Danish people
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- This article is about Danes as an ethnic group. For information about residents or nationals of Denmark, see demographics of Denmark. For other uses, see Dane.
| Danes (Danskere) |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total population | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
7 million (lower boundary) |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Regions with significant populations | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Languages | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Danish | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Religions | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Predominantly Lutheran; small minorities of other faiths; secular | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Related ethnic groups | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Norwegians, Swedes, Icelanders, Faroese and to a lesser extent all Germanic ethnic groups |
The term Dane may refer to:
- People with a Danish ancestral or ethnic identity, whether living in Denmark, emigrants, or the descendants of emigrants.
- Members of the Danish ethnic minority in Southern Schleswig, a former Danish province.
- Anyone whose mother tongue is Danish.
- Nationals or citizens of Denmark, which also includes a German minority in South Jutland as well as recent non-European immigrants and their descendants (see: Demographics of Denmark).
- Members of a people that once immigrated to the areas around east Jutland, south Sweden and the islands in between.
This article refers to the two definitions, ethnic Danes and their descendants plus the minority in Germany.
Contents |
[edit] Origins
Danes/Daner were an ancient North Germanic tribe residing in modern day southern Sweden and on the Danish islands. They were not mentioned by Tacitus, whose famous work Germania mentions the Gothones (Geats and/or Goths?) and the Suiones (Swedes). They seem to be, however, mentioned by Jordanes and Procopius, as the Dani. The name Daner is the etymological root of Dane. Jordanes maintains that the Dani were of the same stock as the Suetidi (Swedes, Suithiod?) and expelled the Heruli and took their lands. If Tacitus simply did not overlook the Dani, and if Jordanes's information was correct, it is possible that they first appeared, as an off-shoot of the Swedes, sometime in the 2nd or 3rd century A.D. According to Sven Aggesen this would have been about the time that Dan the Proud, gave his name to the Danes.
[edit] Danes in Denmark
Almost five million ethnic Danes live in Denmark today.[1] The Danes are a Scandinavian ethnic group, and are the descendants of the Norse - better known as Vikings - along with Norwegians, Swedes, Icelanders, Faroese, and to some extent, the English, due to the settlement of many Danes, along with the Anglo-Saxons in England during the Migration period and during the Danelaw period. The average Dane enjoys a comfortable standard of living.
- See also: History of Denmark
A minority of approx. 50,000 Danes live in Southern Schleswig in Germany, a former Danish territory, forming around 10% of the local population. In Denmark, the latter group is often referred to as De danske syd for grænsen (literally: the Danes south of the (Danish-German) border) or sydslesvigere (South Schleswigers).
[edit] The Danish Nation in a political context
Det danske folk (The Danish nation) as a concept, played an important role in 19th century ethnic nationalism and refers to self-identification rather than a legal status. Use of the term is most often restricted to a historical context; the historic German-Danish struggle regarding the status of the Duchy of Schleswig vis-à-vis a Danish nation-state. It describes people of Danish nationality, both in Denmark and elsewhere. Most importantly, ethnic Danes in both Denmark proper and the former Danish Duchy of Schleswig. Excluded from this definition are people from the formerly Norwegian Faroe Islands and Greenland as well as members of the German minority as well as members of other ethnic minorities.
The term should not be confused with the legal concept of nationality, danske statsborgere (Danish nationals) i.e. individuals holding Danish citizenship.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ a b Danmarks Statistik (pdf, written in Danish) reports that Denmark, per October 1st, 2005, has 461,614 inhabitants of foreign inheritance out of 5,425,420 total inhabitants. That amounts to an estimate of 4,963,806 ethnic Danish people on October 1st, 2005.
- ^ The 2000 American census reports that the United States, in the 2000 census, has 1,430,897 inhabitants of Danish ancestry.
- ^ (List of Canadians by ethnicity, 2001 figure)
- ^ The ABS estimates in a 2003 study that there are between 50,000 and 150,000 people claiming Danish ancestry living in Australia. The middle number has been used, and no change since 03 has been assumed.
- ^ National minorities at the Federal Foreign Office of Germany
- ^ Statistics Sweden
- ^ Spanish National Statistics Institute
- ^ The CIA World Factbook reports that Greenland, in a July 2005 estimate, has 56,375 inhabitants. The share of Danes was in 2000 estimated to be just below 12%. Taking for granted that the two ethnic groups have developed equally from 2000 to 2005, this adds up to an estimate just below 6765 Danish people in July 2005.
- ^ Statistics New Zealand
- ^ [1]
