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// Workers AI · dad joke modeWho's Knut Stjerna? A star player, he's stellar at everything.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Knut Stjerna
Black and white photograph of Knut Stjerna
Knut Stjerna
Born
Knut Martin Stjerna

(1874-03-14)14 March 1874
Malmö, Sweden
Died15 November 1909(1909-11-15) (aged 35)
Uppsala, Sweden
OccupationLecturer at Uppsala University
Known forArchaeology
Academic background
Alma materLund University
ThesisBidrag till Bornholms befolkningshistoria under järnåldern (1905)
Academic work
DisciplineArchaeology
Sub-discipline
Scandinavian archaeology
InstitutionsUppsala University
Notable students
Sune Lindqvist, Birger Nerman
Notable works
Analyzing Beowulf

Knut Martin Stjerna (14 March 1874 – 15 November 1909) was a Swedish archaeologist and scholar. He is notable for a number of papers analyzing Beowulf from an archaeological perspective. He was a lecturer at Uppsala University, where he taught, among others, Birger Nerman and Sune Lindqvist.

Early life and education

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Knut Stjerna was born on 14 March 1874 in Malmö, Sweden.[1] His parents were Johan Stjerna, the traffic director of the Swedish State Railways, and Matilda Johanna Grönlund.[1] Stjerna completed his secondary-school matriculation examination at the Higher General Secondary School in Malmö on 21 May 1892.[1]

Lund University

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On 6 September 1892, Stjerna enrolled at Lund University.[1] He received his bachelors degree there two years later, on 30 May 1894.[1] He then began work on his licentiate degree, also at Lund University, initially focusing on art history and literary history.[1] The teacher most influential for Stjerna was Henrik Schück; in his seminar on literary history, Stjerna presented his first major independent work, Erik den helige: en sagohistorisk studie ("Erik the Holy: a saga-historical study").[1][2]

Stjerna's paper on Saint Erik combined a comparative-literary methodology that was groundbreaking for its time along with uncompromising source criticism, and quickly attracted attention.[1] It was not necessarily popular, however.[1] Some historians called the approach hypercritical; reading the annual report for 1898, the secretary of the Swedish Historical Society said that Stjera's paper had "caused a stir" (gjort uppseende), and threatened "to dissolve many of our historical personalities into myths" (få många af våra historiska personligheter upplösta i myter).[3][1] Stjerna refused to back down in the debate that ensued, a stubbornness that would soon become characteristic of his scholarly career.[1]

The death of his father forced Stjerna to find work to support his family while he continued with his studies.[1] He found employment at the newspaper Sydsvenska Dagbladet Snällposten, where he was personally recruited by its editor Carl Herslow, and worked from 15 December 1900 to 31 December 1905.[1] Sterja was tasked with oversight over the newspaper's new Sunday supplement, and with maintaining contacts with representatives of science, art, and literature.[1] Approaching the work enthusiastically, Stjerna helped produce broad, culturally oriented supplements which were considerably modern in style for the period.[1]

Turn towards archaeology

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In his studies, meanwhile, Stjerna increasingly turned to archaeology.[1] Part of this was due to the intense opposition he had faced with his paper on Saint Erik; this caused him to question whether an academic career was realistically open to him.[1] He may also not have received the support he hoped for from Schück, who left for Uppsala University in the fall of 1898.[1]

In the autumn of 1901, Stjerna published his first independent contributions in Sydsvenska Dagbladet Snällposten, reporting on a visit to prehistoric rock carvings at Simrishamn.[1] Before publication, Stjerna sent these to the well-known archaeologist Oscar Montelius for comment.[1] Montelius appreciated the articles, marking the onset of a student–mentor relationship that soon shifted Stjerna's primary scholarly interests entirely towards archaeology.[1]

Stjerna, who was in intense competition with a student and rival, Otto Rydbeck, quickly completed the requirements for a licentiate degree in comparative archaeology.[1] He then worked feverishly to finish his doctoral dissertation.[1] Simultaneously, he began writing a series of articles on the Old English epic poem Beowulf, combining literary history and archaeology.[1]

Career

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Stjerna began teaching at Uppsala University in 1906, sharing responsibilities with Oscar Almgren, and took on a full-time position as lecturer in Scandinavian and Comparative Archaeology in 1907.[1][4] That same year he undertook a major archaeological excavation in Uppsala with his students, after construction in the city uncovered the remains of medieval buildings.[1] Stjerna's students at the university included Sune Lindqvist and Birger Nerman.[5][6]

Between 1903 and 1908 Stjerna published a number of articles about the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf. In 1912 they were translated into English by John Richard Clark Hall, who was also responsible for several early translations of the poem.[7] Stjerna's articles were credited with "providing a most welcome addition to the critical apparatus of the poem", by supplementing the meagre historical record with observations gleaned from archaeological research.[8]

Personal life

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By 1908 Stjerna's health was deteriorating, and in December he was admitted to the hospital with heart arrhythmia. He was discharged in March and resumed teaching, but died in November at the age of 35.[1]

Publications

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Stjerna published at least 23 works, several posthumous, between 1898 and 1911. They are listed on pages 265–266 of Hall's 1912 translation of Stjerna's works.

  • Stjerna, Knut (1898). "Erik den helige: en sagohistorisk studie" [Erik the holy: a saga-historical study]. Lunds Universitets årsskrift [Lund University yearbook] (in Swedish). 1. Lund: Lunds universitet: 1–34. Open access icon
  • Stjerna, Knut (1899). "Påfvebrefvet om Sankt Eriks korståg" [The papal brief on Saint Eric's crusade]. Historisk Tidskrift [Historical journal] (in Swedish). 19. Stockholm: Svenska Historiska Föreningen: 237–239. Open access icon

References

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Bibliography

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