1st Edition

Contacts and Networks in the Baltic Sea Region Austmarr as a Northern mare nostrum, ca. 500-1500 AD

Edited By Maths Bertell, Kendra Willson Copyright 2019
296 Pages
by Routledge

296 Pages
by Routledge

296 Pages
by Routledge

Since prehistoric times, the Baltic Sea has functioned as a northern mare nostrum — a crucial nexus that has shaped the languages, folklore, religions, literature, technology, and identities of the Germanic, Finnic, Sámi, Baltic, and Slavic peoples. This anthology explores the networks among those peoples. The contributions to Contacts and Networks in the Baltic Sea Region: Austmarr as a... Read more
Preface, Contributors, Introduction: Looking across the Baltic Sea and over linguistic fences, Section 1: Mental maps, Section 2: Mobility, Section 3: Language, Section 4: Mythology and religion formations, Contributors, Indices

Biography

Maths Bertell is university lecturer in religious studies at Mid-Sweden University. He has written on Norse pre-Christian and Sámi religions and conversion in the Nordic area.
Frog is an Academy of Finland Research Fellow in folklore studies at the University of Helsinki, Finland. He has published widely on poetry and mythology in Finnic and Old Norse cultures.
Kendra Willson is a researcher in Nordic languages at the University of Turku in Finland. She works on a range of topics relating to Old Norse-Icelandic and Finnic historical linguistics and onomastics.

For far too long the study of the Baltic Sea has been divided along modern geopolitical borders that center on single cultures, languages, and ethnicities. This edited volume [...] overcomes such linguistic and nationalistic barriers to present an integrated approach to the contacts and networks of the Circum-Baltic region. The result is a truly interdisciplinary volume that features approachable and accessible texts in English on language, mythology, and religious practice. [...] Its individual chapter case-studies work in favor of the book's scope on the Baltic as comprised of diverse cultures, languages, and ethnic groups to ultimately demote unidirectional or unilateral models of interpretation. Contacts and Networks in the Baltic Sea Region proves that there cannot be an overarching, singular narrative of the Baltic.- Laura Tillery, The Medieval Review, 21.09.27 (2021).