Early Scandinavia, 18th Century Europe, and a Miniature Museum
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Great Northern War – Peasant Soldiers
In 1699, Sapherson gives a total of 12848 total soldiers in Norway, with 1838 of those hvervede infantry, or professional soldiers, and 8668 national, or conscripted infantry. The rest of the soldiers, primarily artillery and garrison soldiers, appear to be...
Great Northern War – Extraordinary Stories
c"Bringing Home the Body of Karl XII," Gustaf Cederström, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. In the collections of the National Museum of Stockholm King Karl XII of Sweden lives on in legend. Stories circulate that he used to throw snowballs to break the glass of...
Great Northern War – Battle of Dynekilen
Stordenskjold i Dynekilen, by Carl Neumann - http://www.tordenskjold.nu/tordenskjold.html, Public Domain, via wikimedia commons. A Sneak Attack on the Swedes Finding sources for the Great Northern War written in English has been a challenge. I stumbled on a volume...
Great Northern War – King Karl XII
Gustaf Cederström, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, "Karl XII and Ivan Mazepa after the Poltava Battle." The painting depicts Swedish King Karl XII, his name often Anglicized as Charles XII, during the Battle of Poltava. Karl had been injured in the foot by...
Great Northern War – Battle of Poltava
By Unknown author - National Archives of Sweden, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=112777804 The Battle of Poltava occurred in what is modern-day Ukraine, although in 1709 it was part of mainland Russia under Peter the Great. I found an...
Great Northern War – Battle of Narva
Image: Victory at Narva, 1905, by Gustaf Cederström, National Museum of Sweden, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. This image, painted two hundred years after the battle, depicts what the surrender of Russian forces to Sweden might have looked like after...
Novel Writing Update – November 2024
After watching another online writing conference and listening to yet another literary agent panel, my publishing dream almost died. Set in an unusual time and place, my story world won't slide into an existing group of readers. My books are probably best categorized...
Christmas at the Carl Larsson House – 2024 Update
Clicking on this post will lead you to the series "A Miniature Carl Larsson Christmas," either by clicking on the series title in the category sidebar on the right or on the related posts found underneath. There are twelve posts in the series. My mother staged an...
Naerøy Manuscript – Ceremonial Drum – Other Gods
The 1723 Naerøy Manuscript contains a rambling interpretation of this drawing of a Sami ceremonial drum attributed to Thomas von Westen. The god in the top half of the drum, to the right of Thor, holding a hoe with a claw at the end and having an arch with serrations...
Naerøy Manuscript – Ceremonial Drum – Thor
This is the drawing of the Sami ceremonial drum found in the Naerøy Manuscript, attributed to Thomas von Wessen, 1723. It is in the public domain, and there are other versions of it that render more detail. Johan Randulf, the author of the Naeroy manuscript, rambles a...
Naerøy Manuscript – Intro
I am certain there has been new scholarship on the Naeroy Manuscript since Just Qvigstad published his summary of it in 1903, but since he was my great-grandmother’s brother and he looks like my late father, I have been slowly translating his work for my own...
Tales from Sápmi – Animal Origins
Many of Just Knud Qvigstad’s works are out of print, and most are not in English. This is my paraphrased translation of stories from Sápmi from a French translation of his work. The Angry Loon God made the magnificent birds and let them fly away. The loon grumbled...