‘Os Selve Alene’ A Norwegian Account of the Easter Rising Andrew Newby Introduction The events of the 1916 Easter Rising were well covered in the European press. In many cases, though, syndicated copy from British newspapers was presented without additional comment, meaning that the revolt was presented as a minor skirmish. The influential Norwegian newspaper, Aftonbladet, however, took the opportunity to present a more nuanced account of the situation in Ireland, written by Carl Marstrander, the Professor of Celtic at the University of Oslo. This article contextualises Marstrander’s interest in Irish history and politics, and presents an annotated translation of his article, ‘Unrest in Ireland’. Marstrander: Life and Career: Carl Johan Svedrup Marstrander, later praised as ‘the greatest Norwegian linguist of the twentieth century’ (O’Corráin 2002, 69) was born in Kristiansand in November 1883. Marstrander demonstrated a precocious ability in languages from a relatively early age, and in 1902, he was awarded a place at the University of Oslo, where he pursued comparative linguistics under the guidance of Sophus Bugge and Alf Torp. In 1907 Marstrander made a decision which would have important implications both for himself and for Irish academic life: he won a scholarship to visit Ireland on a research trip and, in accepting this offer, he apparently forewent the opportunity to participate in the 1908 Olympic Games (Ó Luing 1984, 108; Kanigel 2012, 30- 4). Rather than pole-vaulting for Norway, Marstrander devoted his considerable energies to the study of the Irish language, and took up residence on Great Blasket Island, Co. Kerry, working under the tutelage of Tomás Ó Criomhthain(Ó Lúing 1984, 109-11; Quigley 2013, 44-5).1 One legend suggests that Marstrander introduced the pole-vault to the islanders by vaulting over Ó Criomhthain’s house using a currach oar, and he came to be known locally as Lochlannach, ‘the Viking’, but it was his language research that brought him to international prominence (Kiberd 2000, 521; Ó Giolláin 2000, 125). He spent five months on Great Blasket learning modern spoken Irish, as well as developing his Old and Middle Irish skills. In 1910, Marstrander returned to Ireland after being appointed to teach at the School of Irish Learning, which had been established in 1903 by the German scholar Kuno Meyer to promote the place of the Irish language in scholarship (Irish 1 Quigley argues that Marstrander’s ‘reification’ of Ó Criomhthain precipitated a steady and longlasting stream of linguistic ‘pilgrims’ seeking ‘authenticity’ on Great Blasket, placing a considerable burden on Ó Criomhthain in the process. Andrew Newby, University of Helsinki, [email protected] Studia Celtica Fennica XIII (2016), ISSN 1795–097X, © Finnish Society for Celtic Studies Andrew Newby Independent 2 Apr. 1910; Kanigel 2012, 40-1). In this capacity, Marstrander joined Meyer as co-editor of Ériu, and produced articles on Irish philology at a prodigious rate. The blurred lines between culture, politics and academia in Ireland at this time are further demonstrated by Marstrander’s friendship with John (Eoin) MacNeill, the UCD professor, Gaelic League stalwart, historian of medieval Ireland and founder of the Irish Volunteers (Ó Lúing, 1984, 121).2 As will be explored further below, Marstrander also seems to have been acquainted with Terence MacSwiney, although there seem to be few extant clues as to the origins, extent and nature of their friendship. Despite the admiration and loyalty which Marstrander engendered in some of his students, his editorial policy for the Dictionary of the Irish Language apparently caused a great deal of strife within the Irish academic community, and tension with Meyer (Mac Cana 1987, 1; Marstrander 1913-; Ó Lúing 1991, 109, 146; O’Dochartaigh 2004, 72). And so, in 1913 when he returned to Oslo to take up a Chair in Celtic Languages, a position created especially for Marstrander, he was somewhat alienated from Irish academia (Aftenposten 16 Apr. 1913; Ó Lúing 1984, 119). Nevertheless, despite a dearth of students, one of the academic outcomes of his new position was the ‘new intellectual rigour’ he brought to the study of interactions between Old Norse and Celtic (O’Corrain 2002, 69; Oftedal 1982, 14). In September 1914 he married Audhild Sverdrup, daughter of the polar explorer Otto Sverdrup, and in time the couple had three children (Ó Lúing 1984, 120-1). In 1915 he published Bidrag til det norsk sprogs historie i Irland, and subsequently engaged in or oversaw similarly influential research on Marx, Breton and Scots Gaelic (Marstrander 1915; Marstrander 1932; Geipel 1971, 83-4; Le Bris & Widerøe 2010, 169-82). Marstrander also took a political and historical interest in the status of Greenland (Marstrander 1932; Marstrander 1933). He participated in the Norwegian Polar Committee’s activities in claiming Eirik Raudes Land in 1941, part of a wider Norwegian attempt to make a historical claim for that part of Eastern Greenland (Barr 2003, 75, 218-22). There are interesting echoes of German propaganda around the Irish constitutional situation in 1916, in Vidkun Quisling’s claim that the defeat of Britain and the USA in World War II would return ‘Svalbard, Greenland, Iceland, the Faroes, Hjaltland and the Orkneys’ to their historical place under Norwegian rule (Barr 2003, 222). Marstrander’s personal antipathy for German imperialism seemed undiminished, however, and during the World War II occupation of Norway, Marstrander was one of the first academics to be arrested and interned by the German regime after making thinly-veiled satirical comments in an academic paper (Binchy 1966, 237-8). Described by his obituarist 2 Marstrander and MacNeill were elected to fellowships of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland together in September 1910. (Kilkenny People, 1 Oct. 1910.) 34 ‘Os Selve Alene’ A Norwegian Account of the Easter Rising in 1966 as a ‘fervent Norwegian nationalist’, he was arrested several times during the occupation, and used Old Irish as a form of code to baffle the Gestapo. It was said after his death that ‘to one who knew him only in the post-war years he seemed like a survivor from a finer and better era’. (Binchy 1966, 237-8). Norway and Ireland The Irish Question, of course, was not suddenly thrust upon the Norwegian public by the events of 1916. From the 1880s, the Home Rule issue piqued interest throughout the world, as the British Empire struggled with a constitutional crisis so close to its imperial core. Conversely, as one of William Gladstone’s suite of ‘workable examples’ of Home Rule administrations, Norway featured regularly in his political rhetoric, and indeed it is often argued that he embraced the Irish Home Rule cause after a yachting trip to Norway in 1885 (Fjågesund & Symes 2003, 192- 5; Walchester 2014, 66-70). Gladstone’s belief was that a nation’s internal self- government would strengthen imperial loyalty, rather than prompt disintegration. ‘The legislature of Norway’, he told the House of Commons: …has had serious controversies, not with Sweden, but with the King of Sweden, and it has fought out those controversies successfully upon the strictest Constitutional and Parliamentary grounds. And yet, with two countries, so united, what has been the effect? Not discord, not convulsions, not danger to peace, not hatred, not aversion, but a constantly growing sympathy; and every man who knows their condition knows that I speak the truth when I say that, in every year that passes, the Norwegians and the Swedes are more and more feeling themselves to be the children of a common country, united by a tie which is never to be broken.3 Unionist opponents attacked this rhetoric on two fronts: denying that the Swedish-Norwegian case was analogous to Britain and Ireland, as well as arguing that Norway’s national trajectory was heading inevitably towards full independence (inter alia, Scotsman 29 Aug. 1887; ‘Pactum Serva’ 1907, 17). An editorial comment in The Scotsman, for example, anticipated Norway’s independence sixteen years before it was actually achieved: …the cry of ‘Norway for the Norwegians’ is already heard. The inference from the experiment so far seems to be a strong presumption that the more nearly independent one of two united countries is the more it will long and strive for complete independence. It is more than probable that Norway and Sweden will be separated completely before Great Britain and Ireland are separated legislatively, so that if Ireland is given a separate Parliament in imitation of the 3 Hansard’s Parliamentary Debates, 3rd ser., 304 (8 Apr. 1886), cols. 1046-1047. In the Norwegian press see, inter alia, Bergens Adressecontoirs Efterretninger, 11 Jun. 1886; Aftenposten, 8 Jun. 1898. 35 Andrew Newby Scandinavian analogy, it will then be easy to use the same analogy in favour of Mr Parnell’s ‘last link’ policy. (The Scotsman 3 Aug. 1889). Like Hungary, Finland, and other ‘small nations’, Norway provided a model for cultural and political nationalists in Ireland (Gibson 2013, 28-9; Newby 2012, 71-92). The parallel was noted across the political spectrum in Ireland (Griffiths 1983, 150). The unionist Irish Times warned that ‘what might happen in Ireland is already happening in Norway and in Hungary’ (Irish Times, 1 Jun. 1905), whereas the moderate nationalist Freeman’s Journal argued that ‘the relations between [Norway and Sweden] are very interesting to Ireland, because they so closely resemble those between Ireland and England in the time of Grattan’s parliament’. (Freeman’s Journal, 25 Apr. 1905) As Norway celebrated its independence, Arthur Griffith was presenting ‘the Sinn Féin Policy’, based on his Resurrection of Hungary pamphlet of 1904. The dissolution of the Swedish-Norwegian Union was monitored carefully, and Griffith’s United Irishman condemned the British and Unionist wailing over the matter.4 He focussed on the inspirational effect that Norway’s example could have on Ireland: Norway has filled the stage of the world this week, and even in Ireland its greatness has been the topic of discussion.