Experience Note on my interest in learning German, Dutch, and Swedish to gain knowledge of specific aspects of the history of these peoples, particularly related to the History of Commerce (such as the Hanseatic League or the Kalmar Union, for example)

German town during the time of the Hanseatic League

Dutch trading with natives of North America

 1) Due to my interest in the Hanseatic League and the Kalmar Union, I started frequenting Amazon Sweden to find books that deal with these topics.

2) Unfortunately, the Swedish books that cover both the Hanseatic League and the Kalmar Union are older publications, which means I will have to import them directly from Abebooks.

3.1) Anyway, because of my interest in specific subjects, I began to be interested in books in German, Dutch, and Swedish. This allows me to read books written by specialists who write in these languages, to take advantage of what they have to say.

3.2) As for considering Holland, Germany, and Sweden as a home in Christ, as much as Brazil or even Poland, this degree of investment, inherent in this process of settlement which is based on the merits of Christ, is still far from reality. Many members of these societies still reject the Catholic faith as the real reason for being for these peoples, which makes my interest in these peoples relative to what they have done best, which is commerce, whether from the perspective of the Commercial Renaissance or the perspective of the expansion of overseas commercial empires in America.

3.3) For this reason, studying the history of these peoples in what they did best seems interesting to me, in order to gain knowledge of their historical experiences, since I will not be dependent on the academic know-it-alls we have in our universities, who only know how to talk nonsense.

José Octavio Dettmann

Rio de Janeiro, April 23rd, 2024 (original posting date).