and networks of civil servants. The authors demonstrate how the lands under Danish rule included a variety of religious groups, social and economic structures, law systems, and ethnic and linguistic groups. They also consider the economic and ideological benefit of an empire structure in comparison to a nation state. Providing a detailed overview of the long history of the Danish Empire, whilst also confronting current debate and providing novel interpretations, this book offers an original, imperial and multi-territorial perspective on the history of the Danish state, providing essential reading for students of Danish or Scandinavian history and European or Global empires.
Author(s): Michael Bregnsbo, Kurt Villads Jensen
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2022
Language: English
Pages: 285
City: Cham
Acknowledgments
Contents
List of Figures
1 Introduction
An Empire is a World
References
2 The Empire in Himlingøje
References
3 The Christian Empire of the North Sea
Emperor Gorm
Canute the Great, the Emperor
References
4 Crusade Empires in the Baltic
The Conquest of Rügen
From the Northalbing to the Lake Peipus
Novgorod and Northern Germany
References
5 The Union Empire
The Kalmar Union’s Early Period
The Time of Discoveries
Bloodbath and Reformation
References
6 The Princely State: The Decline of Baltic Power 1536–1720
State Type: Conglomerate State
State Form: From Domain State to Tax State
Active Commercial Policy
Politics in the Vicinity of the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and Northern Germany; the Empire's International Position
The Empire's Foreign Policy Until the Disaster of 1658
Royal Absolutism
The Gottorp Problem
Revenge Attempts Against Sweden Within the Framework of Great Politics
References
7 From the Conglomerate State to the Unitary State 1720–1814
The Gottorp Problem
Norway
The North Atlantic
Schleswig and Holstein
The Colonies in the Tropics
Danish, Nordic, or German Identity?
The Empire and the Napoleonic Wars
Conclusion
References
8 1814–1864: From United Monarchy to Nation-State
The German Confederation
Advisory Provincial Estates
“Denmark Will Not!”
The Faroe Islands and Iceland
India and Africa
Dynastic Problems
The Dissolution of Absolutism
Civil War and Free Constitutions
The London Protocol
Two Conflicting and Incompatible Principles
Popular Sovereignty in Other Parts of the Empire
Constitutional Problems
Ejder Politics
The Catastrophe of 1864
From United Monarchy to Nation-State
References
9 The Empire After 1864
Iceland, the Faroe Islands, and Greenlandlak
Southern Jutland/Northern Schleswig
The Interwar Years and Mass Democracy
The Empire and World War II
References
10 The Empire During the Cold War, International Integration, and the Welfare State
Southern Schleswig
The Faroe Islands
Greenland
The Empire in the Twenty-First Century
References
11 The Danish Empire Through the Ages
Expansion of the Empire
The Purpose of the Empire
How Did the Empire Acquire Its Territories?
How Did Territories Leave the Empire?
The Danish Empire
12 The Danish Legacy
Memory and Use of the Danish Past in Former Parts of the Empire
Postcolonial Criticism on the Virgin Islands
The Former Colonies in India and Africa
Greenland
Norwaylak and Iceland
The Faroe Islands
Schleswig–Holstein
Vikings
The Danish Past—A Positive Memory
References
General Literature in English
Index of Concept
Index of People
Index of Places
