This book explores the appropriation of Oriental imagery within Danish and Norwegian 19th century nation-building. The project queries Edward Said's binary notion of Orientalism and posits a more complex model describing how European counties on the periphery -- Denmark and Norway -- imported oriental imagery from France to position themselves, not against their colonial Other, but in relation to central European nations. Examining Nordic Orientalism across a century in the context of modernisation, urbanisation and democratisation the study furthermore shows how the Romanticists' naive treatment of the Orient was challenged by increased contact with the 'real' Orient.