Graenselandsportal/Grenzlandportal - Border Region Portal

This is a bilingual  internetportal on cultural themes in the Danish-German Border Region. It started as a project under the Danish Central Library in Aabenraa and was financed by the Danish National Library Authority (Biblioteksstyrelsen). In 2005 it was expanded  into a joint Danish-German project receiving additional financial support from the European Union. The German partners are the Landeskulturverband Schleswig-Holstein and the Nordfriisk Instituut.  

Until 1920 the Danish-German Border region constituted  a unity. Since that time the territories on both sides of the border have developed differently and their inhabitants possess scarce information about what is happening on the other side. In this portal, information from the two territories is presented as a virtual joint region. However visitors can choose between a Danish and a German language edition of the portal.

The portal supplies information from both the Danish and the German side of the present border on several themes:  

- education and science
- leisure time and entertainment
- administration, politics and infrastructure
- economic life  and tourism
- cultural activities and history  

The History of the  Danish-German Border Region

The historic and cultural region called Sønderjylland or Slesvig in Danish and Schleswig in German covers the southernmost part of the Jutland peninsula. It occupied the area between the Kongeå river in the north and the Eider river in the south.  Today the region encompasses the northern part of the German Land (i.e. state) Schleswig-Holstein and the Danish county,  Sønderjyllands Amtskommune.

Schleswig became a Danish duchy in the 12th century and remained a fief associated with Denmark until 1864. The German duchy of Holstein was also ruled by the kings of Denmark, but as a fief of the Holy Roman Empire. After 1815 Holstein became a part of  the newly formed German Federation. The central administration of both duchies was combined and located in Copenhagen, which was the capital of the Danish-Norwegian kingdom.

In the 19th century German liberal and national feelings were awakened. Schleswig and Holstein wanted  to form a single region within a united Germany, while a Danish countermovement insisted that Schleswig had always belonged to Denmark and should be a part of it. The national differences led in March 1848 to an open uprising by the German population in the duchies and a war between Denmark and Prussia 1848-50. In 1864 another war followed in which the Danish military forces were crushed by Prussia and Austria. By the treaty of Vienna in October 1864 Denmark had to cede Schleswig and Holstein to the two German powers, but after another war Prussia also won Holstein.

Under Prussian rule the Danish speaking majority in the northern part of Schleswig was oppressed and wanted a referendum to decide the future of the region. When Germany was defeated in World War I, the population was promised a plebiscite in accordance with the Treaty of Versailles. When the plebiscite was held in 1920, 75 % of the population in the northern part of Schleswig voted for incorporation in Denmark, while 80 % of the middle of Schleswig voted for remaining within Germany.

The line between the two plebiscite districts became the new Danish-German boundary, which divided the region. As a result of the new boundary, two national minorities organized themselves, - a German minority in Denmark and a Danish one in Germany. It should also be mentioned that there is a Northfrisian minority  in the southwestern part of Schleswig, who do not have a separate mother state.

The boundary was a matter of contention for decades until the governmental Copenhagen-Bonn Declarations of 1955. Since then many contacts were established across the border. In 1997 the co-operation between Sønderjyllands Amtskommune, the city of Flensburg and the German border counties Schleswig-Flensburg and Nordfriesland was formalised under the name Region Sønderjylland-Schleswig.