Tre Kronor

Images of Stockholm's "Three Crowns" Castle, a royal palace since the 13th century. It was destroyed by a violent fire in 1697. The Three Crowns is a symbol (of disputed origin) incorporated into Sweden's coat of arms, and placed above the castle's central tower by the 1500's.

Elias Lönnrot

He was the author of Finland's national epic, the Kalevala, which has inspired generations of Finnish patriots, authors, artists and musicians (most notably, Jean Sibelius). According to Petri Liukkonen:

Elias Lönnrot was born in Sammatti, the son of Fredrik Johan Lönnrot, a tailor, and Ulrika (Wahlberg) Lönnrot. Supported by his eldest brother, the family managed to send the young Elias to Tammisaari and Turku, where he studied the Swedish language and Latin. Due to lack of funds, Lönnrot worked as a tailor, and completed the studies required for university entrance after private tuition. In 1822 Lönnrot entered the Academy of Turku and received his M.A. in 1827. To finance his studies, Lönnrot worked as a tutor at the home of Johan Agapetus Törngren, then professor of surgery and obstetrics. Inspired by his teacher, Reinhold von Becker, Lönnrot had taken the Väinämöinen poems as subject of his master's dissertation, and made from 1828 a number of field trips to collect folk poetry. Between 1829 and 1831 Lönnrot published at his own expense four volumes of poetry, entitled KANTELE.

When the university moved its activity to Helsinki after the fire of Turku, Lönnrot began to study medicine. His dissertation dealt with the magical medicine of the Finns. One of his trips was cut short, when cholera ravaged Helsinki in 1831, and he was needed to fight the epidemic. After graduating in 1832, he worked as an assistant district medical officer in Oulu, where he witnessed the consequences of famine, dysentery and typhoid. From 1833 to 1853 Lönnrot lived in Kajaani near Russian Karelia, where he worked as a district medical officer.

While in Kajaani, he made eleven field trips among the Lapps, the Estonians, and the Finnish peoples of northwest Russia to collect poems and study the relationships between Finno-Ugrian languages. On his fifth trip to Eastern Karelia, he met Arhippa Perttunen, perhaps his most valuable source. His last journey Lönnrot made in 1844-45 – it took him to Estonia.

In Kajaani Lönnrot began to edit his collections of folk poetry for publication, and at the same time created a new work from his materials. The first edition appeared in 1835 (The Old Kalevala), then a collection of old songs and ballads, KANTELETAR (1840), and in 1849 the second., enlarged edition of Kalevala. Lönnrot's work soon received the attention of foreign scholars. In 1845 L.A. Léouzon le Duc published French translation of the 1935 edition and the 1849 edition in 1867. An English translation, by M. Crawford, appeared in 1888. By publishing the poems Lönnrot wanted to tell the ancient history of the Finnish people along similar lines to Homer's Iliad or Edda and the German Nibelungenlied. Lönnrot also translated parts of the of Greek epics. According to his own interpretation, events described in the epic went back to the pre-Christian period when the Finns worshipped their own pagan god, Ukko. The epic ends with the victory of Christianity.

In 1849 Lönnrot married Maria Piponius, who was a Pietist, and over 20 years younger. Before marriage Lönnrot had several affairs. In the year when The Old Kalevala appeared (1835), Lönnrot spent 100 rubles on alcohol – he could have bought five cows with the money. After a long period of carefree drinking, he founded the first Finnish temperance society, Selveys-Seura ('Clearheads Club'), but it did not attract many members. To combat venereal diseases, he suggested the compulsory examination of all travellers. Lönnrot also started to publish the first magazine in Finnish, Mehiläinen (The Bee), edited a collection of riddles (1833), proverbs (1842), and produced SUOMALAISEN TALONPOJAN KOTILÄÄKÄRI (1839, The Finnish Peasant's Home Doctor). Lönnrot's view of the Finnish people was realistic, although for some reason he noted that inland one does not see beautiful women as often as in the coastal areas. Otherwise he did not feel attracted to philosophical speculations, which marked the work of Snellman and Runeberg. With Runeberg he shared an admiration of folk poetry.

In 1853 Lönnrot was appointed professor of Finnish language and Literature at the University of Helsinki, after Mathias Alexander Castrén had died of tuberculosis. Lönnrot worked in this post until 1862. After retiring he spent his last years in the province of Sammatti in southern Finland. During this period Lönnrot compiled a Finnish-Swedish dictionary in two volumes (1866-1880), and published a collection of Finnish magical poems (1880). This was not enough: he also wrote and arranged psalms. In his writings he coined a number of Finnish words for many scientific and technical terms. Lönnrot's contemporaries occasionally enjoyed his skills as a musician and singer. On his travels he played a flute, and he could accompany himself on the traditional Finnish harp, the kantele. "Sorrow is the source of singing," Lönnrot wrote in the Kalevala, but he also believed in progress and in the bright future of the nation. Lönnrot died in Sammatti on March 19, 1884. The first statue of him, by Emil Wickström, was unveiled in Helsinki in 1902. 'Kalevala Day' is celebrated in Finland on the 28th of February.

With his family.

His birthplace.

Queen Dagmar in Denmark

(Credits)

Here is an old Danish ballad about the medieval Queen Dagmar, consort of Valdemar II. She was born Princess Margaret of Bohemia, but the Danes called her Dagmar, ("Maid of Day") for her beauty. The song evokes Dagmar's role in a famous episode ca. 1205, when her husband's rival, the ambitious and rebellious Bishop Valdemar of Schleswig was released from prison. The Bishop was freed through the intervention of the Queen and the Pope, Innocent III, after swearing never to interfere in Danish politics again.

The queen so good of Beyerland

She gave her daughter rede;

"And now to Denmark thou shalt come,

"And honour be thy meed.

"To Denmark thou shalt come anon,

"And win thee rank and fame;

"Tax not the honest humble boor,

"And he shull bless thy name.

"The gift thou first shalt ask thy lord,

"Ask him with smiling cheer,

"He let the bishop out of jail,

"Waldmar, thine uncle dear."

Anon were costly robes of silk

Over the highway spread,

And down to the Ocean's shelly bench

The maiden Dagmar led.

They hoisted high the silken sail,

They gaily plied the oar;

And scarcely two short months at soa

They reach'd the Danish shore.

They came, and forth their anchor cast

Out on the glittering sand,

And lifted maiden Dagmar up,

And set her first on land.

They lifted maiden Dagmar up,

And set her first on land,

The king of Denmark's self was there,

And gave the maid his hand.

Anon were costly robes of silk

Over the highway spread,

And to the castle all in pomp

The maiden Dagmar led.

The morrow, ere a sunbeam yet

Had clear'd the mirky lift,

The maiden Dagmar woke from sleep,

And craved her morning gift.

"With joy I make my first request,

"O let my prayers avail!

"That bishop Waldmar you forgive,

"And set him free from jail.

"The second boon I ask of you,

"And ask with equal glee,

"Forgive the boors their plough-pence all

"And set your captives free."

"Hush! hush! my queen, and say not so,

"That never will I do,

"Or, ere a single year were out,

"A widow'd queen were you."

She took the crown from off her head,

And gave it back the king;

"Why should I then in Denmark stay,

"And gain here not a thing?"

"Haste ye, and fetch Sir Strange in,

"And fetch me Knud my swain,

"And let them ride to Attingborg,

"And loose the captives' chain."

The bishop, when from jail he came,

Could hardly walk upright;

"I've sat here eighteen tedious years,

"And counted day and night."

Queen Dagmar took a golden comb,

And comb'd his yellow hair;

For every single lock she dress'd,

She dropp'd a scalding tear.

"O weep not, gentle queen, for me,

"Nor sorrow for me more,

"For I shall fully venge my wrongs,

"Ere yet a year is o'er."

"Hush! bishop Waldmar, say not so,

"From all such words refrain;

"If back you come to Attingborg,

"I loose you not again."

Swedish Royal Family

My thanks to the Mad Monarchist.

The Legend of St. Erik

Some may recall my post on St. Henry, Bishop of Uppsala, martyred on his mission to Finland. Henry's story is closely linked to that of another medieval Nordic saint, Erik Jedvardsson, King of Sweden from 1156-1160. According to tradition, Erik was a devout, popular King, renowned for his honesty, integrity and generosity towards the Church. It was he who launched the legendary first crusades to Finland, collaborating with Henry in the effort to convert the Finns to Catholicism. This was in the early days when shamanism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Roman Catholicism all battled for the souls of the people.

Erik was to become Sweden's Martyr-King and patron saint. The story goes that on Ascension Day, May 18, 1160, while he was hearing Mass near Uppsala, his men brought word of hostile troops amassing outside the church. Outside, Erik faced a contingent of Danish invaders, joined by rebellious Swedish nobles, angered at the King's insistence that Swedes pay tithes to the Church. After a struggle, Erik was hurled to the ground from his horse, tortured, ridiculed and beheaded. A fresh spring of water with miraculous healing powers sprang out of the soil soaked with his blood.

The King was buried in the Old Uppsala Church. His remains were placed in a shrine and, in 1273, transferred to the new Uppsala Cathedral, dedicated to Erik. Meanwhile, a number of miracles had been associated with his grave, and he was widely venerated as a saint (although never formally canonized). His relics was carried in solemn procession every year to pray for a good harvest. The shrine pictured below is actually the third one constructed to house the King's relics (the earlier two were melted down or destroyed by the ravages of time). It was commissioned by King John III Vasa and designed by the Stockholm goldsmith Hans Rosenfäldt and the Dutch artist Gillis Coyet.

Does the shrine really contain King Erik's remains? We cannot say for sure but apparently it does hold the skeleton of a man from around the 12th century, and traces of a cut by a sword can be found on the neck. The crown believed to be Erik's is also kept in the reliquary.

Photo: in the public domain

Mathilda Wrede

Here is Eero Järnefelt's portrait of Baroness Mathilda Augusta Wrede (1864-1928), dated 1896. Mathilda was a famous Finnish (Lutheran) evangelist and social reformer. She was known as the "Friend of Prisoners" or even the "Angel of the Prisons." The daughter of a provincial governor, Carl Fabian Wrede, Mathilda had the occasion to meet a number of convicts during her youth (they were sometimes assigned to perform repairs at her father's manor house). At 19, she experienced a deep religious awakening, becoming convinced it was her calling to preach the Gospel to these desperate men.

Defying social conventions, she began a genuinely heroic and self-sacrificing career of visiting prisons, arranging Bible studies, and touching the hearts of many through her faith and love. She wore a brooch on her collar, inscribed with the words: "Mercy and Peace." Through her European aristocratic connections, she also worked internationally for the rehabilitation of prisoners. She insisted criminals could be converted through the grace of God. During the Finnish Civil War of 1918, Mathilda suffered deeply. Her family, of course, were on the side of the "Whites," but, through her social work, she had many connections and even friendships among the "Reds," so it was a heart-wrenching period for her. There is a story that she kept on her table a white and a red rose together, as a symbol of her desire for reconciliation...

Of course, as a Catholic, I wish her efforts could have been put in the service of Catholicism rather than Lutheranism, but I still find her story very touching. There are many moving quotes of hers; here is one I found online: "I love prisoners, I'm not ashamed to admit that. I love them just because they are so lonely and unhappy, I love their immortal souls. I love them because my God loves them despite all the crimes, sins and errors."

Scandinavian Court Costumes

Catherine Delors has an article on 18th century court costumes, with photographs of (among others) the wedding suit of King Gustav III of Sweden and the coronation gown of Queen Sofia Magdalena.

Hans Christian Andersen

Another of Petri Liukkonen's literary biographies. It seems Andersen had rather a troubled life. Nonetheless, I loved his work as a child, and The Snow Queen remains my favorite fairy tale ever!

Hans Christian Andersen was born in the slums of Odense. His father, Hans Andersen, was a poor shoemaker and literate, who believed he was of aristocratic origin. Andersen's mother, Anne Marie Andersdatter, worked as a washerwoman. Although she was uneducated and superstitious, she opened for his son the world of folklore. Later Andersen depicted her in his novels and in the story 'Hun duede ikke'. Anne Marie declined into alcoholism and died in 1833 in a charitable old people's home. Andersen's half-sister Karen Marie may have worked as a prostitute for a time; she contacted her famous brother only a few times before dying in 1846.

Andersen received little education. As a child he was highly emotional, suffering all kinds of fears and humiliations because of his tallness and effeminate interests. Andersen's hysterical attacks of cramps were falsely diagnosed as epileptic fits. Encouraged by his parents he composed his own fairy tales and arrange puppet theatre shows. His father loved literature and took Andersen often to the playhouse. "My father gratified me in all my wishes," wrote Andersen in The True Story of My Life (1846). "I possessed his whole heart; he lived for me. On Sundays, he made me perspective glasses, theatres, and pictures which could be changed; he read to me from Holberg's plays and the Arabian Tales; it was only in such moments as these that I can remember to have seen him really cheerful, for he never felt himself happy in his life and as a handicrafts-man."

In 1816 his father died and Andersen was forced to go to work. He was for a short time apprenticed to a weaver and tailor, and he also worked at a tobacco factory. Once his trousers were pulled down when other workers suspected that he was a girl. At the age of 14 Andersen moved to Copenhagen to start a career as a singer, dancer or an actor - he had a beautiful soprano voice. The following three years were full of hardships although he found supporters who paved his way to the theatre. Andersen succeeded in becoming associated with the Royal Theater, but he had to leave it when his voice began to change. When he was casually referred as a poet it changed his plans: "It went through me, body and soul, and tears filled my eyes. I knew that, from this very moment, my mind was awake to writing and poetry." He then began to write plays, all of which were rejected.

In 1822 Jonas Collin, one of the directors of the Royal Theatre and an influential government official, gave Andersen a grant to enter the grammar school at Slagelse. He lived in the home of the school headmaster Meisling, who was annoyed at the oversensitive student and tried to harden his character. Other pupils were much younger, 11-year-olds, among whom six years older Andersen was definitely overgrown. His appearance drew also unwanted attention - he had a long nose and close-set eyes.

Collin arranged in 1827 a private tuition for Andersen. He gained admission to Copenhagen University, where he completed his education. In 1828 Andersen wrote a travel sketch, Fodreise fra Holmens Kanal Til Østpynten af Amager, a fantastic tale in the style of the German Romantic writer E.T.A. Hoffmann. Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm's Children's and Household Tales had appeared between 1812 and 1815, but they were based on original folktales. Andersen's poem 'The Dying Child', was published in a Copenhagen journal and the Royal Theatre produced in 1829 his musical drama. PHANTASIER OG SKISSER, a collection of poems, was born when Andersen fell in love with Riborg Voigt, who was secretly engaged to the local chemist's son. "She has a lovely, pious face, quite child-like, but her eyes looker clever and thoughtful, they were brown and very vivid," Andersen remembered in The Book of My Life. Riborg married the chemists's son, Poul Bøving, in 1831. A leather pouch containing a letter from Riborg was found round Andersen's neck when he died. Also Edvard, Jonas Collin's son, and Henrik Stempe in the 1840s were for Andersen other objects of unfulfilled dreams.

"I do wish that I were dead," Andersen said to one of his friends in 1831, expressing not his feelings about his failed love for Riborg but also echoing the melancholy of Goethe's Werther from The Sorrows of Young Werther (1774). Andersen never met Goethe, who was still alive when Andersen made his first journey to Germany. The visit inspired the first of his many travel sketches. From 1831 onwards he travelled widely in Europe, and remained a passionate traveller all his life. Andersen wrote sketches about Sweden, Spain, Italy, Portugal, and the Middle East. During his journeys Andersen met in Paris among others Victor Hugo, Heinrich Heine, Balzac, and Alexandre Dumas. A Poet's Day Dreams (1853) Andersen dedicated to Charles Dickens, whom he met in London in 1847. And in Rome he met the young Norwegian writer Björnson.

As a novelist Andersen made his breakthrough with The Improvisatore (1835), using Italy as the setting. The story was autobiographical and depicted a poor boy's integration into society, an Ugly Duckling theme of self-discovery in which Andersen returned in several of his works. The book gained international success and during his life it remained the most widely read of all his works. E.B. Browning wrote warmly to her future husband of the novel and her last poem was written for Andersen in 1861, shortly before her death. Only A Fiddler (1837), Andersen's novel, was attacked by the philosopher Søren Kierkegaard in his book Af En endnu Levendes Papirer (1838, From the Papers of a Person Still Alive, Published Against his Will). "The joyless struggle that is Andersen's in real life now repeats itself in his writing," he wrote. Kierkegaard, the 'Ugly Duckling' of Danish philosophy, used a number of pseudonyms, none of whom 'agreed' with one another. A little later, Andersen took his revenge with the play En Comedie i det Grønne (1840), which included an unpractical philosopher.

Andersen's fame rests on his Fairy Tales and Stories, written between 1835 and 1872. Tales Told for Children, appeared in a small, cheap booklet in 1835. In this and following early collections, which were published in every Christmas, Andersen returned to the stories which he had heard as a child, but gradually he started to create his own tales. The third volume, published in 1837, contained 'The Little Mermaid' and 'The Emperor's New Clothes.' Among Andersen's other best known tales are 'Little Ugly Duckling,' 'The Tinderbox,' 'Little Claus and Big Claus,' 'Princess and the Pea,' 'The Snow Queen,' The Nightingale,' and 'The Steadfast Tin Soldier.' With these collections, inspired by the great tradition of the Arabian Nights on the other hand, and Household Tales, collected by the brothers Grimm, Andersen became known as the father of the modern fairytale. Moreover, Andersen's works were original. Only 12 of his 156 know fairy stories drew on folktales.

Andersen broke new ground in both style and content, and employed the idioms and constructions of spoken language in a way that was new in Danish writing. When fairy tales at his time were didactic, he brought into them ambiguity. Children and misfits often speak truth; they serve as Andersen's mouthpiece in moral questions: "But he has nothing on at all," said a little child at last. "Good heavens! listen to the voice of an innocent child," said the father, and one whispered to the other what the child had said. "But he has nothing on at all," cried at last the whole people. That made a deep impression upon the emperor, for it seemed to him that they were right; but he thought to himself, "Now I must bear up to the end." And the chamberlains walked with still greater dignity, as if they carried train which did not exist." (from 'The Emperor's New Suit,' 1837) Ugliness of the hero or heroine often conceals great beauty, which is revealed after misfortunes. In psychoanalysis this kind of figure is sometimes interpreted as a symbol of the inner self of soul, which has to be released from its prison.

Andersen's identification with the unfortunate and outcast made his tales very compelling. Some of Andersen's tales revealed an optimistic belief in the triumph of the good, among them 'The Snow Queen' and 'Little Ugly Duckling', and some ended unhappily, like 'The Little Match Girl.' In 'The Little Mermaid' the author expressed a longing for ordinary life - he never had such. In the story the youngest of six mermaid precesses longs after the land above the sea, but the fulfillment of the dream causes her much pain. "She knew this was the last evening she would ever see him for whom she had forsaken her kindred and her home, given up her lovely voice, and daily suffered unending torment - and he had no idea of it. This was the last night she would breathe the same air as he, or look upon the deep sea and the starry blue sky; an everlasting night without thoughts or dreams waited her, for she had no soul and could not gain one." (trans. L.W. Kingsland) Andersen's tales were translated throughout Europe, with four editions appearing in the UK in 1846 alone. His works influenced among others Charles Dickens ('A Christmas Carol in Prose,' 'The Chimes,' 'The Cricket on the Hearth.' 'The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain'), Willam Thackeray and Oscar Wilde ('The Happy Prince,' 'The Nightingale and the Rose,' 'The Fisherman and His Soul'), C.S. Lewis, Isak Dinesen, P.O. Enquist, whose play, Rainsnakes, was about Andersen, Cees Noteboom, and a number of other writers. Elias Bredsdorff has complained in his book Hans Christian Andersen: The Story of His Life and Work (1975), that Andersen's tales have been bowdlerized and sweetened by Victorian British translators.

Andersen's last unfilled love was the Swedish opera singer Jenny Lind, whom he met first time in 1840. Jenny was the illegitimate daughter of a schoolmistress. According to her own words, she was at the age of nine "a small, ugly, broad-nosed, shy, gauche, altogether undergrown girl". At eighteen, she had made her breakthrough as a singer with her powerful soprano. 'The Ugly Duckling' become Jenny's favorite among Andersen's stories. However, 'Andersen's 'The Nightingale' is considered a tribute to Jenny, or "the Swedish Nightingale" as she was called. "Farewell," she wrote him in 1844, "God bless and protect my brother is the sincere wish of his affectionate sister, Jenny." Andersen never married.

Between the years 1840 and 1857 Andersen made journeys throughout Europa, Asia Minor, and Africa, recording his impressions and adventures in a number of travel books. He wrote and rewrote his memoirs, The Fairy Tale of My Life, but the standard edition is generally considered the 1855 edition During his travels abroad, Andersen was able to be more relaxed and take more liberties than in Copenhagen, where everybody knew him. At the age of sixty-two Andersen went to Paris, where he visited a brothel - it was not his first visit or last. "Then went suddenly up into a meat market - one of them was covered with powder; a second, common; a third, quite the lady. I talked with her, paid twelve francs and left, without having sinned in deed, though I dare say I did in my thoughts. She asked me to come back, said I was indeed very innocent for a man." (from Hans Christian Andersen: The Life of a Storyteller by Jackie Wullschlager, 2001) Andersen died in his home in Rolighed on August 4, 1875. Edvard Collin and his wife were later buried with Andersen. However, their family members moved the Collins' bodies after some years to the family plot in another cemetery.

Childhood home in Odense (photograph courtesy of Kåre Thor Olsen)

His grave (photo courtesy of Thue)

Queen Marie Leszczynska

HERE is an excellent article on the Polish-born consort of King Louis XV of France. More HERE. I find her story particularly interesting, as one normally tends to hear more about French, Spanish, Austrian princesses...

Posting

I will not be posting much for the next week or so. Just feeling too tired...I need some time to rest and reflect.

Louhisaari Manor

Marshal Mannerheim's childhood home.

Romanov Treasures

Diana Mandache reports on a collection of Romanov jewelry (worth 2 million euros) recently discovered in Sweden and on a splendid Faberge silver-gilt pearl and enamel photograph frame given to Princess Thyra of Denmark by her sister Empress Maria Feodorovna.

Ingeborg, Margaretha, Märtha

Princess Ingeborg of Sweden with her two eldest daughters, Margaretha and Märtha.

Crown Princess Märtha of Norway

At The Cross of Laeken, I have often posted on Belgium's beloved Queen Astrid, daughter of Prince Carl and Princess Ingeborg of Sweden. One of Astrid's older sisters was Märtha, Crown Princess of Norway. Like Astrid, Märtha was kind, charming, approachable, a dedicated wife, mother and royal consort. Both women were immensely popular and, sadly, both died young.
Märtha was born in Stockholm on March 28, 1901, and grew up in a close-knit, loving family. Always her mother's idol, she blossomed into a vibrant and glamorous young lady. At 28, she married her cousin, Crown Prince Olav of Norway, to great popular rejoicing. Olav and Märtha had three children: Princess Ragnhild (b. 1930), Princess Astrid (b. 1932) and Prince Harald (b. 1937), currently King Harald V of Norway. Märtha wholeheartedly embraced her role as Norwegian Crown Princess, and, in return, was greatly loved.

Tragedies now began to overshadow Märtha's life. In 1935, she lost her sister, Queen Astrid of Belgium, in a frightful car accident. In 1940, Hitler invaded Norway. The Norwegians resisted heroically, but the country, nonetheless, was soon occupied. The royal family faced the agonizing decision of whether to remain with their suffering people or continue the fight abroad. Reluctantly, they chose exile. The King, Haakon VII, headed a government-in-exile in the UK, and the Prince remained by his side, while Märtha escaped, first to Sweden, and later (after a number of vicissitudes) to the USA. Here, she benefited from a close friendship with the Roosevelts, and devoted all her energies to raising support for the Norwegian cause.

After the war, the royal family returned to Norway to a hero's welcome. During the period of post-war recovery, Märtha embraced her duties as devotedly as ever, but, tragically, her health began to fail. After a long battle with cancer, she passed away on April 5, 1954, three years before her husband's accession to the throne.