Sweden in the Seventeenth Century Paul Douglas Lockhart Sweden in the Seventeenth Century European History in Perspective General Editor: Jeremy Black Benjamin Arnold Medieval Germany, 500–1300 Ronald Asch The Thirty Years’ War Christopher Bartlett Peace, War and the European Powers, 1814–1914 Robert Bireley The Refashioning of Catholicism, 1450–1700 Donna Bohanan Crown and Nobility in Early Modern France Arden Bucholz Moltke and the German Wars, 1864–1871 Patricia Clavin The Great Depression, 1929–1939 Paula Sutter Fichtner The Habsburg Monarchy, 1490–1848 Mark Galeotti Gorbachev and his Revolution David Gates Warfare in the Nineteenth Century Alexander Grab Napoleon and the Transformation of Europe Martin P. Johnson The Dreyfus Affair Paul Douglas Lockhart Sweden is the Seventeenth Century Peter Musgrave The Early Modern European Economy J.L. Price The Dutch Republic in the Seventeenth Century A.W. Purdue The Second World War Christopher Read The Making and Breaking of the Soviet System Francisco J. Romero-Salvado Twentieth-Century Spain Matthew S. Seligmann and Roderick R. McLean Germany from Reich to Republic, 1871–1918 Brendan Simms The Struggle for Mastery in Germany, 1779–1850 David Sturdy Louis XIV David J. Sturdy Richelieu and Mazarin Hunt Tooley The Western Front Peter Waldron The End of Imperial Russia, 1855–1917 Peter G. Wallace The Long European Reformation James D. White Lenin Patrick Williams Philip II European History in Perspective Series Standing Order ISBN 0–333–71694–9 hardcover ISBN 0–333–69336–1 paperback (outside North America only) You can receive future titles in this series as they are published by placing a standing order. Please contact your bookseller or, in the case of difficulty, write to us at the address below with your name and address, the title of the series and the ISBN quoted above. Customer Services Department, Palgrave Ltd Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS, England Sweden in the Seventeenth Century PAUL DOUGLAS LOCKHART © Paul Douglas Lockhart 2004 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. 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A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. 10987654321 13 12 11 10 09 08 07 06 05 04 Printed in China To my Schwiegermutter, Maria, and to my parents, Newton and Marilyn, with love This page intentionally left blank Contents Map of the Swedish Empire in the Seventeenth Century ix The Vasa and Pfalz-Zweibrücken Dynasties x Preface xi A Brief Chronology xiv Chapter 1: The Sixteenth-Century Inheritance 1 Resources, Demographics, and the Structure of Society 3 The Creation of the Vasa State 5 Geopolitics and War 13 The Vasa State in 1611 17 Chapter 2: The Reign of Gustav II Adolf 22 The Reconciliation: King, Nobility, and Nation 23 Constitutional and Administrative Reform 26 Military Reform 32 Chapter 3: Sweden on the World Stage: The Foreign Policy of Gustav II Adolf 38 Foreign Policy Goals 39 The Eastern Threats: Russia and Poland 41 The Background to the German War 44 The ‘Lion of the North’ 49 An Uncertain Goal 53 vii viii CONTENTS Chapter 4: The Interregnum and Queen Christina, 1632–54 56 Domestic Politics: The Regency and the ‘Form of Government’ 57 Changing Goals in Germany 60 Brömsebro and Westphalia 64 Christina: The Costs of War...and of Faith 67 Chapter 5: The Swedish ‘Power State’: Society, Culture, and the Burden of War 73 Paying for War: Economic Development and War Finance 74 Swedish Society at War 79 Cultural Life in the Stormaktstid 85 Chapter 6: Proto-absolutism or ‘Military Monarchy’? The Brief Reign of Karl X Gustav, 1654–59 91 The Polish War 93 The Danish War, 1657–60 97 Karl X Gustav and the Swedish Constitution 101 Chapter 7: The Swedish Empire in Louis XIV’s Europe, 1660–79 106 The Burden of Empire 107 Aristocratic Reaction: The Regency of Karl XI 112 The Early Reign of Karl XI: Constitutional Debates and War 117 Chapter 8: The Swedish ‘Absolutist’ State, 1679–97 123 The Imposition of Absolutism 124 The Absolute Monarchy at Work 130 Armed Neutrality 136 Absolutism and Swedish Society 139 Chapter 9: Epilogue 145 The Violent Death of an Empire 145 Analysis of Decline 147 Notes 153 Further Reading 169 Index 172 FINLAND JAMTLAND HARJEDALEN SWEDEN KARELIA NORWAY HELSINGFORS ND UPPSALA INLA F F INGRIA VASTERÅS F O NARVA UL G REVAL STOCKHOLM ESTONIA NORTH DORPAT SEA RUSSIA ALVSBORG LIVONIA HALLAND BALTIC SEA KALMAR RIGA DENMARK BLEKINGE SKÅNE COPENHAGEN LUND MALMO LITHUANIA KONIGSBERG STRALSUND DANZIG POLAND STETTIN Sweden in 1523–24, including Finland. Territorial changes 1632–54. Territorial changes up to 1568. Territorial changes 1654–60. Map of the Swedish Empire in the Seventeenth Century 1536 1531 = Margareta Leijonhufvud Catherina of Sachsen-Lauenburg = Gustav Vasa (1496–1560) regn.1523–60 1568 Karin Månsdotter = Erik XIV (1533–77) regn.1560–68 1592 1562 Karl IX (1550–1611) = Christina of Holstein-Gottorp Katarina Jagellon = Johan III (1537–92) regn.1604–11 of Poland regn.1568–92 Sigismund (1566–1632) regn.1592–99 (Sweden) 1620 1587–1632 (Poland) Maria Eleonora of = Gustav II Adolf (1594–1632) Brandenburg regn.1611–32 1615 Katarina (1584–1638) = Johann Casimir of Pfalz-Zweibrücken Christina (1626–89) Vasa Line regn.1632–54 1654 Hedwig Eleonora of Holstein-Gottorp = Karl X Gustav (1622–60) Pfalz-Zweibrücken Line regn.1654–60 1698 Ulrika Eleonora (1688–1741) Friedrich IV of Holstein-Gottorp = Hedvig Sophia (1681–1708) Karl XII (1681–1718) regn.1719–20 regn.1697–1718 Rulers of Sweden: The Vasa and Pfalz-Zweibrücken Dynasties Preface This is intended to serve as a brief introduction to the history of Sweden during its ‘Age of Greatness’. The attendant restrictions in attempting to summarize so complex a development as the history of an entire nation- state over a full century in such a short work, of course, force historians to either pick and choose those topics which they feel to be most important, or else to give a hopelessly superficial coverage to a wide array of topics. For obvious reasons, I have chosen the former course. My focus on polit- ical and diplomatic history targets the single most significant fact about Sweden in the seventeenth century: its rise to, and brief career as, an empire and a ‘great power’. I have endeavored to give social, economic, and cultural history their due place within this framework; but, as much of the most recent historical literature on early modern Sweden – concerned with such things as crime, gender history, and agrarian history – is not directly relevant to this theme, social historians may be disappointed. The task was intimidating in another regard as well. That early modern Sweden is not an altogether unknown entity to anglophone his- torians can in large part be attributed to the prolific, well-researched, and beautifully written works of the late Prof. Michael Roberts, a name that is undoubtedly familiar to the past couple of generations of early modernists regardless of their geographical specialty. Roberts’ published writings on Sweden date back to the mid-1950s, but though now quite old and entirely out-of-print they are by no means to be ignored. As Jan Glete has recently remarked, Roberts’ opus has become ‘classic’ rather than ‘dated’; his work is as well-respected in Scandinavia as it is in Britain and North America. His shoes will be difficult ones to fill, and that is not my intention here. What I have set out to do from the very beginning, xi xii PREFACE rather, is to bring together the results of the latest research in Swedish history into a cohesive whole. For these reasons, and for considerations of space, my notes and my bibliography are accordingly limited in scope. In the notes, I have restricted myself to citing – whenever possible – books and articles published within the past two to three decades; the bibliography is more of a list of suggested readings in English than a true compendium of sources cited. This, I believe, will probably be of greater utility to those who read this book. I should point out, however, that most Swedish-language monographs and many journal articles appearing over the past thirty years are accompanied by abstracts written in English, or on occasion in German. A couple of conventions ought to be mentioned from the start. Recently, Scandinavian historians have on occasion taken to the practice of using the term ‘Sweden–Finland’ when referring to the Swedish– Finnish core of the Swedish empire, and for similar reasons using ‘Denmark–Norway’ when discussing the Oldenburg monarchy.