Nordisk familjebok

Spine for the owl edition

Nordisk familjebok(Swedish:[ˈnǔːɖɪskfaˈmɪ̂lːjɛˌbuːk],'Nordic Family Book') is aSwedishencyclopediathat was published in print from between 1876 and 1993,and that is now fully available in digital form viaProject RunebergatLinköping University.The public domain editions of the encyclopedia remain important reference works in Finland, especially onFinnish Wikipedia.

History

First edition

First edition (1876–1899), featuringIdunlogo.

The Owl Edition (1904–1926), featuring its namesake as its logo.

Nordisk familjebokbegan whenHalmstadpublisherChristian Gernandthired an editor, linguistNils Linder,in 1874 to publish a six-volume encyclopedia.Linder drew up a plan for the work, designed the editorial team and created a large circle of experts and literary figures, who submitted article proposals and wrote and reviewed them. Under Linder's direction, the articles were then edited to make them as formal, consistent and accurate as possible. Much attention was paid to Nordic subjects, mainly Swedish and Finnish, where sources and models were often lacking, so extensive and time-consuming pioneering work had to be done. As a result, the earlier plan for the scope and publication period of the work was soon abandoned.

The first edition ofNordisk familjebokwas published in 20 volumes between 1876 and 1899, and is known as the "Idun edition" because it bears a picture ofIdun,theNorse mythologicgoddess of spring and rejuvenation, on its cover. This was published over almost a quarter of a century, and particularly the first ten volumes contain material which are not seen in later editions. A good example of this is found in the end of theBerlinarticle (which is included in the second volume, from 1878), where the author finishes his article by talking about the public decency and morality, which he finds to be very poor. The author continues by complaining about there being a very lazy interest in religious matters and concludes: "to all these joint circumstances, one can hardly defend oneself against the thought of future threatening dangers".

Linder was editor until 1880, when he was succeeded bylexicographerJohn Rosén,first archivist at theNational ArchivesTheodor Westrin,and B. F. Olsson.

Second edition

The second edition, popularly known asUggleupplagan(lit. 'TheOwlEdition') because of an owl image on its cover, was published between 1904 and 1926 in 38 volumes, and is the most comprehensive encyclopedia published in the Swedish language.A number of articles onSwedish Wikipedia,over 20,000, are based on this edition.

Third edition

The third edition had 17 volumes and was published between 1924 and 1937. Another three supplementary volumes were published in 1937, 1938 and in 1939. The supplement covers for instance theSpanish Civil Warand a heavy update onAdolf Hitler,but nothing aboutGermany's war on Polandnor arelater events mentioned.A second printing of the entire third edition was published between 1941 and 1944. Nothing essential is changed in the second printing, but quite a lot of one side portraits (still in black and white), coloured maps of "World cities", European countries, continents, Swedish provinces and cities are added together with a few topics, like a collection of national flags. All the added material are on unnumbered pages, presumably a technical printing solution (so already printed books did not require re-numbering). This edition is usually called "the 1930s edition" and are of brown colour when looking at them on a shelf.

Fourth edition

In 1942, Svensk uppslagsbok AB (later Förlagshuset Norden AB), the same publishing house that published the competingSvensk uppslagsbok,took over the rights toNordisk familjebokand published a fourth, highly concentrated edition in 22 volumes between 1951 and 1957.

Fifth edition

The fifth edition,Nordisk familijebook 1994,was published in 1993 byCoronain both a hardcopy, consisting of only two volumes, and a CD-ROM edition.According to the preface, it was based on the second edition of the larger workLilla uppslagsboken.

Copyrightson the three first versions have expired, putting them in thepublic domain;while the fourth and fifth editions, from the 1950s and 1990s, respectively, are still under copyright.

See also

• Nationalencyklopedin
• Nordisk familjeboks sportlexikon

External links

• Lars Aronsson's preface to the 2003 Digital Edition,accessed 2 September 2023.
• Project Runeberg's two digital editions of theNordisk familjebok(45,000 pages),accessed 2 September 2023.