The unique region around the Baltic Sea unites dozens of completely different and at the same time closely connected countries, stretching from Copenhagen to St. Petersburg. The thousand-year history of these lands has experienced the sea voyages of the Vikings, the rise of the Hanseatic League, uprisings in the Scandinavian countries and the Russo-Polish wars. Sweden, Finland and Denmark, Poland, Russia and Belarus, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – modern states bear traces of these and many other events. Historian Caroline Boggis-Rolf tells about the political intrigues, divisions of territories, revolutions and dynastic crises that determined the fate of the Baltics and made them what we know today. "Since the individual regions of the Baltic region have an interconnected history, understanding the history of one country is very helpful in understanding the others… Despite the deliberate separation in cultural terms, the connections between the regions have always been preserved. On the positive side, one can name the exchange of goods, ideas and people, on the negative side – numerous local conflicts and rivalries. We will explore this contrast by examining the two sides of the Baltic region: on the one hand, a melting pot of cultures, and on the other, a small, tight-knit community with the usual tensions and disputes that occur within families and among neighbours” (Caroline Boggis-Rolfe).