The world championship handball in Croatia is occupying Denmark at the moment. Reports state that around 30% of the Danes saw the live-transmission of the final preliminary group game Denmark – Germany.
This is no surprise as the game is a true national sport which popularity is only surpassed by soccer and possibly cycling during the summer months. The popularity might be related to the common belief in Denmark that handball is a danish invention. Many sources state that the danish teacher, athlete and military officer Holger Nielsen invented the game in 1898.
The International Handball Federation doesn’t mention Holger Nielsen but writes on their homepage that a handball game was played in Nyborg (Dk) in 1897. They add however that ‘the real impulses emanated from Denmark, Germany and Sweden’. In this way they avoid any political issues, as for example the conflict in 1936 (reported on the site of the Danish Handball Federation) when the Nazi-regime in Germany claimed handball to be a German invention which lead to official protests from danish side.
Wikipedia sheds a little light upon the matter by explaining that there naturally were many versions of handball-like games and that ‘Holger Nielsen drew up the rules for modern handball in 1898 and published them in 1906 and R.N. Ernst did something similar in 1897. Another set of team handball rules was published in 1917 by Max Heiser, Karl Schelenz and Erich Koningh. After 1919 these rules where improved by Karl Schelenz”. The latter three being German.
So it seems that the official sources try to give credit to both the dane Holger Nielsen and to the Germans for taking up and developing the modern game of team handball.
Most Danes however say that it was a danish invention, just like many Dutchman might tell you that Laurens Janszoon Coster invented the printed press and many Brazilians know that Alberto Santos Dumond was the first to fly an airplane.