TarTu ÜlIkool ja Põhjasõda - Tartu Ülikooli Ajaloo Muuseum

SõJa mõJuSt aJaLoo kirJutuSeLe
student of the University of Tartu, Arvid Moller In addition to those
mentioned, again a variety of smaller publications of documents, orders,
letters, memories and pamphlets
It is difficult to explain this apparent lack of historical accounts.
Since most of the large chronicles of the 17 th century (such as those by
Moritz Brandis, Thomas Hiärn, Jürgen Helms, Gustav von Lode-David
Werner) were left in manuscript (Christian Kelch’s Liefländische
Historia being the notable exception) there was no surplus of printed
chronicles. There was also a noted interest in Western Europe for the
area under war as the publication of several introductory historical
works in the first decade of the 18 th century show (Daniel Hartnack’s
Kurtzer Entwurff Lieffländischer Geschichte, 1700 in Hamburg; An
Account of Livonia, 1701 in London and Description de la Livonie,
1705 and 1706 in Utrecht). In the Great Northern War the area
changed hands from Sweden to Russia, thus only local accounts from
the Russian viewpoint were welcomed by the government and for example
Kelch’s work praised Sweden Another explanation may lie in
historiography itself, the tradition of chronicle writing faded but the
new genres of historiography had not spread so soon after the war
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