6th of December
6th of December - a visit to Father Christmas
Map of Greenland (Click on the picture for a larger version)
Today is the feast day of St Nicholas, the man who would become Santa Claus. All Danish children know that Santa Claus (or Julemanden, the Christmas Man, as he's called in Danish) lives in Greenland, so today's manuscript is AM 364 fol. which features the history of Greenland along with maps of the arctic and drawings of the flora, fauna and people (and merpeople!) of Greenland.
It was written in Latin in 1689 by Matthias Henriksen Schacht (1660-1700), a school teacher and musician from Visby in Gotland, on the basis of a variety of sources. It is unknown whether he himself went to Greenland or simply relied on the tales of others.
We highly reccomend that you take a look at the manuscript on Handrit.org, as there are too many wonderful pictures to share here.
Click on the picture for a larger version
Contact
Katrín Þórdís Driscoll is a research assistant at the Dept. of Nordic Studies and Linguistics.
Phone: +45 3533 1660
katdris@hum.ku.dk
Anne Mette Hansen is asscociate professor at the Arnamagnæan Institute.
Telephone: +45 35 32 87 13
amh@hum.ku.dk