Mikael Shainkman

Historian, tour guide, podcaster, coffee drinker

To the SHP shop:

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

The raft–called Kon-Tiki–became as famous as Heyerdahl, but the scholarly community largely remained unconvinced of Heyerdahl's theory that Polynesia had been populated from South America.

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

On this day, but in 1947, the Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl ran aground on a miniscule Polynesian island. Unlike what you may expect, this didn’t upset him in the slightest.
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[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

On the contrary, he was delighted: it meant he’d been able to prove that you could cross the Pacific Ocean on a balsa raft built with nothing but Stone Age technology. The 7,000 km voyage had taken 101 days, so that may have added to Heyerdahl’s delight.
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[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

When Louise was young, her father tried to change the law to allow for girls to inherit the crown. But he failed, and Louise wasn’t allowed to succeed him. This was extra annoying for Karl, because the crown instead went to his younger brother Oscar (II), whom he couldn’t stand.

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

In the latest episode, I mentioned that the new king of Norway, Haakon VII, had close ties to the Swedish court through his mother, Louise, who wasn’t just married to the king of Denmark, but was also the only surviving child of king Karl XV of Sweden.
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[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

I’ve also added a photo of a traditional Norwegian herring salad, so you can make up your own mind if the epithet was fitting or not.

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

After listening to the latest episode of the Scandinavian History Podcast, I bet you wonder what the so-called union mark, derisively named “the herring salad” looked like. Well, here are examples of the Norwegian and Swedish flags with the union mark in the top-left corner.
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[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

Today, this former Danish colony is known as the U.S. Virgin Islands.

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

On this day, but in 1916, Denmark agreed to sell its Caribbean colonies to the US. The islands had been Danish for about 250 years, and had brought considerable wealth to Denmark. And considerable suffering to the slaves who’d been forced to work on the sugar plantations there
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[GFY TV @Viralvid_89]

A tiny sandwich shop decided to take a chance...

They heard Liam Neeson was filming Hard Powder nearby, so they wrote a joke on their chalkboard:

"Liam Neeson eats here for free."

On the other side, they added:

"Come in and get TAKEN away by our sandwiches."

They figured he'd never see it.

Seven hours later...

The door opened.

Liam Neeson walked in.

In his signature deep, gravelly voice, he looked at the staff and asked,

"Where is my free sandwich?"

The entire shop was in shock.

Although he didn't have time to stay and eat, he happily posed for photos with the amazed staff before heading out.

The surprise visit became such a memorable moment that the shop later created a sandwich in his honor...

"The Neeson."

What started as a funny chalkboard joke turned into a story the shop will never forget. 🥪🎬

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

On this day, but in 1963, a new monastery was established in Sweden. It was the first time since the large and important monastery in Vadstena was closed down 368 years earlier, during the Reformation.
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[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

It took the Danes until 1340 to get their act together, throw the Germans out and elect a new king. But what a king they chose. For more details, check out episode 48, “A New Dawn”.

https://t.co/UnDdsK1l5b

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

On this day, but in 1332, the Danish king Christopher II died. When he did, the Danes decided there was no point electing a new king. Denmark had been leased to German noblemen who now lorded it over their various bits of Denmark.
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[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

The Swedish king, Magnus Eriksson, also got in on the action and purchased the provinces of Scania and Blekinge from one of the German noblemen who had run into trouble with the locals.
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[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

6yo: When I turn 10, I will still love you, dad.
Me: Awwww
6yo: When I turn 11, I will love coffee.

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

2! Bokmål!

That way, you--dear voters--are of the same opinion as most 19th century Norwegians.

[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

Everyone here at the SHP HQ have been working overtime, and the votes from the Spotify poll for the last episode have been counted and re-counted, analyzed and over analyzed. And now the results are ready. Can you feel the tension in the air?
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[Mikael Shainkman @shainkman]

The question was: If you had lived in Norway in the 1850s, which language would you have preferred to use?

The options were:
1. The radical new landsmål (a.k.a. nynorsk)
2. The moderate riksmål (a.k.a. bokmål)
3. Danish

And the winning option is (drum roll...)
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[Rory Jennings ⭐ ⭐ @Chelsearory]

Martyn Ziegler deserves a Pulitzer Prize for this. He has saved football. There is no way that Infantino survives now and it's all because Ziegler somehow broke the story. If he allowed Infantino to do this on his own timetable, having the time to have clandestine chats in smokefilled rooms maybe he would have got it through but Ziegler had other ideas and that's journalism. Superb.

[Joel Willans @VFinnishProbs]

Today is a good reminder that borders can be complicated, some more than others.

This is Märket. It's the world’s smallest island split between two nations, is a 3.3-hectare Baltic islet shared by Sweden and Finland. In 1885, Finland accidentally built a lighthouse on Sweden’s side, but being good neighbours, they simply redrew the border in 1985 to fix it. 🇫🇮🤝🇸🇪