BUSINESS

Denmark and Poland Over the Centuries

For over two millennia, Denmark and Poland have been neighbors across the Baltic. In the early Middle Ages, Slavic settlements existed on some Danish islands. In the 10th century, in the period of their phenomenal expansion (which lasted from the 8th century to ca. 1050), the Vikings established a busy merchant settlement near today’s Wolin-Jomsborg. The settlement was destroyed by the Danes toward the end of that century. At about the same time, in around 960, Denmark and Poland were Christianized and joined the family of Christian societies.

In the 12th and 13th centuries, Danish politicians set their sights on Baltic Europe. The Danish ruler Canut IV briefly held Stettin - Pomerania. From 1241 to 1340, Denmark succumbed to internal fighting and widespread chaos similar to Polish developments of the time. Valdemar IV Atterdag (in power from 1340 to 1375) united Denmark and maintained close contacts with Casimir the Great, who succeeded in politically consolidating Poland and contributed to its economic development. In 1385, threatened by the Teutonic Knigths, the Poles and the Lithuanians forged a political union in Krewo. In a parallel development in 1397, fearing the German merchant association Hanseatic League, Denmark, Sweden and Norway established a similar political union in Calmar. The union gave rise to a common Scandinavian state, which survived until 1523. The state’s first independent ruler was Eric of Pomerania (in power from 1412 to 1439), the great grandson of the Polish king Casimir the Great. In 1429, Eric of Pomerania imposed the so-called Sound Tolls paid over the subsequent three centuries by Gdansk merchants selling Polish grain in Western Europe.

In 1536, while Christian III carried out Denmark’s reformation, turning the Danes into Protestants, the Poles upheld Catholicism. Under the rule of Christian IV (1588-1648), Denmark became a sea power in the Baltic, whereas Poland struggled with political and economic crisis. From 1721, the Danes engaged in an unending string of wars with the Swedes over domination in the Baltic. Poland, meanwhile, lost its significance as a political and economic partner. In 1772, as Poland was partitioned, Denmark achieved stability and flourished economically.

In the 19th century, the Danish society supported Polish freedom movements as they staged national uprisings. Chancellor Bismarck Germanized Poles in the Poznań Province and followed the same policy toward the Danish population of Schlesvig and Holstein, two provinces annexed to the unifying Germany after the war of 1864 with Denmark.

Denmark did not participate militarily in World War I. After the invading forces of Germany, Austria and Russia were defeated, Poland proclaimed its independence in 1918. Denmark soon recognized the new Polish state. Between the two world wars, political, economic and cultural relations between Poland and Denmark were remained good.

During the Second World War, Denmark fell under the occupation of the forces of the Third Reich, albeit one less severe than the cruel occupation regime the Nazis imposed on the Polish nation. Notably, Poles played an active role in the Danish resistance movement. Denmark joined NATO In 1949 and the Common Market in 1972. Meanwhile, both the Polish state and its people ended up in the so-called Soviet bloc. During the 1960s and 1970s, political and economic relations between the two countries remained fairly limited. The Danes gladly welcomed Poland’s political transformations of 1989-1990. The countries’ bilateral political, economic and cultural contacts gained momentum, yet they were still far from what they could become. Since 1999, Poland and Denmark have established military cooperation within a common military organization: the NATO. The Danes support Poland in its effort to secure a quick accession to the European Union.

Bernard Piotrowski