106-614: Scania , also known by its native name of Skåne ( Swedish: [ˈskôːnɛ] ), is the southernmost of the historical provinces ( landskap ) of Sweden . Located in the south tip of the geographical region of Götaland , the province is roughly conterminous with Skåne County , created in 1997. Like the other historical provinces of Sweden, Scania still features in colloquial speech and in cultural references, and can therefore not be regarded as an archaic concept. Within Scania there are 33 municipalities that are autonomous within
212-464: A Pomeranian griffin 's head. To distinguish it from the city's coat of arms the tinctures were changed and the official blazon for the provincial arms is, in English: Or , a griffin's head erased gules , crowned azure and armed azure, when it should be armed. The province was divided in two administrative counties 1719–1996. Coats of arms were created for these entities, also using
318-492: A Västanstång dragon and one with a Östanstång lion. The current arms for Östergötland (see below) were created in 1884. The current arms for Småland were created for the coronation of John III in 1569. The wild man representing Lappland was created for the funeral of Charles IX in 1612. Arms for Jämtland were created when Norway ceded the province to Sweden in 1635. Arms for Härjedalen were created later. The arms for Blekinge, Bohuslän, Halland and Skåne were created for
424-521: A sea level rise led to the complete drowning of Scania. Subsequently, marine sediments buried old surfaces preserving the rocky shores and hilly terrain of the day. In the Paleogene period southern Sweden was at a lower position relative to sea level but was likely still above it as it was covered by sediments. Rivers flowing over the South Småland peneplain flowed also across Scania which
530-727: A change known as Holtzmann's law . An epenthetic vowel became popular by 1200 in Old Danish, 1250 in Old Swedish and Old Norwegian, and 1300 in Old Icelandic. An unstressed vowel was used which varied by dialect. Old Norwegian exhibited all three: /u/ was used in West Norwegian south of Bergen , as in aftur , aftor (older aptr ); North of Bergen, /i/ appeared in aftir , after ; and East Norwegian used /a/ , after , aftær . Old Norse
636-601: A coat of arms had to be created for the newly acquired province, as each province was to be represented by its arms at his royal funeral. After an initiative from Baron Gustaf Bonde , the Lord High Treasurer of Sweden , the coat of arms of the City of Malmö was used as a base for the new provincial arms. The Malmö coat of arms had been granted in 1437, during the Kalmar Union , by Eric of Pomerania and contains
742-418: A different shape. All other lakes tend to be round, oval or of more complex shape and also lack any specific cardinal direction. Ringsjön , in the middle of the province, is the largest of such lakes. In the winter, some smaller lakes east of Lund often attract young Eurasian sea eagles ( Haliaeetus albicilla ). Where the sea meets higher parts of the sloping landscape, cliffs emerge. Such cliffs are white if
848-417: A female raven or a male crow. All neuter words have identical nominative and accusative forms, and all feminine words have identical nominative and accusative plurals. The gender of some words' plurals does not agree with that of their singulars, such as lim and mund . Some words, such as hungr , have multiple genders, evidenced by their determiners being declined in different genders within
954-412: A front vowel to be split into a semivowel-vowel sequence before a back vowel in the following syllable. While West Norse only broke /e/ , East Norse also broke /i/ . The change was blocked by a /w/ , /l/ , or /ʀ/ preceding the potentially-broken vowel. Some /ja/ or /jɔ/ and /jaː/ or /jɔː/ result from breaking of /e/ and /eː/ respectively. When a noun, pronoun, adjective, or verb has
1060-409: A given sentence. Nouns, adjectives, and pronouns were declined in four grammatical cases – nominative , accusative , genitive , and dative – in singular and plural numbers. Adjectives and pronouns were additionally declined in three grammatical genders. Some pronouns (first and second person) could have dual number in addition to singular and plural. The genitive
1166-629: A lesser extent, Malmö – identify primarily with their city, rather than their province. English and other languages occasionally use Latin names for the Swedish provinces. The name Scania for Skåne predominates in English. Some English exonyms , such as the Dales for Dalarna, East Gothland for Östergötland, Swedish Lapland for Lappland and West Bothnia for Västerbotten are common in English literature. Swedes writing in English have long used
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#17327977873281272-584: A long vowel or diphthong in the accented syllable and its stem ends in a single l , n , or s , the r (or the elder r - or z -variant ʀ ) in an ending is assimilated. When the accented vowel is short, the ending is dropped. The nominative of the strong masculine declension and some i-stem feminine nouns uses one such -r (ʀ). Óðin-r ( Óðin-ʀ ) becomes Óðinn instead of * Óðinr ( * Óðinʀ ). The verb blása ('to blow'), has third person present tense blæss ('[he] blows') rather than * blæsr ( * blæsʀ ). Similarly,
1378-474: A noun must mirror the gender of that noun , so that one says, " heill maðr! " but, " heilt barn! ". As in other languages, the grammatical gender of an impersonal noun is generally unrelated to an expected natural gender of that noun. While indeed karl , "man" is masculine, kona , "woman", is feminine, and hús , "house", is neuter, so also are hrafn and kráka , for "raven" and "crow", masculine and feminine respectively, even in reference to
1484-546: A regional parliament had been introduced by the Social Democratic Party 's local districts in Scania and Västra Götaland already in 1993. When Sweden joined the European Union two years later, the concept " Regions of Europe " came in focus and a more regionalist-friendly approach was adopted in national politics. These factors contributed to the subsequent transformation of Skåne County into one of
1590-476: A similar development influenced by Middle Low German . Various languages unrelated to Old Norse and others not closely related have been heavily influenced by Norse, particularly the Norman language ; to a lesser extent, Finnish and Estonian . Russian, Ukrainian , Belarusian , Lithuanian and Latvian also have a few Norse loanwords. The words Rus and Russia , according to one theory, may be named after
1696-608: A voiced velar fricative [ɣ] in all cases, and others have that realisation only in the middle of words and between vowels (with it otherwise being realised [ɡ] ). The Old East Norse /ʀ/ was an apical consonant , with its precise position unknown; it is reconstructed as a palatal sibilant . It descended from Proto-Germanic /z/ and eventually developed into /r/ , as had already occurred in Old West Norse. The consonant digraphs ⟨hl⟩ , ⟨hr⟩ , and ⟨hn⟩ occurred word-initially. It
1802-467: A vowel or semivowel of a different vowel backness . In the case of i-umlaut and ʀ-umlaut , this entails a fronting of back vowels, with retention of lip rounding. In the case of u-umlaut , this entails labialization of unrounded vowels. Umlaut is phonemic and in many situations grammatically significant as a side effect of losing the Proto-Germanic morphological suffixes whose vowels created
1908-448: A word. Strong verbs ablaut the lemma 's nucleus to derive the past forms of the verb. This parallels English conjugation, where, e.g., the nucleus of sing becomes sang in the past tense and sung in the past participle. Some verbs are derived by ablaut, as the present-in-past verbs do by consequence of being derived from the past tense forms of strong verbs. Umlaut or mutation is an assimilatory process acting on vowels preceding
2014-509: Is Härjedalen , though the borders are not quite the same. Administrative borders are subject to change – for example, several of today’s counties were created in the 1990s – while the provincial borders have remained stable for centuries. All the provinces are also ceremonial duchies , but as such have no administrative or political functions. Nevertheless, the provinces of Sweden are no archaic concept; they are still referenced in everyday speech and seen as culturally distinct. The main exception
2120-429: Is Lapland , where people see themselves as citizens of Västerbotten or Norrbotten , based on the counties . Sweden’s two largest cities, Stockholm and Gothenburg , both have provincial borders running through them: Stockholm is split between Uppland and Södermanland , and Gothenburg is split between Västergötland and Bohuslän . According to a 2011 survey, people in major cities – Stockholm, Gothenburg and, to
2226-477: Is among the most fertile in the world. The Kullaberg Nature Preserve in northwest Scania is home to several rare species including spring vetchling, Lathyrus sphaericus . [T]he present landscape is a mosaic of landforms shaped during widely different ages. The gross relief of Scania reflects more the preglacial development than the erosion and deposits caused by the Quaternary glaciers . In Swedish
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#17327977873282332-544: Is classified as Old West Norse, and Old West Norse traits were found in western Sweden . In what is present-day Denmark and Sweden, most speakers spoke Old East Norse. Though Old Gutnish is sometimes included in the Old East Norse dialect due to geographical associations, it developed its own unique features and shared in changes to both other branches. The 12th-century Icelandic Gray Goose Laws state that Swedes , Norwegians , Icelanders , and Danes spoke
2438-465: Is expected to exist, such as in the male names Ragnarr , Steinarr (supposedly * Ragnarʀ , * Steinarʀ ), the result is apparently always /rː/ rather than */rʀ/ or */ʀː/ . This is observable in the Runic corpus. In Old Norse, i/j adjacent to i , e , their u-umlauts, and æ was not possible, nor u/v adjacent to u , o , their i-umlauts, and ǫ . At
2544-403: Is found well into the 15th century. Old Norse was divided into three dialects : Old West Norse (Old West Nordic, often referred to as Old Norse ), Old East Norse (Old East Nordic), and Old Gutnish . Old West Norse and Old East Norse formed a dialect continuum , with no clear geographical boundary between them. Old East Norse traits were found in eastern Norway , although Old Norwegian
2650-790: Is generally not mountainous , though a few examples of uncovered cliffs can be found at Hovs Hallar , at Kullaberg , and on the island Hallands Väderö . With the exception of the lake-rich and densely forested northern parts ( Göinge ), the rolling hills in the north-west (the Bjäre and Kulla peninsulas) and the beech-wood-clad areas extending from the slopes of the horsts, a sizeable portion of Scania's terrain consists of plains . Its low profile and open landscape distinguish Scania from most other geographical regions of Sweden which consist mainly of waterway-rich, cool, mixed coniferous forests , boreal taiga and alpine tundra . The province has several lakes but there are relatively few compared to Småland ,
2756-492: Is higher than in any other region in Sweden. The Scanian plains are an important resource for Sweden since 25–95% of the total production of various types of cereals come from the region. Almost all Swedish sugar beet comes from Scania; the plant needs a long vegetation period . The same applies also to maize , peas and rape (grown for its oil), although these plants are less imperative in comparison with sugar beets. The soil
2862-529: Is more common in Old West Norse in both phonemic and allophonic positions, while it only occurs sparsely in post-runic Old East Norse and even in runic Old East Norse. This is still a major difference between Swedish and Faroese and Icelandic today. Plurals of neuters do not have u-umlaut at all in Swedish, but in Faroese and Icelandic they do, for example the Faroese and Icelandic plurals of the word land , lond and lönd respectively, in contrast to
2968-459: Is that the nonphonemic difference between the voiced and the voiceless dental fricative is marked. The oldest texts and runic inscriptions use þ exclusively. Long vowels are denoted with acutes . Most other letters are written with the same glyph as the IPA phoneme, except as shown in the table below. Ablaut patterns are groups of vowels which are swapped, or ablauted, in the nucleus of
3074-463: Is the main artery through the western part of Scania all the way from Trelleborg to the provincial border towards neighbouring Halland . It continues along the Swedish west coast to Gothenburg and most of the way to the Norwegian border. There are also several other motorways, especially around Malmö . Since 2000, the economic focus of the region has changed, with the opening of a road link across
3180-401: Is the only one of its kind using a heraldic coat of arms. It is also the same as the province's and the county's, but with a golden griffin's head on a blue shield. The 33 municipalities within the county also have coats of arms. The Scania Griffin has become a well-known symbol for the province and is also used by commercial enterprises. It is, for instance, included in the logotypes of
3286-557: Is unclear whether they were sequences of two consonants (with the first element realised as /h/ or perhaps /x/ ) or as single voiceless sonorants /l̥/ , /r̥/ and /n̥/ respectively. In Old Norwegian, Old Danish and later Old Swedish, the groups ⟨hl⟩ , ⟨hr⟩ , and ⟨hn⟩ were reduced to plain ⟨l⟩ , ⟨r⟩ , ⟨n⟩ , which suggests that they had most likely already been pronounced as voiceless sonorants by Old Norse times. The pronunciation of ⟨hv⟩
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3392-620: Is unclear, but it may have been /xʷ/ (the Proto-Germanic pronunciation), /hʷ/ or the similar phoneme /ʍ/ . Unlike the three other digraphs, it was retained much longer in all dialects. Without ever developing into a voiceless sonorant in Icelandic, it instead underwent fortition to a plosive /kv/ , which suggests that instead of being a voiceless sonorant, it retained a stronger frication. Primary stress in Old Norse falls on
3498-658: The Danish Copenhagen region at north-east Zealand , on the other side of Øresund Sea, is even more densely populated. The north-east part of Zealand (or the Danish Region Hovedstaden without the Baltic island of Bornholm ) has a population density of 878 inhabitants/km, most of Greater Copenhagen included. By adding the population of western Scania to the same of Metropolitan area of Copenhagen , then close to 3 million people live around
3604-826: The Great Belt . Regardless of counting a smaller area with higher population density or a larger one, the Øresund Strait is located in the largest metropolitan area in Scandinavia with Finland . In 1658 , the following ten places in Scania were chartered and held town rights : Lund (since approximately 990), Helsingborg (1085), Falsterbo (approximately 1200), Ystad (approximately 1200), Skanör (approximately 1200), Malmö (approximately 1250), Simrishamn (approximately 1300), Landskrona (1413), and Kristianstad (1622). Others had existed earlier, but lost their privileges. Ängelholm got new privileges in 1767, and in 1754, Falsterbo and Skanör were merged. The concept of municipalities
3710-587: The Jurassic and Cretaceous epochs led to the formation of hundreds of small volcanoes in central Scania . Remnants of the volcanoes are still visible today. Parallel with volcanism a hilly peneplain formed in northeastern Scania due to weathering and erosion of basement rocks . The kaolinite formed by this weathering can be observed at Ivö Klack . In the Campanian age of the Late Cretaceous
3816-535: The Latin alphabet , there was no standardized orthography in use in the Middle Ages. A modified version of the letter wynn called vend was used briefly for the sounds /u/ , /v/ , and /w/ . Long vowels were sometimes marked with acutes but also sometimes left unmarked or geminated. The standardized Old Norse spelling was created in the 19th century and is, for the most part, phonemic. The most notable deviation
3922-667: The Rus' people , a Norse tribe, probably from present-day east-central Sweden. The current Finnish and Estonian words for Sweden are Ruotsi and Rootsi , respectively. A number of loanwords have been introduced into Irish , many associated with fishing and sailing. A similar influence is found in Scottish Gaelic , with over one hundred loanwords estimated to be in the language, many of which are related to fishing and sailing. Old Norse vowel phonemes mostly come in pairs of long and short. The standardized orthography marks
4028-642: The Skåne Regional Council . Scania's largest city , Malmö , is the third-largest city in Sweden, as well as the fifth-largest in Scandinavia . To the north, Scania borders the former provinces of Halland and Småland , to the northeast Blekinge , to the east and south the Baltic Sea , and to the west Öresund . Since 2000, a road and railway bridge, the Öresund Bridge , bridges the Sound and connects Scania with Denmark. Scania forms part of
4134-562: The Viking Age , the Christianization of Scandinavia , and the consolidation of Scandinavian kingdoms from about the 8th to the 15th centuries. The Proto-Norse language developed into Old Norse by the 8th century, and Old Norse began to develop into the modern North Germanic languages in the mid- to late 14th century, ending the language phase known as Old Norse. These dates, however, are not absolute, since written Old Norse
4240-420: The counties of Sweden ( län ). Some were conquered later on from Denmark–Norway . Others, like the provinces of Finland , have been lost. In some cases, the county and province borders correspond almost exactly, as with Blekinge and Blekinge County . The island of Gotland is both a province , a county and a municipality ( kommun ). The only other province to share a name with a modern municipality
4346-668: The word stem , so that hyrjar would be pronounced /ˈhyr.jar/ . In compound words, secondary stress falls on the second stem (e.g. lærisveinn , /ˈlɛːɾ.iˌswɛinː/ ). Unlike Proto-Norse, which was written with the Elder Futhark , runic Old Norse was originally written with the Younger Futhark , which had only 16 letters. Because of the limited number of runes, several runes were used for different sounds, and long and short vowels were not distinguished in writing. Medieval runes came into use some time later. As for
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4452-557: The 11th century in most of Old East Norse. However, the distinction still holds in Dalecarlian dialects . The dots in the following vowel table separate the oral from nasal phonemes. Note: The open or open-mid vowels may be transcribed differently: Sometime around the 13th century, /ɔ/ (spelled ⟨ǫ⟩ ) merged with /ø/ or /o/ in most dialects except Old Danish , and Icelandic where /ɔ/ ( ǫ ) merged with /ø/ . This can be determined by their distinction within
4558-979: The 12th-century First Grammatical Treatise but not within the early 13th-century Prose Edda . The nasal vowels, also noted in the First Grammatical Treatise, are assumed to have been lost in most dialects by this time (but notably they are retained in Elfdalian and other dialects of Ovansiljan ). See Old Icelandic for the mergers of /øː/ (spelled ⟨œ⟩ ) with /ɛː/ (spelled ⟨æ⟩ ) and /ɛ/ (spelled ⟨ę⟩ ) with /e/ (spelled ⟨e⟩ ). Old Norse had three diphthong phonemes: /ɛi/ , /ɔu/ , /øy ~ ɛy/ (spelled ⟨ei⟩ , ⟨au⟩ , ⟨ey⟩ respectively). In East Norse these would monophthongize and merge with /eː/ and /øː/ , whereas in West Norse and its descendants
4664-668: The 13th century there. The age of the Swedish-speaking population of Finland is strongly contested, but Swedish settlement had spread the language into the region by the time of the Second Swedish Crusade in the 13th century at the latest. The modern descendants of the Old West Norse dialect are the West Scandinavian languages of Icelandic , Faroese , Norwegian , and the extinct Norn language of Orkney and Shetland , although Norwegian
4770-463: The 1710 Battle of Helsingborg . In 1719, the province was subdivided in two counties and administered in the same way as the rest of Sweden . In July 1720, a peace treaty between Sweden and Denmark again confirmed the status of Scania as part of Sweden. On 28 November 2017, it was ruled that the Scanian flag would become the official regional flag of Scania. During Sweden's financial crisis in
4876-687: The European hardwood vegetation zone, a considerable part of which is now agricultural rather than the original forest. This zone covers Europe west of Poland and north of the Alps , and includes the British Isles , northern and central France and the countries and regions to the south and southeast of the North Sea up to Denmark. A smaller north-eastern part of Scania is part of the pinewood vegetation zone, in which spruce grows naturally. Within
4982-572: The Faroe Islands, Faroese has also been influenced by Danish. Both Middle English (especially northern English dialects within the area of the Danelaw ) and Early Scots (including Lowland Scots ) were strongly influenced by Norse and contained many Old Norse loanwords . Consequently, Modern English (including Scottish English ), inherited a significant proportion of its vocabulary directly from Norse. The development of Norman French
5088-633: The Iron Age was the Geats ; the main tribe of Svealand, according to Tacitus ca 100 AD, was the Suiones (or the ”historical Swedes”). ”Norrland” was all the unexplored northern parts, the boundaries and Swedish control over which were weakly defined into the early modern age. Due to the Northern Crusades against Finns , Tavastians and Karelians and colonisation of some coastal areas of
5194-596: The King’s long list of titles. Gustav Vasa’s title only had three entries – "King of Sweden , the Goths and the Wends " – so banners were created for each Swedish province for a better display. Some of these arms were short-lived, such as the beaver for Medelpad (changed in the 1570s), the wolverine for Värmland (changed in 1567) and the roses on Småland ’s arms. Östergötland was represented by two different arms, one with
5300-592: The Scandinavian Peninsula and formed the eastern part of the kingdom of Denmark. This geographical position made it the focal point of the frequent Dano-Swedish wars for hundreds of years. By the Treaty of Roskilde in 1658, all Danish lands east of Öresund were ceded to Sweden. First placed under a Governor-General , the province was eventually integrated into the kingdom of Sweden. The last Danish attempt to regain its lost provinces failed after
5406-613: The Scanian Pågatåg trains serve Markaryd in Småland. There are basically three ticket systems: Skånetrafiken tickets can be purchased for all regional traffic including to Denmark, while the Danish Rejsekort system can only be used at stations served by Øresundståg and equipped with special card readers. Additionally, Swedish national SJ-tickets are available for longer trips to the north. The E6 motorway
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#17327977873285512-527: The Swedish population registration and other statistical uses. In 1999, the county council areas were amalgamated, forming Skåne Regional Council ( Region Skåne ), responsible mainly for public healthcare, public transport and regional planning and culture. During the Danish era, the province had no coat of arms . In Sweden, however, every province had been represented by heraldic arms since 1560. When Charles X Gustav of Sweden suddenly died in 1660
5618-508: The Swedish monarch, in some cases for centuries. ( Norway , in personal union with Sweden from 1814 to 1905, never became an integral part of Sweden.) When Sweden ceded Finland to the Russian Empire in 1809, Västerbotten was divided up so that Norrbotten first emerged as a county. Eventually, it came to be recognized as its own province. It was granted a coat of arms as late as in 1995. Some scholars suggest that Sweden revived
5724-454: The Swedish names only. The origins of the provincial divisions lay in the petty kingdoms that gradually became more and more subjected to the central monarchy during the consolidation of Sweden . Until the country law of Magnus Eriksson in 1350, each of these lands still had its own laws and its own assembly (the thing ), and in effect governed itself. The first provinces were considered duchies , but newly conquered provinces received
5830-473: The Swedish plural land and numerous other examples. That also applies to almost all feminine nouns, for example the largest feminine noun group, the o-stem nouns (except the Swedish noun jord mentioned above), and even i-stem nouns and root nouns , such as Old West Norse mǫrk ( mörk in Icelandic) in comparison with Modern and Old Swedish mark . Vowel breaking, or fracture, caused
5936-399: The automotive manufacturer Scania AB and the airline Malmö Aviation . [REDACTED] Kingdom of Denmark 811?-1658 [REDACTED] Kingdom of Sweden 1658-present Scania was first mentioned in written texts in the 9th century. It came under Danish king Harald Bluetooth in the middle of the 10th century. It was then a region that included Blekinge and Halland , situated on
6042-534: The average of the temperature taken throughout both day and night unlike the more usual daily maximum or minimum average. This is done for specific measured periods of thirty years. The last period began at 1 January 1961 and ended at 31 December 1990. The current such period started at 1 January 1991 and will end by 31 December 2020. At that time it will be possible to with a high degree of mathematical certainty to measure possible climate changes, by comparing two separate periods of 30 years with each other. All three of
6148-541: The beginning of words, this manifested as a dropping of the initial /j/ (which was general, independent of the following vowel) or /v/ . Compare ON orð , úlfr , ár with English word, wolf, year . In inflections, this manifested as the dropping of the inflectional vowels. Thus, klæði + dat -i remains klæði , and sjáum in Icelandic progressed to sjǫ́um > sjǫ́m > sjám . The * jj and * ww of Proto-Germanic became ggj and ggv respectively in Old Norse,
6254-411: The cluster */Crʀ/ cannot be realized as /Crː/ , nor as */Crʀ/ , nor as */Cʀː/ . The same shortening as in vetr also occurs in lax = laks ('salmon') (as opposed to * lakss , * laksʀ ), botn ('bottom') (as opposed to * botnn , * botnʀ ), and jarl (as opposed to * jarll , * jarlʀ ). Furthermore, wherever the cluster */rʀ/
6360-430: The concept of provinces in the 19th century. Historically, Sweden was seen as containing four ”lands” (larger regions): In the Viking Age and earlier, Götaland and Svealand were home to a number of petty kingdoms that were more or less independent; Götaland in the Iron Age and Middle Ages did not include Scania and other provinces in the far south, which were then part of Denmark . The leading tribe of Götaland in
6466-415: The concept of the provinces. At the funeral of King Gustav Vasa (Gustav I) in 1560, arms for 23 of the provinces were displayed together for the first time, most of them created for that occasion. Erik XIV of Sweden modelled the funeral processions on those of German dukes , who in turn may have styled their displays after Emperor Charles V 's funeral, where a host of banners represented each entry in
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#17327977873286572-692: The country, Finland fell under the Catholic Church and Swedish rule. Österland ("Eastern land"; the name had early gone out of use) in southern and central Finland formed an integral part of Sweden. Russia annexed Finland in 1809, and reunited it with some frontier counties annexed earlier to form the Grand Duchy of Finland . In 1917, Finland became an independent country . The regional borders have changed several times throughout history with changing national borders. Norrland, Svealand and Götaland are only parts of Sweden, and have never superseded
6678-449: The diphthongs remained. Old Norse has six plosive phonemes, /p/ being rare word-initially and /d/ and /b/ pronounced as voiced fricative allophones between vowels except in compound words (e.g. veðrabati ), already in the Proto-Germanic language (e.g. * b *[β] > [v] between vowels). The /ɡ/ phoneme was pronounced as [ɡ] after an /n/ or another /ɡ/ and as [k] before /s/ and /t/ . Some accounts have it
6784-546: The early and mid-1990s, Scania, Västra Götaland and Norrbotten were among the hardest hit in the country, with high unemployment rates as a result. In response to the crisis, the County Governors were given a task by the government in September 1996 to co-ordinate various measures in the counties to increase economic growth and employment by bringing in regional actors. The first proposal for regional autonomy and
6890-627: The endonym Skåne is used in English. In the Alfredian translation of Orosius 's and Wulfstan 's travel accounts, the Old English form Sconeg appears. Frankish sources mention a place called Sconaowe ; Æthelweard , an Anglo-Saxon historian, wrote about Scani ; and in Beowulf 's fictional account, the names Scedenige and Scedeland appear as names for what is a Danish land. The names Scania and Scandinavia are considered to have
6996-437: The endonym Skåne is used in English text, such as in tourist information, even sometimes as Skane with the diacritic omitted. Scania (as also Dalarna ) is one of the few Swedish provinces for which exonyms are widely used in many languages, such as French Scanie , Dutch and German Schonen , Polish Skania , Spanish Escania , Italian Scania , etc. For the province's modern administrative counterpart, Skåne län ,
7102-414: The first "trial regions" in Sweden in 1999, established as the country's first "regional experiment". The relatively strong regional identity in Scania is often referred to in order to explain the general support in the province for the decentralization efforts introduced by the Swedish government. On the basis of large scale interview investigations about Region Skåne in Scania, scholars have found that
7208-400: The forest-dominated province of Småland . While the landscape typically has a slightly sloping profile, in some places, such as north of Malmö, the terrain is almost completely flat. The narrow lakes with a long north to south extent, which are very common further north, are lacking in Scania. The largest lake, Ivösjön in the north-east, has similarities with the lakes further north, but has
7314-496: The funeral of Charles X Gustav in 1660. The Arms for Norrbotten were created as late as 1995. Götaland ( Gothia , Gothenland ) comrpises ten provinces in the southern part of Sweden. Until 1645, Gotland and Halland were parts of Denmark. Also, until 1658 Blekinge and Scania were parts of Denmark, and Bohuslän was part of Norway . Värmland was counted as part of Götaland until 1812. Svealand ( Swealand ) comprises six provinces in central Sweden. Until 1812, Värmland
7420-500: The griffin motif. The new Skåne County, operative from 1 January 1997, got a coat of arms that is the same as the province's, but with reversed tinctures. When the county arms is shown with a Swedish royal crown, it represents the County Administrative Board, which is the regional presence of central government authority. In 1999 the two county councils ( landsting ) were amalgamated forming Region Skåne . It
7526-630: The larger part, pine may grow together with birch on sandy soil. The most common tree is beech . Other common trees are willow , oak , ash , alder and elm (which until the 1970s formed a few forests but now is heavily infected by the elm disease ). Also rather southern trees like walnut tree , chestnut and hornbeam can be found. In parks horse chestnut , lime and maple are commonly planted as well. Common fruit trees planted in commercial orchards and private gardens include several varieties of apple , pear , cherry and plum ; strawberries are commercially cultivated in many locations across
7632-399: The long vowels with an acute accent. In medieval manuscripts, it is often unmarked but sometimes marked with an accent or through gemination . Old Norse had nasalized versions of all ten vowel places. These occurred as allophones of the vowels before nasal consonants and in places where a nasal had followed it in an older form of the word, before it was absorbed into a neighboring sound. If
7738-408: The lowest ever recorded is −34 °C (−29 °F) ( Stehag , 26 January 1942) Temperatures below −15 °C (5 °F) are relatively rare even at night, while summer temperatures above 30 °C (86 °F) occurs once in a while every summer. Precipitation is spread fairly evenly, both across the province and during the year. Slightly more precipitation falls during July and August than during
7844-730: The most conservative language, such that in present-day Iceland, schoolchildren are able to read the 12th-century Icelandic sagas in the original language (in editions with normalised spelling). Old Icelandic was very close to Old Norwegian , and together they formed Old West Norse , which was also spoken in Norse settlements in Greenland , the Faroes , Ireland , Scotland , the Isle of Man , northwest England, and in Normandy . Old East Norse
7950-514: The nasal was absorbed by a stressed vowel, it would also lengthen the vowel. This nasalization also occurred in the other Germanic languages, but were not retained long. They were noted in the First Grammatical Treatise , and otherwise might have remained unknown. The First Grammarian marked these with a dot above the letter. This notation did not catch on, and would soon be obsolete. Nasal and oral vowels probably merged around
8056-533: The northern locations are at low altitude and fairly close to the Baltic Sea. Compared with locations further north, the Scanian climate differs primary by being far less cold during the winter and in having longer springs and autumns. While the July temperatures does not differ much (see table above). The highest temperature ever recorded in the province is 36.0 °C (97 °F) ( Ängelholm , 30 July 1947) and
8162-472: The number of municipalities, and a second subdivision reform, carried out between 1968 and 1974, established today's 33 municipalities ( Swedish : kommuner ) in Scania. The municipalities have municipal governments, similar to city commissions , and are further divided into parishes ( församlingar ). The parishes are primarily entities of the Church of Sweden , but they also serve as a divisioning measure for
8268-641: The other North Germanic languages. Faroese retains many similarities but is influenced by Danish, Norwegian, and Gaelic ( Scottish and/or Irish ). Although Swedish, Danish and Norwegian have diverged the most, they still retain considerable mutual intelligibility . Speakers of modern Swedish, Norwegian and Danish can mostly understand each other without studying their neighboring languages, particularly if speaking slowly. The languages are also sufficiently similar in writing that they can mostly be understood across borders. This could be because these languages have been mutually affected by each other, as well as having
8374-399: The other months. Scania is divided into 33 municipalities with population and land surface as the table below shows. There is a large population difference between the western Scania, that is located by, or close to Øresund sea compared to the middle and eastern parts of the province. A small part of Båstad municipality is located within the neighbouring province of Halland , this includes
8480-446: The prevailing trend among the inhabitants of Scania is to "[look] upon their region with more positive eyes and a firm reliance that it would deliver the goods in terms of increased democracy and constructive results out of economic planning". Electrified dual track railroad exists from the border with Denmark at the Øresund Bridge to Malmö and onwards to Lund . The latter part is consists of four tracks since October 2023. In Lund,
8586-603: The province (1676–1679) during the Scanian War and again briefly in 1711 during the Great Northern War . In July 1720, a peace treaty between Sweden and Denmark again confirmed the status of Scania as part of Sweden. The endonym used in Swedish and other North Germanic languages is Skåne (formerly spelled Skaane in Danish and Norwegian ). The Latinized form Scania is an exonym in English. Sometimes
8692-475: The province directly to the north. Stretching from the north-western to the south-eastern parts of Scania is a belt of deciduous forests following the Linderödsåsen ridge and previously marking the border between Malmöhus County and Kristianstad County. The much denser fir forests — typical of the greater part of Sweden — are only found in the north-eastern Göinge parts of Scania along the border with
8798-578: The province. Examples of wild berries grown in domesticated form are blackberry , raspberry , cloudberry (in the north-east), blueberry , wild strawberry and loganberry . Three of the 29 National parks of Sweden are situated in Scania. Scania has the mildest climate in Sweden, but there are some local differences. The table shows average temperatures in degrees Celsius at ten Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI) weather stations in Scania and three stations further north for comparison issues. Average temperature in this case means
8904-536: The root vowel, ǫ , is short. The clusters */Clʀ, Csʀ, Cnʀ, Crʀ/ cannot yield */Clː, Csː, Cnː, Crː/ respectively, instead /Cl, Cs, Cn, Cr/ . The effect of this shortening can result in the lack of distinction between some forms of the noun. In the case of vetr ('winter'), the nominative and accusative singular and plural forms are identical. The nominative singular and nominative and accusative plural would otherwise have been OWN * vetrr , OEN * wintrʀ . These forms are impossible because
9010-752: The same etymology. The southernmost tip of what today is Sweden was called Scania by the Romans and thought to be an island. The actual etymology of the word remains dubious and has long been a matter of debate among scholars. The name is possibly derived from the Germanic root *Skaðin-awjã , which appears in Old Norse as Skáney [ˈskɑːnˌœy] . According to some scholars, the Germanic stem can be reconstructed as * Skaðan- meaning "danger" or "damage" (English scathing , German Schaden , Swedish skada ). Skanör in Scania, with its long Falsterbo reef, has
9116-441: The same language, dǫnsk tunga ("Danish tongue"; speakers of Old East Norse would have said dansk tunga ). Another term was norrœnt mál ("northern speech"). Today Old Norse has developed into the modern North Germanic languages Icelandic , Faroese , Norwegian , Danish , Swedish , and other North Germanic varieties of which Norwegian, Danish and Swedish retain considerable mutual intelligibility . Icelandic remains
9222-523: The same stem ( skan ) combined with - ör , which means "sandbanks". Between 1719 and 1996, the province was subdivided in two administrative counties ( län ), Kristianstad County and Malmöhus County , each under a governor ( landshövding ) appointed by the central government of Sweden . When the first local government acts took effect in 1863, each county also got an elected county council ( landsting ). The counties were further divided into municipalities. The local government reform of 1952 reduced
9328-414: The same time, and developed its own provincial identity during the 19th century. Old Norse Old Norse , also referred to as Old Nordic , or Old Scandinavian , was a stage of development of North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and their overseas settlements and chronologically coincides with
9434-449: The soil has a high content of chalk. Good examples of such coastlines exist at the southern side of Ven , between the towns of Helsingborg and Landskrona , and in parts of the south and south-east coasts. In other Swedish provinces, steep coastlines usually reveal primary rock instead. The two major plains, Söderslätt in the south-west and Österlen in the south-east, consist of highly fertile agricultural land. The yield per unit area
9540-652: The status of duchy or county , depending on importance. After the separation from the Kalmar Union in 1523, the Kingdom incorporated only some of its new conquests as provinces. The most permanent acquisitions stemmed from the Treaty of Roskilde in 1658, in which the former Danish Scanian lands ( Skåne , Blekinge , Halland and Gotland ), along with the Norwegian Bohuslän , Jämtland and Härjedalen , became Swedish and gradually integrated. Other foreign territories were ruled as Swedish Dominions under
9646-523: The tracks split into two directions. The dual tracks going towards Gothenburg end at Helsingborg , while the other branch continues beyond the provincial border to neighbouring Småland , close to Killeberg . This latter dual track continues to mid-Sweden. There are also a few single track railroads connecting cities like Trelleborg , Ystad and Kristianstad. Just as five Scanian stations are served partly ( Hässleholm and Osby ) or entirely ( Ballingslöv , Hästveda and Killeberg ) by Småland local trains,
9752-517: The transnational Øresund Region . From north to south Scania is around 130 km; it covers less than 3% of Sweden's total area. The population is over 1,418,000. It represents 13% of the country's population. With 121/km (310/sq mi), Scania is the second most densely populated province in Sweden. Historically, Scania formed part of the kingdom of Denmark until the signing of the Treaty of Roskilde in 1658, when all Danish lands east of Öresund were ceded to Sweden. Denmark regained control of
9858-497: The umlaut allophones . Some /y/ , /yː/ , /ø/ , /øː/ , /ɛ/ , /ɛː/ , /øy/ , and all /ɛi/ were obtained by i-umlaut from /u/ , /uː/ , /o/ , /oː/ , /a/ , /aː/ , /au/ , and /ai/ respectively. Others were formed via ʀ-umlaut from /u/ , /uː/ , /a/ , /aː/ , and /au/ . Some /y/ , /yː/ , /ø/ , /øː/ , and all /ɔ/ , /ɔː/ were obtained by u-umlaut from /i/ , /iː/ , /e/ , /eː/ , and /a/ , /aː/ respectively. See Old Icelandic for information on /ɔː/ . /œ/
9964-482: The verb skína ('to shine') had present tense third person skínn (rather than * skínr , * skínʀ ); while kala ('to cool down') had present tense third person kell (rather than * kelr , * kelʀ ). The rule is not absolute, with certain counter-examples such as vinr ('friend'), which has the synonym vin , yet retains the unabsorbed version, and jǫtunn (' giant '), where assimilation takes place even though
10070-477: The village Östra Karup and some area around it, around 500 people live in Båstad municipality, but beyond the historical boundaries of the Scanian province. These figures can be compared with around to 21 inhabitants per km for entire Sweden . Western Scania has a high population density, not only by Scandinavian standards but also by average European standards, at close to 300 inhabitants per square kilometre. But
10176-558: The word ås commonly refers to eskers , but major landmarks in Scania, such as Söderåsen , are horsts formed by tectonic inversion along the Sorgenfrei-Tornquist Zone in the late Cretaceous . The Scanian horsts run in a north-west to south-east direction, marking the southwest border of Fennoscandia . Tectonic activity of the Sorgenfrei-Tornquist Zone during the break-up of Pangaea in
10282-514: The Øresund Bridge to Denmark . The car ferry service between Helsingborg and Helsingør has 70 departures in each direction daily as of 2014. There are three minor airports in Sturup , Ängelholm and Kristianstad . The nearby Copenhagen Airport , which is the largest international airport in the Nordic countries , also serves the province. Unlike some regions of Sweden, the Scanian landscape
10388-420: The Øresund sea, within a maximum distance from Øresund of 25 to 30 kilometres, at a land surface of approx. 6100 km (approx 460 inhabitants/km). This is in many ways a better measurement of describing the area around Øresund than what the far wider Øresund Region constitutes, as the latter includes also eastern Scania (whose beaches are Baltic Sea ones and is far less populated) as well as all Denmark east of
10494-404: Was a moderately inflected language with high levels of nominal and verbal inflection. Most of the fused morphemes are retained in modern Icelandic, especially in regard to noun case declensions, whereas modern Norwegian in comparison has moved towards more analytical word structures. Old Norse had three grammatical genders – masculine, feminine, and neuter. Adjectives or pronouns referring to
10600-400: Was also influenced by Norse. Through Norman, to a smaller extent, so was modern French. Written modern Icelandic derives from the Old Norse phonemic writing system. Contemporary Icelandic-speakers can read Old Norse, which varies slightly in spelling as well as semantics and word order. However, pronunciation, particularly of the vowel phonemes, has changed at least as much in Icelandic as in
10706-524: Was at the time covered by thick sediments. As the relative sea level sank and much of Scania lost its sedimentary cover antecedent rivers begun to incise the Söderåsen horst forming valleys. During deglaciation these valleys likely evacuated large amounts of melt-water. The relief of Scania's south-western landscape was formed by the accumulation of thick Quaternary sediments during the Quaternary glaciations . The vast majority of Scania belongs to
10812-460: Was counted as part of Götaland instead. Norrland ( Northland ) today comprises nine provinces in Northern and central Sweden. Until 1645 the provinces of Jämtland and Härjedalen were parts of Norway. In 1809, when Sweden ceded Finland to the Russian Empire , the old province of Lapland was split into Swedish Lapland and Finnish Lapland . Norrbotten was separated from Västerbotten at
10918-583: Was heavily influenced by the East dialect, and is today more similar to East Scandinavian (Danish and Swedish) than to Icelandic and Faroese. The descendants of the Old East Norse dialect are the East Scandinavian languages of Danish and Swedish . Among these, the grammar of Icelandic and Faroese have changed the least from Old Norse in the last thousand years, though their pronunciations both have changed considerably from Old Norse. With Danish rule of
11024-670: Was introduced in Sweden in 1863, making each of the towns a city municipality of its own. In the 19th and 20th centuries, four more municipalities were granted city status, Trelleborg (1867), Eslöv (1911), Hässleholm (1914) and Höganäs (1936). The system of city status was abolished in 1971. Provinces of Sweden The 25 provinces of Sweden ( Swedish : Sveriges landskap ) are historical , geographical and cultural regions. They have no administrative function (except in some sports contexts), but retain their own cultural identities, dialects and folklore. Several were administrative subdivisions until 1634, when they were replaced by
11130-535: Was obtained through a simultaneous u- and i-umlaut of /a/ . It appears in words like gøra ( gjǫra , geyra ), from Proto-Germanic *garwijaną , and commonly in verbs with a velar consonant before the suffix like søkkva < *sankwijaną . OEN often preserves the original value of the vowel directly preceding runic ʀ while OWN receives ʀ-umlaut. Compare runic OEN glaʀ, haʀi, hrauʀ with OWN gler, heri (later héri ), hrøyrr/hreyrr ("glass", "hare", "pile of rocks"). U-umlaut
11236-766: Was spoken in Denmark, Sweden, Kievan Rus' , eastern England, and Danish settlements in Normandy. The Old Gutnish dialect was spoken in Gotland and in various settlements in the East. In the 11th century, Old Norse was the most widely spoken European language , ranging from Vinland in the West to the Volga River in the East. In Kievan Rus' , it survived the longest in Veliky Novgorod , probably lasting into
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