Christianization of Scandinavia
The introduction of Christianity first in Denmark , then in Scandinavia and finally in all of Northern Europe took place in the 10th and 11th centuries and reached its peak around the year 1000 (around the years between 970 and 1030). It was connected with armed conflicts and was overlaid by the Viking Age as well as by the unification of the Danish, Norwegian and Swedish empires. With the Christianization of the Vikings , the Danes , Norwegians and Swedes were also Christianized and finally formed their own national churches in the 12th century, which in turn Christianized the Wends, Finns and Balts in the 12th and 13th centuries.
Christianization of Northern Europe
The Christianization of the Germanic peoples of Northern Europe (also known as the North Germanic Mission ) was a consequence of the Christianization of the Germanic peoples of Central Europe by the Romans and the Franks ( Germanic Mission , Friesenmission , Saxony Mission ). The Roman or Frankish and the Irish-Scottish or Anglo-Saxon mission met each other. The Frankish bishop Eligius is said to have sent missionaries to the Danes as early as the 7th century ; in the early 8th century the Anglo-Saxon missionary Willibrord of Utrecht preached among the Frisians in Jutland and at the court of the Danish king Angantyr ; Monks had also come to Ripen in Denmark from the Abbey of Corbie (or its offshoot in Corvey ) . Denmark and Sweden were initially the target of the East Franconian and German missionary efforts that began in the 9th century, mainly from the Archdiocese of Hamburg and Bremen . Due to the Anglo-Danish and Anglo-Norwegian ties and interactions of the Viking Age, however, the Anglo-Saxon and English influence in Denmark and Norway was ultimately just as decisive.
In Norway and Sweden, in the 11th century, there was also a certain Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox influence. Some historians have therefore speculated about whether and to what extent it would not only have influenced or even prevented the proselytizing of the Slavs in Eastern Europe but also the Christianization of Northern Europe if the Eastern Slavs had not adopted Orthodox Christianity, but Islam. (The Kiev Grand Duke is said to have considered accepting Islam in the meantime.)
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The Danish King Harald Klak was baptized in Mainz as early as 826, but his compatriots back home stuck to the old North Germanic religion . Around 860, the Swedish Varangians who ruled Kiev , Askold and Dir, are said to have returned baptized from a (first) attack on Constantinople , but fell victim to the Varangians, led by Oleg , who were initially pagan, two decades later . In conquered England, the Danish Vikings under Guthrum had adopted Christianity around 878, as had the Danish and Norwegian Vikings in Ireland around 926. Around 911, the Danish and Norwegian Vikings in Normandy and their leader Rollo were baptized, a revolt of other Scandinavian newcomers in Normandy against Christianization was put down in 943. The Norwegian kings Håkon the Good and Olav Krähenbein (Olav I) were baptized in England around 940 and 994 respectively. Only the Danish King Harald Blauzahn and the Swedish King Olaf Schosskönig were baptized directly in their homeland in 965 and 1008, but for the final conversion of the Norwegians, Swedes and Danes, Olav Krähenbein brought out English missionaries from 995, Olaf Schosskönig and Knut the Great from 1020 Canterbury into the country. The Norwegian King Olav the Fat (Olav II) was baptized in Normandy around 1014, but lived in exile in Novgorod for a few years. Olav was the last saint of the Western Church who was also recognized by the Eastern Orthodox Church. Olav's brother Harald the Harte and his son Magnus the Good were also not brought up in Norway, but in Novgorod. Harald, who is married to a Russian princess, even served in the bodyguard of the Greek Orthodox Emperor of Byzantium for years before he became king in Norway in 1047. Anund Gårdske , who was king in Sweden until 1075, came from Gardarike or Kievan Rus and came from Orthodox Varangians. The church schism of 1054 (Sweden and Norway Catholic, the Kievan Rus Orthodox) ended the Scandinavian-Russian ties; From then on, Varangian descendants and Swedes developed differently as different peoples.
The Christianization of Scandinavia and Northern Europe in the 10th and 11th centuries took place from above and mostly by force ("sword mission"). Above all, it served to consolidate kingship. The Danish, Norwegian and Swedish kings tried - not always successfully - to use the church to consolidate central royal power. The Church helped the royalty administer and collect taxes. The new Christian conception of the state and state religion of God's willed (hereditary) kingship weakened the traditional democratic thing order of the North Germanic peoples. The introduction of Christianity was completed at least in Denmark and Norway around 1030, while Haithabu , which had already been Christianized in the 9th and 10th centuries , was destroyed by pagan turns in 1066.
The Viking Age came to an end with the Christianization, but bloody persecution of Christians took place in Sweden from 1066 to 1081 beyond the end of the Viking Age. Only with the destruction of the old North Germanic sanctuary, the pagan temple of Uppsala , was Christianization successful there as well from 1087.
Christianization of Denmark
In 823 Ebo from Reims came to Denmark as the first papal missionary. As the first Danish king, Harald Klak is said to have been baptized as early as 826, but the other Danes initially stuck to the old North Germanic belief despite the missionary attempts of Saint Ansgar from Hamburg and Bremen , and numerous churches were destroyed again. From the middle of the 9th century to the middle of the 10th century, only the Swedish Vikings in Haithabu adopted the new belief. It was not until the middle of the 10th century that the Lower Saxon bishop Unni and the Frisian missionary Poppo were also successful in Denmark: In Schleswig (Haithabu), Ripen and Aarhus , Denmark's first dioceses were established in 948. Gorm's successor Harald Blauzahn , who still supported the uprising of pagan Danes in Normandy in 943, was baptized by Poppo sometime between 960 and 968.
A restoration of the old religious beliefs, endeavored by Harald's son Sven Gabelbart , failed; Sven's son Canute the Great brought English missionaries to Denmark at the beginning of the 11th century. As a result, the Danes were Christianized, so that Knut's nephew Sven Estridsson could replace the English clergy with Danish ones in the second half of the 11th century. Sven's son took part in the First Crusade in 1097 , and the church-friendly King Canute IV was canonized in 1101. With the establishment of an archbishopric in Lund , the Danish church broke away from Hamburg and Bremen in 1104, and Danish kings now began their own crusades to convert the Wends (conquest of Rügen in 1168).
King Harald Blauzahn was baptized by the Frisian missionary Poppo around 965
Canute the Great completed Christianization with English priests from 1020 onwards
King Canute IV was canonized in 1101 and was Denmark's patron saint
Christianization of Norway
In Norway, King Håkon the Good († 961) , who was allegedly baptized as early as 940 , and Saint Sunniva of Selje initially unsuccessfully promoted the Christian mission. Hakon succeeded in introducing Christianity just as little as his Danish rival and successor Harald Blauzahn († 987). Resistance arose against Christianization, which was forcibly pursued by Olav Tryggvason († 1000) and Olav the Fat († 1030), and both kings fell in the fight against the Danes, who were allied with the rebels. But the Danish victors were now also Christians, and after their expulsion, Olav the Fat was canonized as early as 1035. The Norwegian King Sigurd I even took part in a crusade to Jerusalem from 1107, and King Inge Krogrygg achieved the elevation of the diocese of Trondheim to an archdiocese by the Pope in 1152 and thus the separation of the Norwegian Church from the Danish Archdiocese of Lund.
Although Christianization began earlier in Norway than in Denmark and was sooner completed than in Sweden, the Reformation reached Norway as the last of the three Nordic kingdoms united in the Kalmar Union since 1397 . Only after the introduction of the Reformation in 1537 were the non-Germanic Finns and Lappes (Sami) Christianized in Northern Norway. In the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, they too were mostly converted by force - this time, however, by Evangelical Lutheran missionaries.
The Danish missionaries who were brought ashore by Harald Blauzahn were sent back by Håkon Jarl in 975
Olav I († 1000) was baptized in England and converted Norway, the Faroe Islands and Iceland mainly by force
Olav II succumbed to the Danes in 1030, with his canonization the Christianization was complete
Christianization of Sweden
The first attempts at Christianization of Sweden had already been made in the 9th century, but the missionary efforts of Saint Ansgar († 865), Rimberts († 888) and Bishop Unni († 936) from Hamburg were unsuccessful, most Swedes lasted longer as Danes or Norwegians stuck to their old Germanic belief in gods. While the Swedish Varangians in Russia adopted (Orthodox) Christianity between 860 and 988 and the Swedish Vikings in Haithabu were also converted around 950, (Catholic) Christianity in Sweden only began its gradual triumphant advance with the baptism of Olof III. in 1002 or 1008 by Saint Siegfried . Nevertheless, only Västergötland was Christianized around 1014 , fighting between predominantly Christian Gauten (in Västergötland and Östergötland) and predominantly non-Christian Svear (in Svealand ) continued. Pagan counter-movements also brought about massacres of Christians until 1081.
King Inge I had the pagan temple of Uppsala destroyed around 1087 , but only under Sverker I , who had a church built over the ruins of the former temple in 1133, or under Erik the saint, who even tried to embrace Christianity in 1154/55 spreading with a crusade from Sweden to Finland, the new belief prevailed. Erik's successor, Charles VII , created a Swedish church independent of the Danish Lund in 1164 with the establishment of the Archdiocese of Uppsala .
Olof III. († 1022) was the first Christian king of Sweden and the first unifier
As the Swedish patron saint, Erik IX. († 1160) immortalized in the Stockholm coat of arms
Christianization was only completed under Erik's son Knut I († 1196)
Christianization of the Faroe Islands, Iceland and Greenland
Norway's King Olav I Tryggvason also carried out the Christianization of the Faroe Islands between 997 and 999 and forced the adoption of Christianity in Iceland in the year 1000. The Icelanders, however, long retained pagan rituals in private. From Norway and Iceland, the Norwegian and Icelandic Grænlendingar were Christianized in Greenland in the year 1000 , but their settlements perished in the 14th century. The rediscovery and renewed, now Evangelical-Lutheran missionary work in Greenland did not take place until the 18th century under the Danish "apostle" Hans Egede and his son Paul Egede .
Christianization of Finland
The Christianization of the Finns came from Sweden and in rivalry with the Russian Grand Duchy of Novgorod.
Swedish Crusades under Erik IX. (Sweden) and Birger Jarl in the middle of the 12th century and in the middle of the 13th century also served primarily for the conquest of Finland by Sweden. A little later, Orthodox Russians began missionary work in Karelia from the Valaam monastery . In 1154 the first Swedish diocese in Finland was established in Nousis . Bishop Heinrich von Uppsala worked as a missionary, was slain by a pagan Finn and is considered the national saint of Finland because of his martyrdom. An uprising by the Central Finnish Tavast against Christianization was suppressed in 1239. With the founding of Åbo (Turkus), the Christianization and conquest of Finland was completed in 1279. The "actual Finns" (Western women) and the Tavast (Tavastlanders) became Catholic, while the Karelians (Eastern Finns) became Russian Orthodox from 1227 onwards. Saints Herman and Sergei from the Valaam monastery and the missionaries Lazarus of Murom , Theodoret of Kola and Tryphon of Pechenga played an important role in the conversion of the Karelians and then the Sami to Orthodox Christianity .
literature
- Jochen Martin : Atlas for church history. The Christian Churches Past and Present. Updated new edition. Herder, Freiburg (Breisgau) et al. 1987, ISBN 3-451-20869-5 .
- Hans-Erich Stier, Ernst Kirsten , Heinz Quirin , Werner Trillmich , Gerhard Czybulka (eds.): Westermann's great atlas on world history. Prehistoric times, ancient times, middle ages, modern times. Westermann, Braunschweig et al. 1965, pp. 58 and 61
Individual evidence
- ↑ Hans-Erich Stier, Ernst Kirsten, Heinz Quirin, Werner Trillmich, Gerhard Czybulka: Westermann's Great Atlas for World History. 1965, pp. IX, X and 61.
- ↑ Hans Ulrich Rudolph, Vadim Oswalt (ed.): TaschenAtlas German history. Klett-Perthes, Gotha et al. 2004, ISBN 3-623-00011-6 , p. 20 f.
- ^ Robert Bohn: Danish History (= Beck'sche series. Vol. 2162). CH Beck, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-406-44762-7 , p. 10 ff.
- ↑ a b c Rudolf Simek : Die Wikinger (= Beck'sche series 2081 CH Beck Wissen ). CH Beck, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-406-41881-3 , pp. 127-130.
- ↑ Hubert Houben : The Normans (= Beck'sche series 2755 knowledge ). CH Beck, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-406-63727-8 , p. 15.
- ↑ Hubert Houben: The Normans (= Beck'sche series 2755 knowledge ). CH Beck, Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-406-63727-8 , p. 16 f.
- ^ Ralph Tuchtenhagen : Little History of Norway , page 27. CH Beck, Munich 2009
- ↑ a b Harm G. Schröter: History of Scandinavia (= Beck'sche series. Vol. 2422). CH Beck, Munich 2007, ISBN 978-3-406-53622-9 , p. 23.
- ↑ Siebo Heinken: Spreading Christianity: How King Blue Tooth Tamed the Vikings. On Spiegel online , September 7, 2014.
- ↑ Die Wikinger (= Beck'sche series 2081 CH Beck Wissen ). CH Beck, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-406-41881-3 , pp. 125 and 127.
- ↑ a b Sweden, history. In: Meyers Konversations-Lexikon. An encyclopedia of common knowledge. Volume 14: Saw - Tasman. 3rd, completely revised edition. Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig 1878, p. 461 f.