Originally Posted by
gilpin
So if Flensburg were again Flensbourg you'd argue it wouldn't be Scandinavian?
For sure this city is and was never Scandinavian. It belonged to Danmark as part of the Herzogtum Schleswig.
Originally Posted by
gilpin
No matter, the salient point is that Denmark is historically a Scandinavian country because for hundreds of years it had possesions which are clearly part of Scandinavia by any definition.
I am not arguing but quoting from Wikipedia. I have no doubt that Danmark has a Scandinavian language, flag, population, alcohol prices, currency......
Originally Posted by
gilpin
The claim that Finland is in no way Scandinavian "languagewise" (a.k.a. linguistically) or historically couldn't be more wrong. Sweden ruled most of what is now Finland almost 700 years, starting in the eleven hundreds with more or less total control from 1249 to 1714, and some control until 1809.
For sure Sweden occupied large parts of Finland (so did Russia) but neither the Swedish nor the Russian occupation make Finland a Scandinavian or Slavic country. Spanish is widely spoken in the US but nobody would consider Texas or California to be a part of Latin America, would you?
Originally Posted by
gilpin
And as far as Greenland goes, clearly it is not geograpically even part of Europe (despite the opinion of some Europeans). But what lanuguages do you think Eric the Red or the much later Danish colonists spoke? I'd imagine today the Danish influence in Greenland is quite limited, but historically it was significant.
Good question, I did not meet him, but I assume he spoke a Germanic language as he was exiled from Iceland for murder. During those days there was (I assume) not a lot of difference between the language spoken in Germany, Scandinavia and England. And afterwards Greenland became during the decades a colony of Norway, Sweden and Denmark. But being a colony does not lead to the consequence that a territory becomes part of colonists' nation, does it? Otherwise the US would be a "British country" (or: Russian because of Alaska, French because of New Orleans? Spanish because Florida, Dutch because New Amsterdam or even Mexican because of New Mexico......)