[gothic-l] Sturm ueber Europa - Storm over Europe

[keth at ONLINE.NO]

Bertil,
This reminds me a bit of Isaac Newton, who once said
[wrote] that he "stood on the shoulders of giants".
It was of course Galileo Galilei whom he had in mind,
but also the pioneers of classical science, such as
Archimedes and Euclid.



>Dear Listmembers,
>
>Happy to report on the 4th program of the ZDF series.
>According to the editors Europe stands on the shoulders of:
>
>The Ostrogothic kingdom in Italy (Gothic migration from Scandinavia)
>The Visigothic kingdom of Spain (Gothic migration from Scandinavia)
>The Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England (migration from Denmark or 
>south of Denmark?)
>The Frankish kingdom of France

So according to "ZDF" (=Deutsche Funk?) we can regard "Europe"
as founded upon the shoulders of the "Scandinavian giant" then ?
Don't you find such statements at least a little embarassing?


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
On another, perhaps related matter, I did read the paper
published by Prof. KLINGENBERG, that Dirk recommended.
It is in "Alvismål" from 1994. I don't have the exact URL,
but it would be easy to find, by searching in Google or Lycos
for "alvismal" (sp). This particular publication offers
its articles free on the net. If you download the pdf file
and save it on your disk, you can either read it by means of
the Acrobat reader, or take it out on your printer.
I did the latter, and the print quality was quite amazing.
In particular, the 11th century "Cotton" map, came out
in high res, where I could even read the tiny geographical
names by using a magnifying glass.


Although the article did not contain much new material,
at least not for those who are already familiar with
the Edda prolog as well as the Heimskringla histo-geography,
it gives a nice summary, and also a good excercise in reading
Old Norse, since the Professor has included many quotes
from Snorri's Old Norse, and added German translations.

What was new to me, was the fact that he pointed out the
differences between the Edda account and the Heimskringla
account. Klingenberg explains the difference by pointing
to the considerable time period that must lie between the
writing of these two descriptions of the Æsir-Vanir "trek"
from Asia/Turkey to Scandinavia.

Whether these Icelandic accounts reflect original
Scandinavian legendary/mythic material, or, whether
they represent merely commonplace Medieval imaginings
adapted to the "Urgeschichte" of the Scandinavians -
well, that Prof. Klingenberg is of course unable to say.
But he does a good job of pointing out the many paralells
between continental Germanic legendary history, and the
Snorrean adaption of the same.

In particular, it is interesting to have such a good
copy of the "Cotton" map, which will allow a good reflection
upon the rather distorted world view that must have been common
in the Middle Ages. These distortions clearly result
from a considerable reduction in the area size of the then
little- or un-known Eurasic regions. Thus, one will see
how the North-South size of "Scythia" (now Ukraina/Russia)
appears, on the Cotton map, as hardly further than from, say,
Rome to Southern France. Thus it becomes clear how it was
possible to think of "Scythia" as almost the same country
as "Svecia" or Sweden.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
These just some remarks on the interesting article
pointed out to us by Dirk.




>Interesting snippets of information was the use of sail during
>the Migration Era on the North Sea and the DNA research to find out 
>more about the settlement of Angles and Saxons in Britain.
>
>In all,  this was a fine series and I think Professor Herwig Wolfram
>can be proud of his contribution to the series.

Yes, but does he subscribe to the image of the "Scandinavian giant"?

>
>A video-cassette with all four programs can be purchased from ZDF
>and then, of course, there is the book _Sturm ueber Europa_ (Storm
>over Europe).

There was a similar program on the Huns some years ago,
also on videao casette. Do you think, Bertil, that these
casettes will have lasting value - or will they be quickly
superseded in the media age that we have now entered?
(I am thinking of the Brockhaus that becomes updated every
couple of years now)


>Below info in German on the highly spectacular fourth program
>in the series.
>
>Gothically
>
>Bertil
>
>Folge 4: Die Erben des Imperiums
>Im 5. und 6. Jahrhundert errichteten die Barbaren auf r–mischem Boden ihre Reiche: die Ostgoten in Italien, die Westgoten in Spanien, Angeln und Sachsen in England, die Franken in Deutschland und Frankreich. Mit der Kaiserkr–nung Karls des Groþen im Jahre 800 entstand das mittelalterliche Europa.
>Sonntag, 24. M”rz 2002, 19.30 Uhr

Is that a special service in Sweden, as result of the EU integration?
I don't think German TV is very common in Norway.


Best regards
Keth



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