Saxo and the Peoples to the East

• Around the year 1200, the historian Saxo wrote his impressive, and very long, work on the deeds of the Danes, in an elaborate and classicizing Latin presenting Denmark as an empire as old and mighty as the German Roman one. When Saxo wrote, Danish rulers had fought against, and sometimes with, Slavic rulers along the southern coast of the Baltic for centuries. Saxo had great actual knowledge of Slavic tribes, individuals, and geography, which he took great effort to press/twist to conform to his stereotypical attitudes to peoples – gentes – and his idea of an eternal unavoidable clash of civilizations between Danes and Slavs. Examining Saxo’s information, and his viewpoint, allows for a nuanced discussion of his perception of his medieval world.

Ämnesord

HUMANIORA  -- Historia och arkeologi -- Historia (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- History and Archaeology -- History (hsv//eng)

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