Expressing the 'Top-Flex Identity!
Saga times in the Faroe Islands 🇫🇴 have largely been represented with a certain choral signature typical of the Faroese language.
Grani bar gullið av heiði, brá hann sínum brandi av reiði, Sjúrður vá á orminum, Grani bar gullið av heiði.
The Nordic cross flag design is predominantly associated with the countries and regions of Finland 🇫🇮, Sweden 🇸🇪, Norway 🇳🇴, Denmark 🇩🇰, Iceland 🇮🇸, the Åland Islands 🇦🇽, and the Faroe Islands 🇫🇴. However, Nordic cross flag designs also exist for regional flags such as the Norwegian flag of Trøndelag or the Scottish Counties of Orkney and Shetland.
The Nordic cross refers to the cross that symbolizes Christianity in the flag of Denmark and in all flags derived from the Danish flag design. The colors may vary based on the particular nation; however, every nation provides a clear and distinct approach to identical flag designs as appropriate for representing the nations in question.
The North Sea is home to the Orkney, Shetland, and Faroe Island territories. Orkney and Shetland are today part of Scotland, while the Faroe Islands are today part of Denmark. However, all three (3) island chains effectively appear the same geographically, with mostly cultural differences separating the three island chains. The Orkney Islands are the furthest south and are immediately north of Caithness on the Scottish mainland, while the Shetland Islands to the north represent the northernmost territory associated with Scotland and the United Kingdom as a whole. The Faroe Islands, however, are a territory of Denmark with relative autonomy, such as the island region opting out of the European Union to protect associated fisheries and related Faroese cultural traits.
The Orkney and Shetland Islands of Scotland are around 21,000 to 22,000 residents by population per territory, while the Faroe Islands are around 59,000 residents by population. Just as the islands themselves are on the relatively smaller and more isolated side, the overseas territorial populations are similarly small, with similar population dynamics also occurring in the significantly larger Iceland (population approximately 390,000).
The Faroese Chain Dance refers to one of perhaps the only dances to have remained intact since the Middle Ages, with a communal dancing pattern and effectively a circle focused on the right arms of participants. The chain dance associated with the Faroe Islands 🇫🇴 involves significant movement and adherence to Medieval 🏰 traditions in numerous categories, including the presence of the entire community in question.
The Faroese Chain Dance is typically used in Faroese tunes, especially traditionally. Though such tunes exist in the Faroe Islands that do not revolve around the aforementioned chain dancing, the vast majority of Faroese tunes represents the proper Faroese cultural traditions.
Iceland is an isolated country, often associated with Scandinavia though physically located far from the Scandinavian mainland. Unlike the mainland Scandinavian Peninsula, Iceland maintains a more conservative Norse identity thanks to contact difficulties between the island and the mainland(s) in any direction. Significant distances are required to identify land that does not belong to Iceland in any direction, whether toward Greenland (not very populated), Scotland (culturally distinct), or Norway (in which Iceland was once associated as part of the Kingdom of Denmark-Norway).
The East Iceland community of Seyðisfjörður is accessible by MS Norröna ferry service, more commonly renowned for connections to the Faroe Islands including the capital at Tórshavn. The European mainland is also connected by way of the community of Hirtshals in northern Denmark, approaching Norway along the Skaggerak and the Kattegat.
Though the regions listed are not included within the general definition of the European Union, each region is identified as an overseas territory of a sovereign state in the EU, albeit with varying levels of autonomy depending on the specific case.
Of the Overseas Countries and Territories of the Member States of the European Union, the regions that are included within the EU are referred to as the Outermost Regions, while the regions not included are referred to as the Overseas Countries and Territories. Therefore, the regions not already identified as Outermost Regions should be listed within the remainder of the article:
On the Mercator projection, the territory of Greenland is often distorted relative to the entire continent of Africa. However, the true size of the island of Greenland is far from continental, even with relation to the physical land area of Australia, which can indeed be classified as continental. While Greenland is simply part of North America, the entire territory is currently under the Kingdom of Denmark, along with the Faroe Islands further southeast toward metropolitan Denmark. One of the most gender-inclusive and LGBTQIA+-friendly regions globally, the Kingdom of Denmark has played a large role in providing counterweights to heteronormativity, with the island of Greenland expanding on the aforementioned counterweights in numerous regards.
While the short answer to the question posed is a clear and obvious “no,” with the fixed national and international borders of the modern day, portions of Scotland have indeed been considered at least somewhat Nordic in the past. If the Faroe Islands of Denmark can be considered Nordic, then so can the Shetland and Orkney Islands, both included within Scotland. Even further south are the Counties of Caithness and Sutherland, with Sutherland identifiable with a saltire overlaid on a Nordic cross on the modern flag.
Today, the Shetland Islands continue to celebrate the associated Nordic heritage of the region with a Nordic cross flag, white on the inside and blue on the outside. Though the flag is effectively inverted from the Finnish flag, the Shetland blue is supposed to be somewhat brighter than the Finnish blue, and the Shetland cross may be thinner as well, more akin to the Danish flag. Historically associated with the Kingdom of Norway and with general Norwegian rule, the region continues to represent a crossroads between modern Iceland, modern Norway, and the northern edge of the mainland of Scotland. Today, the county town of the Shetland Islands is known as Lerwick, also at least partly representative of the Nordic heritage of the region and general area.
To the south of the Shetland Islands are the Orkney Islands. While the modern population of the British Isles would not consider the Orkney Islands directly part of the Nordic realm, the historical context of the Orkney Islands was also related to the geographical position of the islands relative to the Scottish mainland. Immediately off the coast of Caithness, the Orkney Islands are perhaps most prominently identified by the county town of Kirkwall. If the Shetland Islands can be considered Nordic, then the Orkney Island culture may be identified quite similarly, though the Viking heritage of the general region has largely been diluted after over a millennium, firmly establishing the Orkney Islands as identifying within modern Scotland even if geographically more akin to the Faroe Islands of Denmark.
The two northernmost counties on the Scottish mainland, north even of the Hebrides on the west coast of the country, are Caithness and Sutherland. While Caithness represents the absolute northernmost portion of the Island of Great Britain and uses Wick as the county town, Sutherland is located primarily to the south and west and is named using Norse terminology for “southern land” from the vantage points of either Caithness or the Orkney Islands.
There currently exist five (5) distinct Nordic nations, recognized by their distinctive Nordic cross flag shapes. These countries are Denmark 🇩🇰, Norway 🇳🇴, Sweden 🇸🇪, Iceland 🇮🇸, and Finland 🇫🇮, just to name sovereign states. Outlying territories which also contain the Nordic crosses also include the Faroe Islands 🇫🇴 of Denmark and the Åland Islands 🇦🇽 of Finland.
Unfortunately, the previous post could not cover the entirety of the different subnational regions, but could only cover the specific regions of the British Isles and the Romance nations. This post is specifically dedicated to the nations of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria, Iceland, Denmark, Norway, and Sweden.
While the Nordic countries are perhaps most notable in the modern world for sharing a common symbol, the Nordic cross, amongst the flags of the associated nations and regional identities, each country also maintains a clear and present national identity of pride, even in spite of surface and historical similarities such as the traditional Kalmar Union of Sweden and Denmark-Norway.
From the Anglosphere, the Nordic countries are of particular interest as often representing the easiest foreign languages to learn, particularly because of shared basic vocabulary and grammar rules, even though the English language is linguistically more similar to the Dutch and German languages than to the languages further north in the European continent. Today, the English language, though often inheriting vocabulary from French and occasionally other Romance languages, continues to represent the Germanic linguistic roots as with the Viking communities, whom were also considered Germanic. Eventually, Old English and Old Norse were effectively identified as slightly different languages, though over a millennium of divergence has resulted in significant deviations between the English and Nordic languages. Even the orthographies are no longer of particular similarities, though Icelandic people are occasionally recorded, perhaps mistakenly, as speaking Old English.
While Scotland 🏴 is not a strictly Nordic country, centuries of rule by the Norwegians and other historic Nordic groups north of the Teutonic peoples have resulted in special Nordic treatment for the Shetland Islands, the Orkney Islands, and the Counties of Caithness and Sutherland, all from north to south. To the west are the Inner and Outer Hebrides, including notable islands such as the Isles of Skye, Barra, and the Uists, just to name a few.
Today, the Nordic Cross is featured as the most prominent feature on the flags of Shetland and Orkney, while the Flag of Caithness adds a galley to symbolize the county atop the flag design. Sutherland also adds additional symbols, further deviating the flag design from the general Nordic cross.
Of the three constituent territories of the Kingdom of Denmark, Greenland is actually the largest in terms of land area. Greenland is also the northernmost and only constituent territory to extend into the Arctic, though Greenland also extends somewhat further south and overlaps Iceland 🇮🇸 in latitude.
The Kingdom of Denmark has had numerous historical connections, including by way of Denmark-Norway, as well as to the remainder of the Scandinavian region of Northern Europe, as well as the outer constituencies of the Faroe Islands and Greenland. Iceland has also been included prior to around World War II (WWII).
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