When I wrote my two books ”The First Schleswig Holstein Wars, 1848 - 50” and ”Generals of the Danish army in the First and Second Schleswig Holstein wars1848-50 and 1864”, I had only briefly considered the longer term effects of the borderland history between Denmark and Germany. Of course, wars do not originate out of nothing, and instead have long histories of conflicts between peoples often at geological boundaries, in this case, the river Trene where the old border rampart, Dannevirke in Schleswig is situated. The wars I described in the two books mentioned, had two forerunners during medieval time. These two wars took place during the period 1410 to 1432 and essentially paved the ground for the conflicts in Schleswig Holstein of 1848-50 and 1864. This understanding led me along the path of Danish Medieval history, focusing particularly on the Danish King Erik VII of Pomerania (1382 -1459). He ruled over a vast area, the Kalmar Union, which included the kingdom Denmark, the kingdom of Sweden and Finland, the kingdom of Norway, and finally Iceland and Greenland. Although the Kalmar Union was large, the population was small, compared to the Central European kingdoms.
In many aspects, his destiny ends unhappy as the Danish nobilities in 1439 expelled him from Denmark and replaced him by King Christopher III of Bavaria.
This led me to prepare a new book “Medieval wars in the Duchy of Schleswig 1410 to 1432 and the quest for the Nordic Countries”.
The book is for the readers interested in medieval history and the conflicts of that time. Literature about the contemporary European rivalries is extensive but when it comes to the conflicts of the Scandinavian countries, books in English are more limited. I hope that this book will remedy some of this shortage.
The book is available from Amazon (Amazon.)
An extract is available above.
