Wends
Wends (
In
Term
According to one theory, Germanic peoples first applied this name to the ancient Veneti. For the
For people living in the medieval Northern Holy Roman Empire and its precursors, especially for the Saxons, a Wend (Wende) was a Slav living in the area west of the River Oder, an area later entitled Germania Slavica, settled by the Polabian Slav tribes (mentioned above) in the north and by others, such as the Sorbs and the Milceni, further south (see Sorbian March).
The Germans in the south used the term Winde instead of Wende and applied it, just as the Germans in the north, to Slavs they had contact with; e.g., the Polabians from , which appears as Windischland in some documents prior to the 18th century.
Following the 8th century, the
Due to the process of
Some sources claim that in the 13th century there were actual historic people called Wends or
Today, only one group of Wends still exists: the Lusatian Sorbs in present-day Eastern Germany, with international diaspora.[5]
Roman-era Veneti
The term "Wends" derived from the Roman-era people called in
History
Rise (700–1000)
In the 1st millennium AD, during the
While the Wends were arriving in so-called Germania Slavica as large homogeneous groups, they soon divided into a variety of small tribes, with large strips of woodland separating one tribal settlement area from another. Their tribal names were derived from local place names, sometimes adopting the Germanic tradition (e.g.
Some tribes unified into larger, duchy-like units. For example, the Obotrites evolved from the unification of the Holstein and Western Mecklenburg tribes led by mighty dukes known for their raids into German Saxony. The Lutici were an alliance of tribes living between Obotrites and Pomeranians. They did not unify under a duke, but remained independent. Their leaders met in the temple of Rethra.
In 983, many Wend tribes participated in a great uprising against the
Wends and Danes had early and continuous contact including settlement, first and mainly through the closest South Danish islands of Møn, Lolland and Falster, all having place-names of Wendish origin[citation needed]. There were also trading and settlement outposts by Danish towns as important as Roskilde, when it was the capital: 'Vindeboder' (Wends' booths) is the name of a city neighbourhood there. Danes and Wends also fought wars due to piracy and crusading.[8]
Decline (1000–1200)
After their successes in 983 the Wends came under increasing pressure from Germans, Danes and Poles. The Poles invaded Pomerania several times. The Danes often raided the Baltic shores (and, in turn, the Wends often raided the raiders). The Holy Roman Empire and its margraves tried to restore their marches.
In 1068/69 a German expedition took and destroyed Rethra, one of the major pagan Wend temples. The Wendish religious centre shifted to Arkona thereafter. In 1124 and 1128, the Pomeranians and some Lutici were baptised. In 1147, the Wend crusade took place in what is today north-eastern Germany.
This did not, however, affect the Wendish people in today's Saxony, where a relatively stable co-existence of German and Slavic inhabitants as well as close dynastic and diplomatic cooperation of Wendish and German nobility had been achieved. (See: Wiprecht of Groitzsch).
In 1168, during the
From the 12th to the 14th centuries, Germanic settlers moved into the Wendish lands in large numbers, transforming the area's culture from a Slavic to a Germanic one. Local dukes and monasteries invited settlers to repopulate farmlands devastated in the wars, as well as to cultivate new farmlands from the expansive woodlands and heavy soils, with the use of iron-based agricultural tools that had developed in Western Europe. Concurrently, a large number of new towns were created under German town law with the introduction of legally enforced markets, contracts and property rights. These developments over two centuries were collectively known as the Ostsiedlung (German eastward expansion). A minority of Germanic settlers moved beyond the Wendish territory into Hungary, Bohemia and Poland, where they were generally welcomed for their skills in farming and craftsmanship.
The
Between 1540 and 1973, the kings of
From the Middle Ages the kings of Denmark and of Denmark–Norway used the titles King of the Wends (from 1362) and Goths (from the 12th century). The use of both titles was discontinued in 1973.[11]
Legacy
The Wendish people co-existed with the German settlers for centuries and became gradually assimilated into the German-speaking culture.
The Golden Bull of 1356 (one of the constitutional foundations of the German-Roman Empire) explicitly recognised in its Art. 31 that the German-Roman Empire was a multi-national entity with "diverse nations distinct in customs, manner of life, and in language".[12] For that it stipulated "the sons, or heirs and successors of the illustrious prince electors, ... since they are expected in all likelihood to have naturally acquired the German language, ... shall be instructed in the grammar of the Italian and Slavic (i.e. Wendish) tongues, beginning with the seventh Year of their age."[13]
Many geographical names in Central Germany and northern Germany can be traced back to a Slavic origin. Typical Slavic endings include -itz, -itzsch and -ow. They can be found in city names such as Delitzsch and Rochlitz. Even names of major cities like Leipzig and Berlin are most likely of Wendish origin.
Today, the only remaining minority people of Wendish origin, the
The Texas Wends
In 1854, the Wends of Texas departed Lusatia on the Ben Nevis[14] seeking greater liberty, in order to settle an area of central Texas, primarily Serbin. The Wends succeeded, expanding into Warda, Giddings, Austin, Houston, Fedor, Swiss Alp, Port Arthur, Mannheim, Copperas Cove, Vernon, Walburg, The Grove, Bishop, and the Rio Grande Valley.
A strong emphasis on tradition, principles, and education is evident today in families descendant from the Wendish pioneers. Today, thousands of Texans and other Americans (many unaware of their background), can lay claim to the heritage of the Wends.[15]
Other uses
Historically, the term "Wends" has also occurred in the following contexts:
- Until the mid-19th-century German-speakers most commonly used the name Wenden to refer to Slovenes. This usage is mirrored in the name of the Windic March, a Medieval territory in present-day Lower Carniola, which merged with the Duchy of Carniola by the mid 15th century. With the diffusion of the term slowenisch for the Slovene language and Slowenen for Slovenes, the words windisch and Winde or Wende became derogatory in connotation. The same development could be seen in the case of the Hungarian Slovenes, who used to be known under the name "Vends".
- Windischentheorie was a 1927 work by Martin Wutte , a Carinthian German nationalist historian.
- It was also used to denote the Slovaks in German-language texts before c. 1400.
- The German term "Windischland" was used in the Middle Ages for the historical Kingdom of Slavonia (in Croatia).[16] The terms Veneta, Wenden, Winden etc. were used in reference to the westernmost Slavs in the 1st and 2nd century CE, as a reference to the name of the earlier tribes of Veneti.[17]
See also
References
- ^ "Who Are the Wends?". January 2010.
- ^ "History of Migration".
- ISBN 0-262-53267-0.
- ISBN 9639116424.
- ^ "Museum". 29 January 2015.
- ^ Brather, Sebastian (2004). "The beginnings of Slavic settlement east of the river Elbe". Antiquity, Volume 78, Issue 300. pp. 314–329
- ^ Istorija Armenii Mojseja Horenskogo, II izd. Per. N. O. Emina, M., 1893, s.55-56.
- ^ "Venderne og Danmark" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on November 16, 2012.
- ^ Harry van der Hulst. Word Prosodic Systems in the Languages of Europe. Walter de Gruyter. 1999. p. 837.
- Britannica Online Encyclopedia. Lekhitic languages. Retrieved 2013-03-09.
- ^ "Kungl. Maj:ts kungörelse med anledning av konung Gustaf VI Adolfs frånfälle". Lagen.nu. Archived from the original on 12 July 2014.
- ^ Charles IV, Golden Bull of 1356 (full text English translation) translated into English, Yale
- ^ Charles IV, Golden Bull of 1356 (full text English translation) translated into English, Yale
- ^ "Ben Nevis, Wends and German Texans".
- ^ "Who Are the Wends?". January 2010.
- Miroslav Krleža Lexicographical Institute. 2021. Retrieved 15 December 2021.
- ISSN 1848-9184.
Further reading
- Lencek, R. L. (1990). "The Terms Wende-Winde, Wendisch-Windisch in the Historiographic Tradition of the Slovene Lands". Slovene Studies. 12 (1): 93–97. .
- Knox, Ellis Lee (1980). The Destruction and Conversion of the Wends: A History of Northeast Germany in the Central Middle Ages. Department of History (Master's thesis). University of Utah. Archived from the original on 12 November 2001.