is a
county, province, municipality and diocese of Sweden
and the
largest island in the Baltic Sea
. At 3,140 square kilometers in area, it
makes up less than one percent of Sweden's total land area.
The region
also includes the small islands of Fårö
and Gotska
Sandön
to the north, and the tiny Karlsö Islands to the west.
The
inhabitants number is 57,317 (2006 SCB figure), with about 22,600
living in the primary city Visby
. The
main sources of income to the island are
tourism,
agriculture and
concrete production from locally mined
limestone.
Administration
The traditional
provinces of
Sweden serve no administrative or political purposes, but are
historical and cultural entities.
In the case of Gotland, however,
due to its insular position, the administrative county, län, Gotland County
and the municipality, kommun,
Gotland
Municipality
both cover the same territory as the
province. Furthermore, the
Diocese of Visby is also congruent with the
province.
Heraldry
Gotland
was granted its arms in about 1560, even though the island was at
the time occupied by Danish
forces. The coat of arms is represented with a ducal
coronet. Blazon: "Azure a ram statant Argent armed Or holding on a
cross-staff of the same a banner Gules bordered and with five tails
of the third." The county was granted the same coat of arms in
1936. The municipality, created in 1971, uses the same picture, but
with other
tinctures.
The Gotlandic flag displays the Gotlandic coat of arms, white on
red ground, known from the 13th century in the shape of the seal of
the Gotlandic Republic with the proud ram. It reads: "Gutenses
signo xpistus signatur in agno". This can be translated as follows:
"I (the ram) am the sign of the Gotlanders, but with the lamb
symbolize Christ".
Geography
Map of Gotland
Visby, with about
two fifths of the island's population (approximately 22,600), is
the seat of the municipality as well as the capital of the
county.
Gotland is
located about 90 km east of the Swedish mainland and about 130 km
from the Baltic States, Latvia
, being the
nearest. The island Gotland is obviously just one island,
but the historical province of Gotland also includes adjacent
islands, which are often considered part of the Gotlandic
culture:
There are several shallow lakes located near shores of the island.
The
biggest is Lake Bästeträsk
, located near Fleringe in
the northern part of Gotland.
Geology
Gotland is made up of a sequence of
sedimentary rocks of a
Silurian age, dipping to the south-east.The main
Silurian succession of
limestones and
shales comprises thirteen units spanning
200-500 m of stratigraphic thickness, being thickest in the
south, and overlies a 75-125 m thick
Ordovician sequence. It was deposited in a
shallow, hot and salty sea, on the edge of an equatorial continent.
The water depth never exceeded 175–200 m, and shallowed over
time as
bioherm detritus, and terrestrial
sediments, filled the basin.
Reef growth started in the Llandovery
, when the sea was 50–100 m deep, and reefs
continued to dominate the sedimentary record. Some
sandstones are present in the youngest rocks towards the south of
the island, which represent sand bars deposited very close to the
shore line.
The lime rocks have been weathered into characteristic
karstic rock formations
known as
rauks. Fossils, mainly of
rugose corals and
brachiopods, are abundant throughout the island;
palæo-
sea-stack are preserved in
places.
History
The island is the home of the
Gutar (the
Gotlanders) and sites such as
Ajvide
show that it has been occupied since
prehistory.
Early on Gotland became a commercial center
and the town of Visby was the most
important Hanseatic city in the
Baltic Sea. In late medieval time, the island had twenty
district courts (
ting), each
represented at the island-ting, called
landsting, by its
elected judge. New laws were decided at the landsting, which also
took other decisions regarding the island as a whole.
The
Gutasaga contains legends of
how the island was settled by
Þieluar and populated by his descendants.
It also tells that a third of the population had to emigrate and
settle in southern Europe, a tradition associated with the
migration of the
Goths, whose name has the
same origin as
Gutar, the native name
of the people of the island. It later tells that the Gotlanders
voluntarily submitted to the king of Sweden and asserts that it is
based on mutual agreements, and notes the duties and obligations of
the Swedish King and Bishop in relationship to Gotland. It is
therefore not only an effort to write down the history of Gotland,
but also an effort to assert Gotland's independence from
Sweden.
It gives
Awair Strabain as the man
who arranged the mutually beneficial agreement with the king of
Sweden, and the event would have taken place before the end of the
9th century, when
Wulfstan of
Hedeby reported that the island was subject to the
Swedes:
Then, after the land of the Burgundians
, we had on our left the lands that have been called
from the earliest times Blekingey
, and Meore, and Eowland
, and Gotland, all which territory is subject to the
Sweons; and Weonodland was all the way on our right, as far as
Weissel-mouth.
[36519]
The region is considered by some historians to be the original
homeland of the
Goths.
The Visby city wall, near the North
gate.
The city of Visby and rest of the island were governed separately
and a civil war caused by conflicts between the German merchants in
Visby and the trading peasants on the countryside had to be put
down by King
Magnus III of
Sweden in 1288. In 1361,
Valdemar Atterdag of Denmark
invaded the island. The
Victual
Brothers occupied the island in 1394 to set up a stronghold
headquarters on their own in Visby. At last Gotland came as a
fiefdom of the
Teutonic Knights, awarded to them on the
condition that they expel the piratical Victual Brothers from their
fortified sanctuary. An invasion army of
Teutonic Knights conquered the island in
1398, destroying Visby and driving the Victual Brothers from
Gotland. In 1409 guaranteed Grand Master
Ulrich von Jungingen of the Teutonic
Knights peace with the
Kalmar Union of
Scandinavia by selling the island of
Gotland to Queen
Margaret of
Denmark, Norway and Sweden.
The number of
Arab dirhams discovered on the
island of Gotland alone is astoundingly high. In the various
hoards located around the island, there are
more of these silver coins than any other site in Western
Eurasia. The total sum is almost as great as the
number that has been unearthed in the entire
Muslim world. These coins moved North through trade
between
Rus merchants and the
Abbasid Caliphate, along the
Silver-Fur Road, and the money made by
Scandinavian merchants would help Northern Europe, especially
Viking Scandinavia and the
Carolingian Empire, as major commercial
centers for the next several centuries.
The
Berezan' Runestone,
discovered in 1905 in Ukraine, was made by a
Varangian (
Viking) trader
named Grani in memory of his
business
partner Karl. It is assumed that they were from Gotland.
The
authority of the landsting was successively eroded after the island
was occupied by the Teutonic Order, then sold to Eric of Pomerania and after 1449 ruled by
Danish
governors. In late medieval times, the ting consisted of
twelve representatives for the farmers, free-holders or tenants.
Since the
Treaty of
Brömsebro in 1645, the island has remained under Swedish
rule.
Culture
Iron age axe from Gotland.
The
medieval town of Visby has been
entered as a site of the UNESCO
World heritage program. An impressive
feature of Visby is the fortress wall that surrounds the old city,
dating from the time of the Hanseatic League.
The inhabitants of Gotland traditionally spoke their own language,
known as
Gutnish. Today however, they have
adapted a dialect of Swedish that is known as "Gotländska".In the
13th century, a work containing the laws of the island, called "The
Gotlandic law" (Gutalagen), was published in the ancient Gutnish
language.
Gotland is famous for its 94 medieval churches, most of which are
restored and in active use. These churches exhibit two major styles
of architecture:
Romanesque
and
Gothic. The older churches
were constructed in the Romanesque style from 1150–1250 A.D. The
newer churches were constructed in the Gothic architectural style
that prevailed from about 1250 to 1400 A.D. The oldest painting
inside one of the churches on Gotland stretches as far back in time
as the 12th Century.
Traditional games of skill like
Kubb,
Pärk, and
Varpa are played on
Gotland. They are part of what has become called "Gutniska Lekar",
and are performed preferably on the Midsummer’s Eve celebration on
the island, but also throughout the summer months. The games have
widespread renown; some of them are played by people as far away as
in the United States.
The
knotwork design subsequently named the "Valknut" has the most attested historic instances on
picture stones in Gotland, which
include being on both the Stora
Hammar stone and the Tängelgårda stone
. There are also thousands of mysterious
grooves on the island that are
suspected of having been used for
archaeoastronomy.
Gotland also has a rich heritage of folklore, including myths about
the
bysen,
Di
sma undar jordi, Hoburgsgubben and the
Martebo lights.
Gotland competes in the bi-annual
Island Games, which
it hosted in 1999.
Notable Gotlanders
- Christopher Polhem
(1661–1751), the father of Swedish mechanical physics was born in
Visby. He was also called the "Archimedes
of the North".
- Swedish film director Ingmar Bergman lived on Fårö, the small island directly north of Gotland
Island.
- Former ice hockey player in the NHL Håkan Loob.
- Lennart Eriksson,
also known as Fjodor, the old punk star
from Ebba Grön moved to
Gotland soon after he left the band in 1982.
- Singer Susanne Alfvengren,
famous in Sweden during the 1980s.
- Death metal band Grave hails from
Visby.
- Cyclist Thomas Lövkvist is
from Visby. He is occasionally referred to by his nickname
Gotland.
- Singer/composer/musician Theresa
Andersson, currently living/working in the U.S.
References in popular culture
The Long Ships, or
Red
Orm (original title:
Röde Orm), a best-selling
Swedish novel written by
Frans Gunnar Bengtsson, contains a
vivid description of Gotland in the Viking period.
A section of the book
is devoted to a Viking ship setting out to Russia
, stopping on
its way at Gotland and engaging a pilot from the island who plays
an important part in their voyage. Gotlanders of the Viking
Era are depicted as city people, more sophisticated and
cosmopolitan than other Scandinavians of their time, and proud of
their knowledge and skills.
The
crime novels of
Mari Jungstedt, featuring Detective
Superintendent Anders Knutas, are set on Gotland.
In the
Battlefield Vietnam
modification
Invasion Gotland the
Soviet army invades Gotland in
1977.
Sport Events
- Gotland Grand National (GGN) is and annual enduro race on
Gotland. GGN is a part of the swedish enduroklassikern(enduro
classics,Ränneslättsloppet,Stångebroslaget and Gotland Grand
National)
See also
References
- Clara Nevéus, Bror jacques de Wærn: Ny svensk
vapenbok, 1992
- Creer 1973
- Gray, Laufield & Boucot, 1974
- See Goths and
Scandza for more
information on this matter.
- Gotland is famous for its 94 medieval
churches
External links
and Lilla Karlsö
)
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