Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1999, Side 99

V Nordic debate in the period of Scandinavianism
79
of langs’ sagas.16 Grundtvig did nothing to conceal his strong national
sentiments in this literary discussion, and he vividly deplored the Anti-
Danish feelings he found in Norway, in particular emanating from the
poet Henrik Wergeland and his father Nicolai, author of a famous an-
onymous pamphlet on “Denmark’s political crimes against the King-
dom of Norway” (“En sandfærdig Beretning om Danmarks politiske
Forbrydelser imod Kongeriget Norge”, 1816). This Norwegian attitude
was naturally resented as especially hurtful at this fateful moment when
Denmark was threatened by an aggressive and powerful neighbour and
needed all the sympathy it could get from its northem brethren.17
One after the other Grundtvig commented on Keyser’s arguments for
the Norwegian origin of the Eddie poems and found them all to be with-
out foundation, even Keyser’s tramp card on the mountainous character
of the Eddie landscape was discarded - could not, he wondered, Møns
Klint also be called a mountain? Keyser’s immigration theory was un-
justified, he maintained, but even if it had been just, it would disprove
Keyser’s view on the origin of the Edda, instead of supporting it. The
Southern elements of the Eddie legends are too prominent to be over-
looked, and they were most unlikely to have been created by a particular
Northem branch of the Germanic tribe which had immigrated to
Norway from the North. On the contrary, if Keyser’s theory were right,
it would foliow that the mythological and heroic poetry of the Northem
peoples would be alien to the same peoples, since its subject matter
indicated an origin among a pre-Nordic “German” population of Scan-
dinavia. In an emotional “Scandinavistic” appeal, seasoned with
outbursts of Nordic racism and anti-German sentiments, which must be
16 “Denne ramnorske deus ex machina” (Grundtvig 1866-67: 524). “Den lemfældigste
kritik må forstumme ligeover for den pyramidale hypotesebygning, her står opført for vore
ojne. Man vover knap at ånde, at ikke det skonne korthus skal synke sammen til intet”
(Grundtvig 1866-67: 527).
17 “Den kortsynede og snæverhjærtede, uforstandig egenkærlige Norskhed, der fra Wer-
geland, fader og son, udgik i literaturen, og fra den berettigede iver for at hævde og værge
sit land gik over til en udfordrende og fjendtlig stilling imod brødrene, og da nærmest mod
Danmark, den tor vel håbes nu i det hele taget at have udspillet sin rolle, så det er ved at gå
op for hele den norske almenhed, at den art af åndelig selvstændighed og uafhængighed,
der skal købes med usandhed, næres med blind forfængelighed og holdes gående ved
krampagtig unatur, en sådan baskisk-vallisisk isolatjon, hvori hin uægte nationalfølelse
har søgt sin stolthed og sin glæde, den fører ikke folkeånden fremad til kraft og til klar-
hed, men er netop åndslivets grav” (Grundtvig 1866-67: 507-08).