The Historical Geography of Europe, Vol. I, Text

by Edward A. Freeman

It follows then that, for the purposes of our present survey, while the British islands and the Spanish peninsula will each claim a distinct treatment, we cannot separate the Scandinavian peninsulas from the general mass of the Baltic lands. ♦The Northern Slavonic lands.♦ We must look at Scandinavia in close geographical connexion with the region which stretches from the centre to the extreme east of Europe, a region which, while by no means wholly Slavonic, is best marked as containing the seats of the northern branch of the Slavonic race. This region has a constant connexion with both German and Scandinavian history. ♦Germanized Slavonic lands.♦ It takes in those wide lands, once Slavonic, which have at various times been more or less thoroughly incorporated with Germany, but which did not become German without vigorous efforts to make large parts of them Scandinavian. In another part of our survey we have watched them join on to the Teutonic body; we must now watch them drop off from the Slavonic body. ♦Northern Slaves under Hungary or Austria.♦ And with them we must take another glimpse at those among the Northern Slaves who passed under the power of the Magyar, and of that composite dominion which claims the Magyar crown among many others. These North-Slavonic lands which have passed to non-Slavonic rulers form a region stretching from Holstein to the Austrian kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria and to the Slovak and Ruthenian districts of Hungary. But above all, this North-Slavonic region takes in those two branches of the Slavonic race which have in turn lorded it over one another, neither of which passed permanently under the lordship of either Empire, but one of which owed its unity and national life to settlers from the Scandinavian north. ♦Characteristics of Poland and Russia.♦ That is to say, it is the land of the Pole and the Russian, the land of the two branches of the Slavonic race which passed severally under the spiritual dominion of the elder and the younger Rome without passing under the temporal dominion of either. ♦The primitive nations.♦ And within the same region we have to deal with the remnant that is left of those ancient nations, Aryan and non-Aryan, which so long refused all obedience to either Church as well as to either Empire. ♦Aryan nations; Prussians and Lithuanians.♦ The region at which we now look takes in the land of those elder brethren of the European family whose speech has changed less than any other European tongue from the Aryan speech once common to all. Alongside of the Orthodox Russian, of the Catholic Pole, of the Swede first Catholic and then Lutheran, we have to look on the long abiding heathendom of the Lithuanian and the Prussian.[53] ♦Non-Aryan Fins.♦ And at their side we have to look on older races still, on the præ-Aryan nations on either side of the Bothnian and Finnish gulfs. The history of the eastern coast of the Baltic is the history of the struggle for the rule or the destruction of these ancient nations at the hands of their Teutonic and Slavonic neighbours.

♦Central position of the North-Slavonic lands.♦

The whole North-Slavonic region, north-eastern rather than central with regard to Europe in general, has still a central character of its own. It is connected with the history of northern, of western, and of south-eastern Europe. The falling away of so many Slavonic lands to Germany is of itself no small part of German history. But besides this, the strictly Polish and Russian area marches at once on the Western Empire, on the lands which fringe the Eastern Empire, on the Scandinavian North, and on the barbarian lands to the north-east. This last feature is a characteristic both of the North-Slavonic region and of the Scandinavian peninsula. ♦Barbarian neighbours of Russia and Scandinavia.♦ Norway, Sweden, Russia, are the only European powers whose land has always marched on the land of barbarian neighbours, and have therefore been able to conquer and colonize in barbarian lands simply by extending their own frontiers. This was done by Norway and Sweden as far as their geographical position allowed them; but it has been done on a far greater scale by Russia. ♦Russian conquest and colonization by land.♦ While other European nations have conquered and colonized by sea, Russia, the one European state of later times which has marched upon Asia, has found a boundless field for conquest and colonization by land. She has had her India, her Canada, and her Australia, her Mexico, her Brazil, her Java, and her Algeria, geographically continuous with her European territory. This fact is the key to much in the later history of Russia.

♦Relation of the Baltic lands to the two Empires.♦

With regard to the two Empires, the lands round the Baltic show us several relations. ♦Norway always independent.♦ In Scandinavia, Norway stands alone in never having had anything to do with the Roman power in any of its forms. ♦Relations of Sweden and Denmark to the Empire.♦ Sweden itself has always been equally independent; but in later times Swedish kings have held fiefs within the Western Empire. The position of Denmark has naturally caused it to have much more to do with its Roman or German neighbour. In earlier times some Danish kings became vassals of the Empire for the Danish crown; others made conquests within the lands of the Empire. In later times Danish kings have held fiefs within the German kingdom and have been members of the more modern Confederation. ♦The Empire and the West-Slavonic lands.♦ The western parts of the Slavonic region became formally part of the Western Empire. But this was after the Empire had put on the character of a German state; these lands were not drawn to it from its strictly Imperial side. ♦Poland and the Empire.♦ Poland sometimes passed in early days for a fief of the German kingdom; in later days it was divided between the two chief powers which arose out of that kingdom. ♦Relations of Russia to the Eastern Church and Empire.♦ Russia, on the other hand, the pupil of the Eastern Empire, has never been the subject or the vassal of either Empire. When Russia had an external overlord, he was an Asiatic barbarian. ♦Imperial style of Russia.♦ The peculiar relation between Russia and Constantinople, spiritual submission combined with temporal independence, has led to the appearance in Russia of Imperial ideas and titles with a somewhat different meaning from that with which they were taken in Spain and in Britain. The Russian prince claims the Imperial style and bearings, not so much as holding an Imperial position in a world of his own, as because the most powerful prince of the Eastern Church in some sort inherits the position of the Eastern Emperor in the general world of Europe.

§ 1. The Scandinavian Lands after the Separation of the Empires.

At the end of the eighth century the Scandinavian and Slavonic inhabitants of the Baltic lands as yet hardly touched one another. The most northern Scandinavians and the most northern Slaves were still far apart; if the two races anywhere marched on one another, it must have been at the extreme south-western corner of the Baltic coast. ♦The Baltic still mainly held by the earlier races.♦ The greater part of that coast, all its northern and eastern parts, was still held by the earlier nations, Aryan and non-Aryan. ♦Formation of the Scandinavian kingdoms.♦ But, within the two Scandinavian peninsulas, the three Scandinavian nations were fast forming. A number of kindred tribes were settling down into the kingdoms of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden,[54] which, sometimes separate, sometimes united, have existed ever since.

Of these three, Denmark, the only one which had a frontier towards the Empire, was naturally the first to play a part in general European history. ♦Formation of the Danish kingdom.♦ In the course of the tenth century, under the half-mythical Gorm and his successors Harold and Sven, the Danish kingdom itself, as distinguished from other lands held in after times by its kings, reached nearly its full historical extent in the two peninsulas and the islands between them. ♦Denmark in the northern peninsula.♦ Halland and Skåne or Scania, it must always be remembered, are from the beginning at least as Danish as Zealand and Jutland. ♦Frontier of the Eider.
The Danish March. 934-1027.♦ The Eider remained the frontier towards the Empire, save during part of the tenth and eleventh centuries, when the Danish frontier withdrew to the Dannewerk, and the land between the two boundaries formed the Danish March of the Empire. Under Cnut the old frontier was restored.

The name of Northmen,[55] which the Franks used in a laxer way for the Scandinavian nations generally, was confined to the people of Norway. ♦Formation of the kingdom of Norway.♦ These were formed into a single kingdom under Harold Harfagra late in the ninth century. The Norwegian realm of that day stretched far beyond the bounds of the later Norway, having an indefinite extension over tributary Finnish tribes as far as the White Sea. The central part of the eastern side of the northern peninsula, between Denmark to the south and the Finnish nations to the north, was held by two Scandinavian settlements which grew into the Swedish kingdom. ♦The Swedes and Gauts.♦ These were those of the Swedes strictly so called, and of the Geátas or Gauts. This last name has naturally been confounded with that of the Goths, and has given the title of King of the Goths to the princes of Sweden. Gothland, east and west, lay on each side of Lake Wettern. Swithiod or Svealand, Sweden proper, lay on both sides of the great arm of the sea whose entrance is guarded by the modern capital. ♦The Swedish kingdom.♦ The union of Svealand and Gothland made up the kingdom of Sweden. ♦Fluctuations towards Norway and Denmark. 1111.♦ Its early boundaries towards both Denmark and Norway were fluctuating. Wermeland, immediately to the north of Lake Wenern, and Jamteland farther to the north, were long a debateable land. At the beginning of the twelfth century Wermeland passed finally to Sweden, and Jamteland for several ages to Norway. Bleking again, at the south-east corner of the peninsula, was a debateable land between Sweden and Denmark which passed to Denmark. ♦Growth to the north.♦ For a land thus bounded the natural course of extension by land lay to the north, along the west coast of the Gulf of Bothnia. In the course of the eleventh century at the latest, Sweden began to spread itself in that direction over Helsingland.

Sweden had thus a better opportunity than Denmark and Norway for extension of her own borders by land. ♦Western expeditions of the Danes and Northmen.♦ Meanwhile Denmark and Norway, looking to the west, had their great time of Oceanic conquest and colonization in the ninth and tenth centuries.[56] These two processes must be distinguished. ♦Conquests.♦ Some lands, like the Northumbrian and East-Anglian kingdoms in Britain and the duchy of Normandy in Gaul, received Scandinavian princes and a Scandinavian element in their population, without the geographical area of Scandinavia being extended. ♦Colonies.♦ But that area may be looked on as being extended by colonies like those of Orkney, Shetland, Faroe, the islands off the western coast of Scotland, Man, Iceland, Greenland. Some of these were actually discovered and settled for the first time by the Northmen. ♦Settlements in Ireland.♦ The settlements on the east coast of Ireland, Dublin, Waterford, Wexford, may also pass as outposts of Scandinavia on Celtic ground. Of these outlying Scandinavian lands, some of the islands, specially Iceland, have remained Scandinavian; the settlements on the mainland of Britain and Ireland, and on the islands nearest to them, have been merged in the British kingdoms or have become dependencies of the British crown.