Baltic statesThe Baltic states or the Baltic countries is a geopolitical term, which currently is used to group three countries: Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. All three countries are members of NATO, the European Union, the Eurozone, and the OECD. The three sovereign states on the eastern coast of the Baltic Sea are sometimes referred to as the "Baltic nations", less often and in historical circumstances also as the "Baltic republics", the "Baltic lands", or simply the Baltics.
Frisian languagesThe Frisian languages (ˈfriːʒən or ˈfrɪziən ) are a closely related group of West Germanic languages, spoken by about 500,000 Frisian people, who live on the southern fringes of the North Sea in the Netherlands and Germany. The Frisian languages are the closest living language group to the Anglic languages; the two groups make up the Anglo-Frisian languages group and together with the Low German dialects these form the North Sea Germanic languages.
LatviaLatvia (ˈlætviə , ˈlɑːtviə ; Latvija ˈlatvija; Latveja; Lețmō), officially the Republic of Latvia (Latvijas Republika, Latvejas Republika, Lețmō Vabāmō), is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the Baltic states. It borders Estonia to the north, Lithuania to the south, Russia to the east, and Belarus to the southeast and shares a maritime border with Sweden to the west. Latvia covers an area of , with a population of 1.9 million. The country has a temperate seasonal climate.
Lübeck lawThe Lübeck law (Lübisches (Stadt)Recht) was the family of codified municipal law developed at Lübeck, which became a free imperial city in 1226 and is located in present-day Schleswig-Holstein. It was the second most prevalent form of municipal law in medieval and early modern Germany next to the Magdeburg Law. Lübeck Law provided for municipal self-government and self-administration yet did not negate dependence upon a lord, be it a bishop, duke, king or, in Lübeck's case, an emperor.
BirkaBirka (Birca in medieval sources), on the island of Björkö (lit. "Birch Island") in present-day Sweden, was an important Viking Age trading center which handled goods from Scandinavia as well as many parts of the European continent and the Orient. Björkö is located in Lake Mälaren, 30 kilometers west of contemporary Stockholm, in the municipality of Ekerö. Birka was founded around AD 750 and it flourished for more than 200 years. It was abandoned c. AD 975, around the same time Sigtuna was founded as a Christian town some 35 km to the northeast.
RostockRostock (ˈʁɔstɔk), officially the Hanseatic and University City of Rostock (Hanse- und Universitätsstadt Rostock), is the largest city in the German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and lies in the Mecklenburgian part of the state, close to the border with Pomerania. With around 208,000 inhabitants, it is the third-largest city on the German Baltic coast after Kiel and Lübeck, the eighth-largest city in the area of former East Germany, as well as the 39th-largest city of Germany.
TartuTartu is the second largest city in Estonia after Tallinn. Tartu has a population of 97,435 (as of 2023). It is southeast of Tallinn and 245 kilometres (152 miles) northeast of Riga, Latvia. Tartu lies on the Emajõgi river, which connects the two largest lakes in Estonia, Lake Võrtsjärv and Lake Peipus. From the 13th century until the end of the 19th century, Tartu was known in most of the world by variants of its historical name Dorpat.
Estonian languageEstonian (eesti keel ˈeːsjti ˈkeːl) is a Finnic language and the official language of Estonia. It is written in the Latin script, and is the first language of the majority of the country's population; it is also an official language of the European Union. Estonian is spoken natively by about 1.1 million people; 922,000 people in Estonia, and 160,000 elsewhere. Estonian language belongs to the Finnic branch of the Uralic language family. Other Finnic languages include Finnish and some minority languages spoken around the Baltic Sea and in northwestern Russia.
Kalmar UnionThe Kalmar Union (Danish, Norwegian, and Kalmarunionen; Kalmarin unioni; Icelandic: Kalmarsambandið; Unio Calmariensis) was a personal union in Scandinavia, agreed at Kalmar in Sweden, that from 1397 to 1523 joined under a single monarch the three kingdoms of Denmark, Sweden (then including much of present-day Finland), and Norway, together with Norway's overseas colonies (then including Iceland, Greenland, the Faroe Islands, and the Northern Isles of Orkney and Shetland).
MalmöMalmö (ˈmælmoʊ,_ˈmɑːlmɜː, ˈmâlːmøː; Malmø ˈmælmˌøˀ) is the largest city in the Swedish county (län) of Scania (Skåne). It is the third-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm and Gothenburg, and the sixth-largest city in the Nordic region, with a municipal population of 357,377 in 2022. The Malmö Metropolitan Region is home to over 700,000 people, and the Öresund Region, which includes Malmö and Copenhagen, is home to 4 million people. Malmö was one of the earliest-industrialised and most-industrialised towns in Scandinavia, and it struggled to adapt to post-industrialism.
