To many present inhabitants of Pomerania it may seem that the culture expressed in its historical language, folklore and traditions of the region ceased to exist a long time ago. Some would say that it happened at the beginning of the 15th century, when the Slavic tongue disappeared there. Others would maintain that the culture of Pomerania belongs to the past since the native people were expelled and dispersed after 1945. Most of us is likely to believe that a living and breathing Pomeranian culture did not survive. Well, not so! Pomeranian civilisation remains alive among the world's biggest Pomeranian community in southern Brazil. Let the Krakowiak dance, performed by the Brazilian Pomeranos, be an introduction to the present post:
The Pomeranos are nowadays an about three-hundred-thousand community which arrived from Pomerania in the 19th century and settled down in the three southern states of Brazil: Espirito Santo, Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina.
At those times of great emigrations the people from the poorest regions of Europe, mostly from Ireland, Pomerania and Austrian Galicia, were leaving their homeland in search of "the promised land" in other parts of the world. The Pomeranians were induced to emigration not only owing to poverty but also due to drastic social policy, at first, by Frederick William III, the king of Prussia, and then by Otto von Bismarck. The first one prohibited public and later on even private practicing Lutheran religion, the dominating confession in Pomerania. The other one, nicknamed "the Iron Chancellor" who, by the way, had for a spouse Johanna von Puttkamer, who came from the old Pomeranian noble family of Slavic origins, and whom he very much respected, from one side he succeeded in unification of Germany and in its substantial economic growth, and on the other hand, he suppressed non-German minorities and non-German culture.
USA and Australia was then the main destination for Pomeranian craftsmen and city workers who were a little bit better off than hopelessly poor inhabitants of villages and of land estates. Some three or four hundred people emigrated from the city of Massow (now Maszewo) and its neighbourhood to the USA in that period. Most of them settled in the state of Wisconsin, where during 150 years they have completely assimilated in the American society and they have even lost the sense of distinct features of Pomeranian culture, as compared with German.
The poorest Pomeranians had no piece of land and no house. They were sheltered under the roof of a junker's farmstead, in return for their work rendered in the land estate. They, like many people from the Naugard (Nowogard) county, often chose Brazil for emigration, as the king Pedro II offered to immigrants a free ship travel, a free piece of land (to be deforested) and an in-kind loan, in the form of farm animals and grain). They arrived to Brazil with little belongings and were given place in the heart of the forest, away from the roads and of other settlements. They began to built their second homeland. Isolation from the outside world strengthened their internal social bounds and the will to survive. The first cottages in Pomeranian style were raised and the first, half-timbered church, without a single brick, was built. There are many blogs of the Pomeranos on the internet, who treat about their history and culture. Here is one of the photos there from, the archives of Ursula Topper Dettmann:
The contemporary Pomeranian language, called Pommersche Platt, is a dialect of the Low-German language (Plattdüütsch) that was somehow influenced by the Dutch language. It is quite different from the old-Pomeranian which was Slavic language and which became extinct at the beginning of the 15th century. I do not know if any Slavic remnants of the old-Pomeranian were preserved in the actual language of the Pomeranos. In the opinion of historians and linguists the tongue of the Pomeranian Slavs might have been closely related to the language of the Polabian Slavs. In the book "The Biblical Repository" (Vol. 4, 1834) Edward Robinson mentions that the latest known church mass conducted in the Polabian language took place in Wustrow, called also Wendland (40 km West of Wittenbegre on Elbe) in 1751.
According to the study "Slawische Orts- und Gewässernamen in Deutschland" by Oswald Jannermann (2009), there are about a thousand geographical names in today's Germany (towns, villages, rivers, lakes, terrains) of Slavic origins. They are usually ending on -itz, -enz, -ik, -in oraz -ow. For example Berlin, Leipzig (formerly Leipzik). It is interesting to see how certain Slavic languages are related one to another, if we take nasal vocals into consideration. The latter are present in the Polish, Polabian and old-Pomeranian languages, and are absent in the Russian and Lusatian languages. For example, the word "meadow" means łąka in Polish, lonka or lanka in Polabian, but luka in Russian and luk or luckau in Lusatian.
The contemporary Pomeranian language (of German origins) was introduced as a subject to Pomeranian children of five primary schools in the state Espírito Santo in 2005. A year later, Prof. Ismael Tressmann, ethnographer, linguist and intellectual authority of the Pomeranos, issued the Pomeranian-Portuguese dictionary "Pomerisch - Portugíísisch Wöirbauk", containing about 15 thousand entries.
The excellent researcher of Pomeranian culture, the native, late Klaus Granzow, during his visit by the Pomeranos in 1975 had remarked that they did not know the Pomeranian word Kauke, for cake. Instead, they used the German word Kuchen. He concluded then that the original Pomeranian word dropped out of use and was forgotten, because due to poverty the Pomeranos have not eaten cakes for some generations since their arrival to Brazil 150 years ago. I think it is quite possible that even the first Pomeranian immigrants to Brazil did not already know the word "cake" in their native language because, being farmers dispossessed of their own farmland, they had been the poorest social class in Pomerania for ages. The chances are that the Pomeranos are the descendants of Pomeranian Slavs, and thus they are the inheritors of Pomeranian culture, regardless how much it has changed throughout the ages.
The Pomeranos referred to their Slavic, but also to German roots, while giving the grounds to the draft law of the state parliament of Rio Grande do Sul which resolved in 2007, in the 150th anniversary of their immigration, that the 18th of January would be a Pomeranian Day in the state. In the broadcast of 6.09.2004, dedicated to German traces in the state of Espirito Santo, the Radio Deutsche Welle informed in Portuguese that the "Prussian province of Pomerania preserved its particular cultural identity, despite of diverse attempts to be dominated on the part of Danish, Swedes and Germans".
While German colonisation of the Duchy of Pomerania followed its christianisation in the high middle ages, the native Slavs who did not assimilate with the newly arriving culture and social organisation, and that usually concerned the poorer people, had an obstructed access to education and to performing handwork and trade. They were forced, either legally or economically, to leave the towns and to settle in villages. Those indigent Slavs formed up an essential part of the peasant class, the third and the lowest order of feudal society. In the course of the ages they became more and more impoverished, for the benefit of the growing latifundia, belonged to the Pomeranian nobility, easily adopting German culture, to the German colonists and to the Catholic Church.
It is worth saying that the increasing gap in social stratification and the growth of economical and political power of nobility was a typical process in all European countries in the feudal epoch. From the historical perspective it can be clearly seen that the surrounded by stronger neighbours Duchy of Pomerania, in the face of alternating threats to her sovereignty from Denmark, Sweden, Poland and Germany, was bound to look for an alliance with one of them, in order to protect herself from the others. The Slav character of Poland and Pomerania apparently appeared to be a bond too weak and too loose, comparing with the potential of Christianity introduced in Pomerania by Germans.
The religion brought about not only expulsion of the Slavic or pagan tongue (as it was then considered) and replacing it with German, but it decidedly contributed to the economical growth of the Pomeranian state. One should also remember that when the Poland of the Piast dynasty included Pomerania into its territories, it did not come out from a common agreement of two Slavic states but it was a consequence of the preceding, repeated conquests of the Pomeranian land by Poland. It was exactly during the reign of the Polish king Wladislaw Herman when his army commanded by the palatine Sieciech invaded Pomerania and ravaged the castle at Maszewo or Massow in 1092 (as well as the castles at Pyrzyce, Stargard, Bialogard and Kamien). The Massovian castle was probably never rebuilt thereafter.
Pomeranian culture has grown up both from the Slavic and German roots. And the same like a man whose character is subjected to certain evolution during his life span, a local community or a whole nation evolve during their ages-long history. The Pomeranian cultural heritage is also an outcome of changes which occurred in history to its language, customs and even to its religion. What has not changed, as in other local communities, is its sense of identity with the homeland, with its nature and climate, and with the rhythm of life common to other countrymen. The contemporary Pomeranos, despite of enormous restrictions and obstacles which they have encountered on their way in the last 150 years, safeguarded the culture of their forefathers. We may have for them for that a lot of admiration. I shall write about those encounters and risks and about the culture itself, by another occasion. It is certainly worth to!
The poorest Pomeranians had no piece of land and no house. They were sheltered under the roof of a junker's farmstead, in return for their work rendered in the land estate. They, like many people from the Naugard (Nowogard) county, often chose Brazil for emigration, as the king Pedro II offered to immigrants a free ship travel, a free piece of land (to be deforested) and an in-kind loan, in the form of farm animals and grain). They arrived to Brazil with little belongings and were given place in the heart of the forest, away from the roads and of other settlements. They began to built their second homeland. Isolation from the outside world strengthened their internal social bounds and the will to survive. The first cottages in Pomeranian style were raised and the first, half-timbered church, without a single brick, was built. There are many blogs of the Pomeranos on the internet, who treat about their history and culture. Here is one of the photos there from, the archives of Ursula Topper Dettmann:
The contemporary Pomeranian language, called Pommersche Platt, is a dialect of the Low-German language (Plattdüütsch) that was somehow influenced by the Dutch language. It is quite different from the old-Pomeranian which was Slavic language and which became extinct at the beginning of the 15th century. I do not know if any Slavic remnants of the old-Pomeranian were preserved in the actual language of the Pomeranos. In the opinion of historians and linguists the tongue of the Pomeranian Slavs might have been closely related to the language of the Polabian Slavs. In the book "The Biblical Repository" (Vol. 4, 1834) Edward Robinson mentions that the latest known church mass conducted in the Polabian language took place in Wustrow, called also Wendland (40 km West of Wittenbegre on Elbe) in 1751.
According to the study "Slawische Orts- und Gewässernamen in Deutschland" by Oswald Jannermann (2009), there are about a thousand geographical names in today's Germany (towns, villages, rivers, lakes, terrains) of Slavic origins. They are usually ending on -itz, -enz, -ik, -in oraz -ow. For example Berlin, Leipzig (formerly Leipzik). It is interesting to see how certain Slavic languages are related one to another, if we take nasal vocals into consideration. The latter are present in the Polish, Polabian and old-Pomeranian languages, and are absent in the Russian and Lusatian languages. For example, the word "meadow" means łąka in Polish, lonka or lanka in Polabian, but luka in Russian and luk or luckau in Lusatian.
The contemporary Pomeranian language (of German origins) was introduced as a subject to Pomeranian children of five primary schools in the state Espírito Santo in 2005. A year later, Prof. Ismael Tressmann, ethnographer, linguist and intellectual authority of the Pomeranos, issued the Pomeranian-Portuguese dictionary "Pomerisch - Portugíísisch Wöirbauk", containing about 15 thousand entries.
The excellent researcher of Pomeranian culture, the native, late Klaus Granzow, during his visit by the Pomeranos in 1975 had remarked that they did not know the Pomeranian word Kauke, for cake. Instead, they used the German word Kuchen. He concluded then that the original Pomeranian word dropped out of use and was forgotten, because due to poverty the Pomeranos have not eaten cakes for some generations since their arrival to Brazil 150 years ago. I think it is quite possible that even the first Pomeranian immigrants to Brazil did not already know the word "cake" in their native language because, being farmers dispossessed of their own farmland, they had been the poorest social class in Pomerania for ages. The chances are that the Pomeranos are the descendants of Pomeranian Slavs, and thus they are the inheritors of Pomeranian culture, regardless how much it has changed throughout the ages.
The Pomeranos referred to their Slavic, but also to German roots, while giving the grounds to the draft law of the state parliament of Rio Grande do Sul which resolved in 2007, in the 150th anniversary of their immigration, that the 18th of January would be a Pomeranian Day in the state. In the broadcast of 6.09.2004, dedicated to German traces in the state of Espirito Santo, the Radio Deutsche Welle informed in Portuguese that the "Prussian province of Pomerania preserved its particular cultural identity, despite of diverse attempts to be dominated on the part of Danish, Swedes and Germans".
While German colonisation of the Duchy of Pomerania followed its christianisation in the high middle ages, the native Slavs who did not assimilate with the newly arriving culture and social organisation, and that usually concerned the poorer people, had an obstructed access to education and to performing handwork and trade. They were forced, either legally or economically, to leave the towns and to settle in villages. Those indigent Slavs formed up an essential part of the peasant class, the third and the lowest order of feudal society. In the course of the ages they became more and more impoverished, for the benefit of the growing latifundia, belonged to the Pomeranian nobility, easily adopting German culture, to the German colonists and to the Catholic Church.
It is worth saying that the increasing gap in social stratification and the growth of economical and political power of nobility was a typical process in all European countries in the feudal epoch. From the historical perspective it can be clearly seen that the surrounded by stronger neighbours Duchy of Pomerania, in the face of alternating threats to her sovereignty from Denmark, Sweden, Poland and Germany, was bound to look for an alliance with one of them, in order to protect herself from the others. The Slav character of Poland and Pomerania apparently appeared to be a bond too weak and too loose, comparing with the potential of Christianity introduced in Pomerania by Germans.
The religion brought about not only expulsion of the Slavic or pagan tongue (as it was then considered) and replacing it with German, but it decidedly contributed to the economical growth of the Pomeranian state. One should also remember that when the Poland of the Piast dynasty included Pomerania into its territories, it did not come out from a common agreement of two Slavic states but it was a consequence of the preceding, repeated conquests of the Pomeranian land by Poland. It was exactly during the reign of the Polish king Wladislaw Herman when his army commanded by the palatine Sieciech invaded Pomerania and ravaged the castle at Maszewo or Massow in 1092 (as well as the castles at Pyrzyce, Stargard, Bialogard and Kamien). The Massovian castle was probably never rebuilt thereafter.
Pomeranian culture has grown up both from the Slavic and German roots. And the same like a man whose character is subjected to certain evolution during his life span, a local community or a whole nation evolve during their ages-long history. The Pomeranian cultural heritage is also an outcome of changes which occurred in history to its language, customs and even to its religion. What has not changed, as in other local communities, is its sense of identity with the homeland, with its nature and climate, and with the rhythm of life common to other countrymen. The contemporary Pomeranos, despite of enormous restrictions and obstacles which they have encountered on their way in the last 150 years, safeguarded the culture of their forefathers. We may have for them for that a lot of admiration. I shall write about those encounters and risks and about the culture itself, by another occasion. It is certainly worth to!
