Kristine Dyrmann

Research

My research focuses on how the wives of a group of advisers to the Danish crown prince, later king Frederik 6 (1768-1839) participated in diplomatic practices and everyday political life. The crown prince and his advisers took power in 1784; from 1808-1814, Frederik 6 ruled as king of Denmark-Norway, then as king of Denmark from 1815. I am particularly interested in how the women of this elite political network engaged in practices of sociability and informal discussions related to Danish foreign policies during the time of transition that was the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars. My PhD dissertation was the first study beyond those focusing on queens to investigate the roles of Danish elite women in eighteenth-century politics and diplomacy. This research, and the project I am currently doing, is based on the close reading of archival sources – mainly correspondence, but also memoirs, journals, account books, and maps. I am interested in how women discussed matters of foreign and domestic policy amongst themselves through their correspondence, and in conversation with political actors, revealing their agency as integral to everyday practices of diplomacy. I am currently turning this research into a monograph on women’s informal political spaces and gendered diplomatic practices in late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Denmark-Norway.

During my previous positions in the heritage sector I have examined servants in eighteenth-century Danish country houses, investigating the hierarchies and everyday experiences of servants at two country estates. I also worked collaboratively with the museum’s curatorial staff to discover everyday consumption practices at an eighteenth-century country house, incorporating a study on embodied practices of recreating the historical dress of masters and servants within the museum space.

Talks and presentations

26 April 2024
“Women’s agency and diplomatic practices in Denmark-Norway during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars”, Gender History seminar, History Faculty, University of Oxford

22 March 2024
“Diplomatic dinners and salon sociability in Copenhagen during the revolutionary and Napoleonic wars”, Women & War conference, jointly organized by King’s College London and the University of Oxford, All Souls College, University of Oxford

4 March 2024
“Political sociability at the Danish court”, Research seminar presentation, Court Studies seminar, Jesus College, University of Oxford,

30 January 2024
“Salon Diplomacy and State Bankruptcy”, Linacre College’s interdisciplinary research seminar, University of Oxford

3-5 January 2024
“Friendly pastime or political network? The correspondence practices of Louise Stolberg, Charlotte Schimmelmann, and Sybille Reventlow in Denmark-Norway, 1780-1820”, The British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (BSECS) annual conference, St. Hugh’s College, University of Oxford

30 May 2023
Guest lecture to MA students from Leiden through the Europeaeum collaborative partnership between the universities of Oxford and Leiden

13 June 2023
Eighteenth-Century Literature and Culture seminar, Mansfield College, University of Oxford

30 May 2023
“Gender and Diplomacy in the Early-Modern World”, launch of special issue in The International History Review, Early Modern Diplomacy seminar.

25-27 May 2023
New Diplomatic History Conference, University of Turku, Finland

12-15 April 2023
European Social Science History Conference, University of Gothenburg, Sweden

14 November 2022
Early Modern Diplomacy research seminar, University of Oxford

15-16 September 2022
Before Suffrage: Women, Politics and Society in Europe, 1789-1850,CNRS Lyon, France

8-11 August 2022
“Dinner Diplomacy from the eighteenth to the twentieth centuries”, Nordisk Historikermøde, University of Gothenburg, Sweden

24-27 August 2022
“Bal, appartement, dîner: Political sociability among the elite in Copenhagen in the late 18th century”, Nordic Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies annual meeting, University of Copenhagen

17 June 2022
“Den gode historiske forskningsansøgning fra et early career-perspektiv”, History Faculty research programme, Aarhus University (invited speaker)

18-22 May 2022
“Political sociability and women’s agency at the Danish court, 1784-1797”, Monarchy in turmoil: Princes, Courts, and Politics in Revolution and Restoration, 1780-1830, Leiden University and Huygens Institute, Netherlands (invited speaker)

22-23 April 2022
Mothers and Fathers in the Premodern World, c. 1000-1800, University of Cambridge, UK

29 March 2022
“Sybille Reventlows selskabelighed og fremvisningen af Brahetrolleborgs herregårdslandskab o. 1789”, Danish Society for the Study of Castles and Manors symposium, Brahetrolleborg

9 December 2021
“Salondiplomati og politisk selskabelighed”, Fælles skandinavisk forskningsseminar i kulturhistorie, Åbo Academy and Turku University, Finland (invited speaker)

4 December 2021
LUMEN Centre for the Study of Lutheran Theology and Confessional Societies, Aarhus University (invited speaker)

25 November 2021
“Salondiplomati og politisk selskabelighed. Kvinders uformelle politik ved indgangen til 1800-tallet”, seminar om Kvinder, magt og politik i 1800-tallet, Centre for Nineteenth-Century Studies, Aarhus University (invited speaker)

28 October 2021
“Servants in eighteenth-century country houses”, ENCOUNTER online seminar, the Danish Research Centre for Manorial Studies

26 August 2021
“Guvernanten, ammen og huslæreren”, Nordisk Slots- og Herregårdssymposium, 2021 online seminar, the Danish Research Centre for Manorial Studies

19-21 August 2021
“Women’s political agency in eighteenth-century Denmark-Norway and a twentieth-century edited collection of sources: Gender, power and disempowerment in Danish historiography”, Nordic Women’s and Gender History Conference, Aarhus University

26-28 May 2021
“Salon diplomacy, neutrality, and revolutionary war: Charlotte Schimmelmann’s sociability in Copenhagen, 1789-95”, New Diplomatic History 4^th Conference, Aarhus University

24-26 March 2021
“Interior décor and neutral politics in a time of war: Charlotte Schimmelmann’s redecorations of Schimmelmann House in Copenhagen, 1789 and 1805”, European Social Science History Conference, 24-26 March, 2021, Leiden University, the Netherlands

10-12 December 2020
“The Court in The Countryside: Privacy and political sociability in the suburbs of Stockholm and Copenhagen in the late eighteenth century”, Privacy at Court? A Reassessment of the Public/ Private Divide within European Courts (1400-1800), University of Copenhagen, Denmark

15-17 August 2019
“Hvad er Landlivet i et Hofs Nærhed? Landsted og politisk selskabelighed i Stockholm og København i 1700-tallets sidste årtier”, Nordic Symposium on Castles, Country Houses, and Manors 2019, Danish State Archives, Copenhagen

14-17 July 2019
“The acquisitions of Count and Countess von Scheel between Copenhagen and their Jutland Manor House, 1750-1780”, International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies’ Congress, University of Edinburgh, Scotland

09-10 May 2019
“Account Books as Sources in Country House Research”. Book launch: Estate Landscapes in northern Europe. ENCOUNTER workshop, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen, Germany

20-22 August 2018
“Herregårdshistorie – museumsforskning, formidling og materialitet”, Danish Historians’ Meeting, M/S Maritime Museum of Denmark, Elsinore

11-12 June 2018
“Diplomacy at the spa: A Danish noblewoman’s encounter with the European elite at Bad Pyrmont, 1789-94”, Gender and Diplomacy Conference 2018, TORCH, University of Oxford

23-24 May 2018
“Flourishing children, dying children: Frederikke Reventlow’s notebook on motherhood in eighteenth-century Denmark”, Family, Memory and Identity Symposium, Aarhus Institute of Advances Studies, Aarhus University