Coastal cultural history stories at Backes bu Thursday 10 July

 CL: 12.00 – 13.00 

Fyrglede at Backe's bow, Henriette sjæveland

TIME: 1:00 PM -2:00 PM

The king, the privateer and the battle for the Nordic region

King Christian II's struggle for the North is one of the most dramatic chapters in Scandinavian medieval history. In the spring of 1523, the controversial Danish-Norwegian king was driven into exile and sought refuge in the Netherlands. From there, he began a bold, costly, and protracted struggle to win back his Nordic kingdoms.

One of his most important supporters was the Danish captain and privateer Klaus Kniphoff. Until he was executed for piracy in the autumn of 1525, Kniphoff played a key role in the exiled king's attempts to intimidate, punish and weaken his opponents and thereby defend his royal dignity. In this lecture we will delve into how Kniphoff's privateering was connected to the major political struggle for royal power in the Nordic countries.

Time: 2:30 PM – 3:30 PM

Clais Kniphof and His Dutch Connections in 1525. Clais Kniphof – admiral, corsair and pirate – between the Netherlands and Norway, 1525

In 1523, Christian II, the last Union King of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, left his kingdoms and fled to the Netherlands. During his exile he made several attempts to regain his thrones. In 1525 one of his agents, Clais Kniphof, equipped a ship and received a license from the exiled king to take enemy vessels. This lecture discusses Kniphof's preparations in the Netherlands and his subsequent actions both in ports like Goedereede and at sea on his way to Norway.

Time: 4 – 5 p.m.

Of Pirates, Ravens and the Devil. conflicts, ​​​​Competition and Criminalization in the North Atlantic (1450-1535)

  In 1526 near Farsund, a brutal confrontation took place between the Lübeck Bergenfahrer, a corporation of merchants trading with Bergen, and Martin Pechlin, a partisan of the exiled Danish king Christian II. In processions, chronicles and exhibitions of trophies, the Bergenfahrer who returned to Lübeck presented themselves as victorious fighters against pirates. 

In my lecture, I will examine why they did this. Drawing on the example of 1526, I will shed light on how maritime communities around 1500 thought about economic competition, fought their opponents and reinvented the Roman concept of piracy in order to criminalise their opponents and justify their own acts of violence.