FRIESIANS
 
The Friesians are
one of those tribes, that make it easy to report about them. They aren’t too big
and have nevertheless never “became extinct” (in German: untergegangen =
sunk). – So they at least didn’t “sink“ historically, as most Friesians
live in their old homeland at the coast of the North Sea/ the German Sea. In
permanent fights against the Ocean they have won land. Already 1000 years ago
people associated in “Deichgenossenschaften = dike co-operatives“ for this
purpose.
In front of the
dikes their land merges into the “Watt“ – where the bottom of the sea turns
into wide land with every fall of the tide. The streets in Friesland often
lead over old dikes. Most houses are build in brick. Already in Roman
times the Friesians were known as excellent cattle breeders, traders and
Sailors.
The history of
the Friesians reports about “Manndränken“, catastrophes in which big parts of
the population were killed by the ocean. Entire cities disappeared.
“Halligen(s)“ are
typically Friesian little islands, remainings of the loss of land to the
ocean. Big parts of the halligens get overflooded from time to time. Than it
looks, as if the houses stood in the ocean.
- And the “Friesian house“ is
something very typical. Like in Old-Germanic time, it’s a long
building in which the living section and an agricultural section exist under
one roof.
The flat land along
the coast is called “Marsch“. Behind it lies the „Geest“. The word means
„unfertile land“. The ground there is mostly sandy and dry. Once people were
mostly sheep-breeders and beekeepers there. Their land brought only poor
yields of rye or oats and later of potatoes, which had been imported from
America. But modern methods have changed this landscape very much in the 20th
century.
Like the Land, so
are people.
Okay ... the Friesians do also have humour. The East-Friesian: Otto Waalkes
Apart from that
the Friesians always proved to be unruly
- against nature, against
christianisation and against the medieval feudalism. There were even several
“Peasants’ Republics” already in the Middle Ages! Their love
for freedom gets also expressed by their famous motto: “Lewer duad üs
slav! = rather dead than slave“, which one can see below on the
North-Friesian flag.
Over the
centuries however more and more of Friesland went to bigger powers.
The special language
of the Friesians is still today very closely related to the English language
of their former neighbors. And also the motto “Ostfriesische
Gemütlichkeit: Es steht ’ne Tasse Tee bereit
= East-Friesian cosiness: A cup
of tee is waiting“ fits to this somehow ...
A Friesian tea-dishes-pattern
Friesians have
proved their special relationship to their old Homeland also in America. The
newspaper “Ostfriesische Nachrichten (since 1944 Ostfriesische Zeitung)” from
Breda, Iowa reported about Friesian information from both sides of the
Atlantic between 1882 and 1971. This Friesian German-American culture may
not sink in Lederhosen! …
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