Page:History of the Literature of the Scandinavian North.djvu/357

Rh first power in the world, they also imagined that it had already been so in the past, and they persisted in persuading themselves of this imaginary fact. In the previous epochs already, Johannes Magnus had written a work which contained no history, but all fiction. Now, on the other hand, brilliant air-castles were built on a very weak foundation of facts, yet so skilfully that nobody, and least of all the authors themselves, ever dreamed of doubting their reality. Even men of comprehensive learning and of keen intellects, as they abundantly proved themselves in other branches of knowledge, allowed themselves in their historical works to be carried away by the most absurd fancies. Thus the royal antiquary, (1618-82), who distinguished himself by his excellent translations of the Swedish sagas, and whose antiquarian works were called by his contemporaries "the Ariadne-thread through the ancient monuments of the country," boldly maintained that "whosoever dared to doubt that the Goths who conquered Rome had set forth from Sweden should be punished as a criminal, and that any one who was heard to underrate the venerable age of the Swedish nation should have his head broken with runic stones."

This fabulous historiography was carried to its climax by the Elder (1630-1702). His special department was medicine, and he also studied anatomy with great zeal. Anatomy had been almost wholly neglected at the Upsala University, but by Rudbek it was developed into great prominence. At the age of twenty-two he discovered the system of lymphatic vessels so important in the science of anatomy, and this involved him in a violent controversy with the equally renowned Danish anatomist and scholar, Thomas Bartholin, who also claimed the honor of this discovery. They probably both made the discovery at the same time. Rudbek was a polyhistor in the true sense of the word, and