Axel Olof Freudenthal
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Axel Olof Freudenthal (12 December 1836 – 2 June 1911), was a Finland-Swedish philologist and politician.
He was born in Siuntio, and studied at the University of Helsinki where the nationalistic movement struggle between the Fennomans and the Svecomans currently was raging. He would side with the latter propagating against the Finnification of the society. His main arguments were based on pseudo-racial theories such as "Aryan Germanic übermen" and "lower race mongoloid Finns". His ideas together with Rolf Nordenstreng later affected Third Reich pseudo-racial theorists, such as Hans F. K. Günther.
Freudenthal was appointed a docent in 1866 in Old Norse language and wrote his doctoral thesis on the dialect of Närpes in 1878. He was a Professor of Swedish language and literature between 1878-1904. He died in Helsinki.
His life's work was documented by Arvid Mörne in the book Axel Olof Freudenthal och den finlandssvenska nationalitetstanken (1927).
The Swedish People's Party issues a decoration named after him, the Axel Olof Freudenthal-medal . Many Silver and Bronze medals have been given to individuals since 1937, but only one Gold medal has been issued - to Elisabeth Rehn in 1994.[1]
