Celebrating the End of the Polar Night, or: The Arrival of a New "Sun King" (A programma from Sorø Equestrian Academy, for the occasion of the King's birthday, 29 Jan 1767)

Abstract

The Lofoten-born historian Gerhard Schøning (1722–1780) is well known for his many works on Norwegian history, architecture and folklore. After graduating at Copenhagen University, he became one of the founding fathers of the Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences and Letters in Trondheim, where he served as the rector of the Cathedral School from 1751 to 1765. However, in 1765 he left his post at the northernmost town of the Kingdom of Denmark and Norway. From then on, he was a professor eloquentiae et historiarum at the Equestrian Academy at Sorø in Denmark, before ending his career as the head of the national archives in Copenhagen (1775–1780). On 14 January 1766, King Frederick V died. His successor Christian VII ascended to the throne, shortly before his 17th birthday, on 29 January 1766. It was on the latter occasion that the newly appointed professor Schøning published a programma to be read ahead of the solemn birthday celebrations for the young regent at Sorø Academy. The programma contains an erudite discussion of how the end of the polar night had been celebrated in Thule according to ancient sources. While the text primarily and ostensibly constitutes an exegesis of texts by both Greco-Roman and Old Norse authorities, it is interwoven with references to the arrival of the new king on the throne. The topos of the enlightened monarch is obviously playing an important role, in the sense that the celebrations at the end of the polar winter darkness in ancient times forges a symbolic harmony with the arrival of a new “sun king” and the on-going celebrations of his birthday. While not strictly a dissertation, the programma in question contains all the key features of a dissertation both in terms of length (16 pages), genre (footnotes, erudite discussion), language (Latin) and format (quarto), the only major difference being the overt references to the King’s ascendancy to the throne and his birthday celebrations, visible both on the title page and in the exordium of the short text. These facets allow for a discussion of the forms and functions of the programma vis-à-vis the thesis, or dissertatio, within early-modern academic institutions. Full title of the text: Solis in Septentrione occidui reditus festivus, sive de festo, post occidui solis reditum in Septentrione olim cel[e]brato PROGRAMMA, qvo serenissimi et augustissimi monarchae ac principis CHRISTIANI SEPTIMI, Daniae et Norvegiae, Vandalorum, Gothorumqve regis, ducis Slesvici, Holsatiae, Stormariae et Dithmarsiae, comitis in Oldenburg et Delmenhorst. prima post sumtas imperii habenas natalitiorum solennia, d. IV. Calend. Februar. faustis ominibus, piaqve et supplici votorum nuncupatione publice celebranda, indicit, ad eamqve rem, rite procurandam, orationem a Dno. JOHANNE ERICI, utriusqve juris professore. in freqventi auditorum coetu recitandam pronuntiat Academia Eqvestris Sorana, per GERHARDUM SCHÖNING, eloqventiae et historiarum professorem. Typis Regiae Eqvestris Academiae Soranae. Excudebat Jonas Lindgren, Academiae Typographus [1766]. Digitisation available at: https://www.kb.dk/e-mat/dod/130020757427.pdf