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HISTORY OF THE SWEDES.
*
INTRODUCTION.
The Scandinavian North, almost entirely unknown
to the cultivated nations of antiquity, did not, until
a late period, find a place in history. Thule, of
which Pytheas received information in Britain,
about 300 years before the Christian era, as the
most northerly region of the earth, yet not wholly
unsettled, nor without tillage, was in all likelihood
Western Scandinavia. Report spoke of an island
of prodigious magnitude, comparable to a continent,
not far from the Scythian shore, on the amber
coast; referring probably to the southern
portion of the great peninsula. These dark rumours,
however, were soon lost in oblivion, or were thought
to be fabulous; and if the Greek had learned some
truth from them, it did not long dwell in the
memory of the Romans. Pliny was well acquainted
with these accounts, and had himself visited the
shores of the North Sea; yet he relates, as a
novelty, that ‘immense islands had been of late
discovered, beyond Germany; of these, the noblest
was Scandinavia, of yet unknown magnitude; the
inhabitants styled it another world [1]’. He speaks
of Nerigon, (Norige, Norway,) as an especially
large island, without conjecturing that it might be
only a part of the former. It is not till half a
century after the birth of Christ that these names
appear, and shortly afterwards Tacitus tells us of
‘the communities of the Suiones in the Ocean, strong
in men, arms, and ships.’ The geographer Ptolemy,
in the second century, knew of Goths and Danes
inhabiting the southern division of Scandia. These
well known names resound to us in the voice of
antiquity, with more that are unknown, and that, for
us, must remain unknown.
Intercourse with Pagan or with Christian Rome,
with the old Empire or the Popedom, brought most
of the nations dwelling in western or northern
Europe on the stage of history; and when at
length, in right of culture, they became domesticated
there, Roman influences had already intervened
between them and their earliest recollections,
of which little that was primordial remained. This
is true, not only of the nations whose language was
Romanized, but in a great measure even of those
Germanic peoples, who preserved their own. All
we know of Pagan Germany comes to us through
Rome; its antiquity is without really aboriginal
recollections; and if attempts have been made in
more recent times to supply this deficiency by art,
yet can we by no means affirm that they have
succeeded. We descry a temple wherein learning
worships its own idol, but we miss the voice of the
people.
The youngest brother of this great stock, is he,
whose destinies we have taken upon us in part to
relate; the youngest, reckoning from his appearance
in history, but the one who has sojourned
longest in the house of his fathers, and should have
most to tell of its ways. Of alien influences he
knows least, and extraneous impulses, in times
foregone, he more frequently imparted than
received. Old Rome, in her decline, was to him,
perhaps, better known than ever he was by
herself; and a thousand years of the Christian era
had sped away, before he, the terrible foe of
Christendom, was numbered among the sons of the
Romish church.
The recollections, then, which Scandinavia has to
add to those of the Germanic race, although of
later date, are yet the most antique in character,
and comparatively the most original. They offer
the completest remaining example of a social state,
existing previously to the reception of any influences
from Rome, and in duration stretching onwards so
far, as to come within the sphere of historical light.
Thus the history of the North resembles its physical
nature, in whose rocks and mountains the primitive
formations lie open to the day, while in southern
lands these are covered by more recent deposits.
We have pointed out the relation of the northern
history generally to that of the kindred races. We
will add some remarks upon the mutual relations
linking the elder history of the three northern
kingdoms; taking occasion also shortly to comment
upon the sources whence it is to be illustrated, in so
far as our subject demands.
Scandinavia was first laid open to the rest of
Europe by Christianity. Missionary accounts of
the progress of the gospel among races whose
names had long been the terror of Christendom, as
well as the peaceful intercourse gradually following
upon the conversion of the north, at length shed
light upon these remote, and, till then, little known
countries, which even by the first Christian teachers
were likened to a new world [2]. After a connection
with the church of Rome had led to acquaintance
with their learning and language, this was applied
by the clergy, here as in other parts of Europe, in
the composition of Latin chronicles. In those
labours Denmark stood foremost, and the history
of her middle age is generally more copious than
that of her sister lands. Saxo alone is worth many
[1] Pliny, Hist. Nat. iv. 13, (ed. Bipont, 27.) Alterum
terrarum orbem. (Compare also ii. 108, iv. 16. Trans.)
[2] Transeuntibus insulas Danorum alter mundus aperitur
in Sveoniam vel Normanniam, quae sunt duo latissima
aquilonis regna, et nostro orbi fere incognita. Adam. Bremen.
de Situ Daniæ, c. 60, ed. Lindenbrog.
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