List of publications on the Great Northern War

The list of publications on the Great Northern War contains the standard works on the subject of armed conflict in the Baltic Sea region from 1700 to 1721 . Thematically, the subject area is broken down into individual aspects such as the history of operations on land and water, the armed forces of the participating states, the history of diplomacy, social affairs and civil society and the general history of the state.

Most publications on the war itself date from the 19th century . During this period, the letters, reports and dispatches of the commanders, which are now stored in the state archives of Sweden, Russia, Germany and other states involved in the war , were often evaluated . This resulted in an almost complete picture, although original Russian sources were hardly used and the history of the operation had to be rewritten taking into account the Russian primary sources .

In addition to the many original Swedish documents, contemporary reporting on the Great Northern War also shaped the content of the subsequent historiography of the 18th and 19th centuries.

The historiography of the 20th and 21st centuries concentrated on the representation of socio-cultural aspects such as the fate of the urban population or their relationship to the military. On the other hand, treatises on the military operations were neglected.

Older publications until 2010

author	plant	Publishing year	Remarks
François Marie Arouet de Voltaire	History of Charles XII, King of Sweden , German Book Association, Hamburg / Stuttgart	First published in 1748	With increasing age, Voltaire devoted himself more and more to the historical biography. The story of Charles XII, King of the Swedes, is considered the most successful work of Voltaire of this kind. Not least because Voltaire in the introduction points to deficiencies in the previous historiography and at the same time offers himself as a reformer of this genre. Voltaire was able to interview many contemporaries of the Swedish king who were still in contact with the famous Sweden. From this Voltaire derives the claim for his work to be a kind of reproduction of facts. In some cases the playwright's imagination still comes through.
Hartwig Ludwig Christian Bacmeister	Contributions to the history of Peter the Great, Volume One, (Ed. Johann Friedrich Hartknoch )	1774	Historical work from the 18th century. Unlike most publications in German-speaking countries, this book primarily incorporates the Russian perspective.
Knut Lundblad	History of Charles the Twelfth King of Sweden. Freely translated from the Swedish original (Vol. 2: corrected and expanded) by GF v. Jenssen. 2 volumes. Friedrich Perthes, Hamburg, digitized volume 1 , digitized volume 2 .	1835-40	The content is similar to the work of the same name by Anders Fryxel from 1861. The book gives a lot of valuable information on the operational history of the Great Northern War from a Swedish perspective. Russian sources are rarely used. The narrative style that emphasizes the heroism of the Swedes is correspondingly biased. Quite common for the 19th century, it is nowadays a risk for readers to fall into this linguistic and intellectual style when evaluating sources.
Fryxell is different	Life story of Charles the Twelfth, King of Sweden. Based on the Swedish original, freely transcribed by Georg Friedrich von Jenssen-Tusch. Volume 1. Vieweg, Braunschweig, digitized .	1861	Fryxell's work gives many details about the history of operations in the Great Northern War that can otherwise only be found in the original reports. Despite a nationalist perspective and outdated language apparatus, the works convince with the wealth of information that can be used to reconstruct the time.
Fryxell is different	History of Charles the Twelfth. New edition. Mustard, Leipzig	1865	Fryxell's work gives many details about the history of operations in the Great Northern War that can otherwise only be found in the original reports. Despite a nationalist perspective and outdated language apparatus, the works convince with the wealth of information that can be used to reconstruct the time.
Christian Chalice	Liefland Historia. Continuation 1690 to 1707. Given for printing based on the original manuscript. Provided with foreword, evidence and register of persons by Johannes Lossius. Dorpat: Schnakenburg's lithograph and typograph. Institution	1875	Its sequel, the Continuation, which only appeared in print in 1875, is particularly significant. It covers the years 1690 to 1707 and has remained one of the best sources of the time to this day. Especially the years of the great famine from 1695 to 1698 and the first years of the Great Northern War are impressively portrayed by Kelch as contemporary witnesses.
RC Anderson	(English) RC Anderson: Naval wars in the Baltic (Roger Charles), 1883.	Published 1910	Few can imagine how persistent and persistent the sea battles of the Swedes, Danes and Russians in the Baltic Sea were between 1680 and 1720. The layout of the coast, the weather conditions and the dangerous shallows made the Baltic Sea a challenge for seafaring. Mr. Anderson describes these conditions and a complete rendering of the naval battles. Tactics and battles are clearly analyzed and reproduced by him. It is the standard work on naval warfare in the Great Northern War.
Georg Tessin	Wismar's Swedish regiments in the Northern War , In: Mecklenburgische Jahrbücher, Volume 101, pp. 101–156	1937	Detailed description of the Swedish army organization at the time of the Great Northern War.
Robert K. Massie	Peter the Great: His Life and World, Random House	1980	Part Three: The Great Northern War: Chapter 22 - Chapter 39 (p. 289 - p. 528)
Jörg-Peter Findeisen	Charles XII. of Sweden. A king who became a myth. Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, ISBN 3-428-07284-7 .	1992	The author traces the life of Charles XII. against the historical background of that time. The reader learns how and why the Swedish king was driven into the battles of the Northern War. The military events in Copenhagen, Narva, in Saxony-Poland, from Poltava to the Prut, are described in detail, Charles's Turkish exile, his ride from the Ottoman Empire to Stralsund in 15 days, the fighting in Norway up to his sudden death are described.
Joachim Kruger	Wolgast in the ashes. Selected sources on the lustration of the city in the Danish era (1715–1721) (= publications by the Chair of Nordic History, Volume 8). Panzig, Greifswald, ISBN 978-3-86006-295-6	2007	The publication, which is also an edition of the sources, uses the example of the small Pomeranian town of Wolgast to deal with the effects of the Great Northern War in Swedish-Pomerania and Danish-Pomerania.
Peter Hoffmann	Peter the Great as a military reformer and general. Lang, Frankfurt am Main, ISBN 978-3-631-60114-3 .	2010	Peter the Great is portrayed in his work as a military reformer and as a troop commander and general. The comparison of the battles at Lesnaya and Poltava sets new accents. The Russian victory at Poltava is seen as a point of contention in current Russian and Ukrainian views. Hoffmann's study is particularly valuable because of the unreserved use of both the younger Russian and the older Soviet literature.
Benjamin Richter	Scorched earth: Peter the Great and Karl XII. ; the tragedy of the first Russian campaign, MatrixMedia, ISBN 978-3-932313-37-0	2010

Newer literature

author	plant	Publishing year	Remarks
Alexander Querengässer	The Army of August the Strong in the Northern War, Volume 21 by Heere & Waffen, Zeughaus Verlag GmbH, ISBN 3-938447-75-3	2013	The volume analyzes the structures of the Saxon army during the war. The usual recruitment conditions and living conditions of an early modern army are presented in detail, as well as the campaigns and battles in which the Electoral Saxon army was involved.
Robert I. Frost	The Northern Wars: War, State and Society in Northeastern Europe, 1558-1721, Routledge, ISBN 978-0-582-06429-4	2014	This book provides a study of the neglected but very important series of wars fought for control of Eastern and Northeastern Europe during the period 1558–1721. It is the first comprehensive book to take into account the revolution in military strategy on the battlefields of Eastern Europe. Robert Frost examines the effects of the war on the very different social and political systems in Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Lithuania and Russia and explains why Russia emerged victorious from these wars. Based on extensive primary and secondary research (including much material not known in English), this book makes an important contribution to the debate on military change and political developments in early modern Europe
Reno Stutz (Ed.)	300 years of the battle of Gadebusch. International conference from October 12 to 14, 2012 in Gadebusch, Greifswald	2014
Kirsten Baumann, Ralf Bleile	From swords, sails and cannons: the sinking of Princess Hedvig Sofia, Foundation Schleswig-Holstein State Museums Schloss Gottorf, Sandsteinverlag Dresden, ISBN 978-3-95498-167-0	2015
Ralf Bleile, Joachim Krüger (Eds.)	`Princess Hedvig Sophia´ and the Great Northern War, Foundation Schleswig-Holstein State Museums Schloss Gottorf, Sandsteinverlag Dresden, ISBN 978-3-95498-166-3	2015
Stephen L. King (Jr.)	Great Northern War Compendium - A Special Collection Of Articles By International Authors On The Great Northern War, In Two Volumes , THGC Publishing, THGC, ISBN 978-0-9964557-3-2	2015
Mindaugas Šapoka	Warfare, Loyalty, and Rebellion: The Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Great Northern War, 1709-1717, Routledge	2018
Boris Megorsky	The Russian Army in the Great Northern War 1700-21: Uniforms, Organization, Materiel, Training and Combat Experience, Helion, Limited	2018
Crossways	The Electoral Saxon Military in the Great Northern War 1700–1717, Volume 107 of War in History, Schoeningh Ferdinand GmbH, ISBN 3-506-78871-X	2018
Joachim Kruger	The last attempt at a hegemonic policy on the Oresund. Denmark-Norway and the Great Northern War (1700–1721), LIT, Berlin, ISBN 978-3-643-14480-5	2019

Remarks

1. ↑ Examples: Martin Meier: Vorpommern north of the Peene under Danish administration 1715 to 1721: Establishing an administration and securing rule in a conquered area, Walter de Gruyter, 2008 or Stefan Kroll: Stadtgesellschaft und Krieg: Social structure, population and economy in Stralsund and Stade 1700 until 1715, Franz Steiner Verlag, 1997