Rom im fernen Norden: Wirkungen einer Kulturverbindung über weite Wege

The article investigates different phenomena of cultural transfer between the Byzantine sphere and Scandinavian countries during the High Middle Ages. Taking its cue from a twelfth-century wall painting of the Theotokos Hodegetria in Zealand (Denmark) which shows a remarkably Byzantine iconography, it traces different aspects of the appropriation of ideas and knowledge from the Rhomaean sphere in the North and how these were employed in the shaping of local identities. A Danish chronicle of the Third Crusade details the meaning of the original icon of the Hodegetria in Constantinople, providing the oldest witness of the weekly miracle performed by the icon, while the Gesta Danorum by Saxo Grammaticus creates a mental map of the world which stresses a lasting „Greek“-Danish connection. The depiction of mutual agreement is particularly detailed in the description of the meeting between King Erik Ejegod of Denmark and Alexios I in 1103. The narrative, which stresses Danish loyalty towards the emperor as well as a deep insight into the mechanisms of Byzantine diplomacy on the part of the Scandinavians, finds its counterpart in Morkinskinna, the earliest Old Norse chronicle of the Norwegian kings, and its narrative of King Sigurðr Jórsafalari’s crusade and subsequent visit to Constantinople in 1111. The present study argues that both these texts were informed by eyewitness knowledge of Scandinavians who had served in the Varangian guard just before the conquest of 1204. It is argued that cultural transfer during the long twelfth century shaped cultural memories of the Byzantine-Scandinavian relationship, also regarding narratives of earlier contacts as well as the Late Byzantine Varangian guard.