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Abstract
Royal courts could profoundly influence other parts of government. While government bureaucracy has usually been seen as leading the charge towards new, more efficient and stronger centralised authority, this article demonstrates how the Swedish court acted as an engine in the transformation of the dysfunctional Swedish state of 1600 into something much more formidable. At the encouragement of monarchs, noble courtiers became more attentive in their service to the state, more educated, more diverse in their origins, and more skilled in the arts of war. But such change was not everlasting, and the article compares characteristics of the court at the beginning of the seventeenth century with those of the later decades — the Caroline period. In these years the court turned inward on itself, declining from a position of innovation and leadership to one of reaction and decay, more rearguard than vanguard.
Notes
1 Lunds universitetsbibliotek [hereafter LUB], De la Gardieska samlingen Ekebl.5.2, anonymous prophecy attached to a letter from Johan Ekeblad to Christoffer Ekeblad, Göteborg, 8 May 1658.
2 LUB, De la Gardieska samlingen Ekebl.5.2 Johan Ekeblad to Christoffer Ekeblad, Göteborg, 8 May 1658.
3 It is not clear who had put together the prophecy forwarded by Ekeblad. Several English astrologers, such as William Lilly, were of interest to Swedes. A copy of a prophecy by Lilly, very different from the above prophecy, is found in the Uppsala universitetsbibliotek, Nordin 1209.
4 Johannes Schefferus, Memorabilium sueticæ gentis exemplorum liber singularis (Amsterdam, 1671), translated by Birger Bergh as En bok om det svenska folkets minnesvärda exempel (Stockholm, 2005), p. 194.
5 Michael Roberts, Gustavus Adolphus (London, 1953), p. 94.
6 Sven A. Nilsson, ‘Reaktionen mot systemskiftet 1611. En linje i Gustav II Adolfs politik’, Scandia, vol. 20, no 1 (1950).
7 Lant Pritchett and Michael Woolcock, ‘Solutions when the Solution is the Problem: Arraying the Disarray in Development’, Working Paper 10, Center for Global Development (Washington, 2002).
8 Richard Swedberg and Ola Agevall, The Max Weber Dictionary. Key Words and Central Concepts (Stanford, 2005).
9 G.R. Elton, ‘Tudor Government’, Historical Journal, vol. 31 (1988).
10 David Starkey, ‘Intimacy and Innovation: The Rise of the Privy Chamber, 1485–1547’, in David Starkey (ed.), The English Court from the Wars of the Roses to the Civil War (London, 1987), p. 100. See also David Starkey ‘Court and Government’, in Christopher Coleman and David Starkey (eds), Revolution Reassessed: Revisions in the History of Tudor Government and Administration (Oxford, 1986), p. 56; and Robert Bucholz, The Augustan Court: Queen Anne and the Decline of Court Culture (Stanford, 1993), p. 3. See also Pere Molas Ribalta ‘The Impact of Central Institutions', in Wolfgang Reinhard (ed.), Power Elites and State Building (Oxford, 1996), p. 19.
11 Jeroen Duindam, ‘Royal Courts’, in Hamish Scott (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Early Modern History. Vol. 2 Cultures and Power (Oxford, 2015), p. 442.
12 Fabian Persson, Servants of Fortune. The Swedish Court between 1598 and 1721 (Lund, 1999).
13 Mats Hallenberg, Kungen, fogdarna och riket (Stockholm, 2001).
14 Tor Berg, ‘Nils Chesnecopherus’, Svenskt Biografiskt Lexikon, vol. 8 (1929).
15 W. Sjöstrand, Pedagogikens historia. Vol II. Sverige och de nordiska grannländerna till början av 1700–talet (Lund, 1958), p. 146.
16 Sjöstrand, Pedagogikens historia, p. 146.
17 ‘Om Omyndige Barns Förmynderskap’ (1649), printed in Bernhard Taube (ed.), Sveriges ridderskaps och adels riksdags-protokoll (17 vols, Stockholm, 1855–1902), vol.4:1, appendix E.
18 Jan Samuelson, Aristokrat eller förädlad bonde? Det svenska frälsets ekonomi, politik och sociala förbindelser under tiden 1523–1611 (Lund, 1993).
19 Ibid. See also Anders Kullberg, Johan Gabriel Stenbock och reduktionen (Uppsala, 1973).
20 Ingvar Elmroth, För kung och fosterland. Studier i den svenska adelns demografi och offentliga funktioner 1600–1900 (Lund, 1981).
21 Persson, Servants of Fortune. I have here taken the ‘old nobility’ to mean families who had been noble for at least four generations.
22 Björn Asker, Officerarna och det svenska samhället 1650–1700 (Uppsala, 1983), pp. 163-4.
23 By the titled nobility I mean those who were counts, countesses, barons or baronesses.
24 Sten Carlsson, Ståndssamhälle och ståndspersoner 1700–1865 (Lund, 1949), p. 71.
25 Fabian Persson, ‘“Dog utlefwad cammarfr.ken”: Det svenska hovfruntimret under stormaktstiden’, in Eva Österberg (ed.), Jämmerdal och fröjdesal: Kvinnor i stormaktstidens Sverige (Stockholm, 1997), pp. 306-33.
26 Riksarkivet [hereafter RA], Rådsprotokoll, 27 February 1665 by Secretary Franc.
27 Gunnar Artéus, Till militärstatens förhistoria. Krig, professionalisering och social förändring under Vasasönernas regering (Stockholm, 1986).
28 Sven A Nilsson, På väg mot militärstaten. Krigsbefälets etablering i den äldre Vasatidens Sverige (Uppsala, 1989), p. 17.
29 RA, Riksregistraturet, 10 November 1647.
30 Gustaf Elgenstierna, Den introducerade svenska adelns ättartavlor, vol. 4 (Stockholm, 1928), p. 232.
31 RA, Riksregistraturet, Gustavus Adolphus to Johan Sparre, Hall, 13 September 1631.
32 Ellen Fries, Teckningar ur svenska adelns familjelif i gamla tider (Stockholm, 1901), p. 97.
33 Council minutes, 14 June 1643, printed in N. A. Kullberg, S. Bergh, et al. (eds), Svenska riksrådets protokoll (Handlingar rörande Sveriges historia, 3rd series), (18 vols, Stockholm, 1878–1959), vol. X, p. 194.
34 David Kirby, Östersjöländernas historia 1492–1772 (Stockholm, 1994), pp. 151 and 178-9.
35 Ibid., p. 179.
36 Sveriges ridderskaps och adels riksdags-protokoll, Bernhard Taube (ed.) (Stockholm, 1886), vol. VIII, p. 27, 4 October 1660.
37 Amendment to the Constitution (literally the ‘Instrument of Government’), § XII, 1660. Printed in Anders Anton Stiernman, Alla Riksdagars och Mötens Besluth, vol. II (Stockholm, 1729).
38 Simon de Petkum to Christian V, Stockholm, 31 January 1672, printed in Anders Fryxell, Handlingar rörande Sverges historia, ur utrikes arkiver samlade och utgifna (4 vols, Stockholm, 1836), p. 221.
39 RA, Rådsprotokoll, 26 June 1660, by Secretary Franc.
40 RA, Rådsprotokoll, 26 June 1660, by Secretary Franc.
41 Lars Nihlén, Peregrinatio academica: det svenska samhället och de utrikes studieresorna under 1600–talet (Lund, 1983).
42 The figure for the Pages includes those who matriculated after leaving court service.
43 Carl Hinrichs, Preussen als historisches Problem (Berlin, 1964), pp. 103-21. More recently, however, the view of the Prussian court under Frederick the Great has been revised, notably by Thomas Biskup in Friedrichs Größe. Inszenierungen des Preußenkönigs in Fest und Zeremoniell 1740–1815 (Frankfurt, 2012).
44 Karl Emil Ferdinand Ignatius, Finlands historia under Karl X Gustafs regering (Helsingfors, 1965), p. 191.
45 ‘Ur Jon Jonssons vandringsbok 1582-1620’, Historisk Tidskrift, vol. 18 (1898), p. 343.
46 Samuelson, Aristokrat eller förädlad bonde?
47 Persson, Servants of Fortune.
48 Ingvar Elmroth, För kung och fosterland. Studier i den svenska adelns demografi och offentliga funktioner 1600–1900 (Lund, 1981), p. 42.
49 Ronald Asch, Der Hof Karls I. von England. Politik, Provinz und Patronage 1625–1640 (Cologne, 1993).
50 The number of chamberlains can be seen for example in Jeroen Duindam, Vienna and Versailles: The Courts of Europe's Dynastic Rivals 1500–1780 (Cambridge, 2007).
51 H.C. Ehalt, Ausdrucksformen absolutistischer Herrschaft. Der Wiener Hof im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert (Vienna, 1980), p. 39.
52 Werner Paravicini, ‘The Court of the Dukes of Burgundy: A Model for Europe?’, in Ronald Asch and Adolf Birke (eds), Princes, Patronage, and the Nobility. The Court at the Beginning of the Modern Age c.1450–1650 (Oxford, 1991).
53 Persson, Servants of Fortune.
54 The four in question were Erik von der Linde, Harald Oxe, Wilhelm Taube, and Matthias Palbitzki.
55 Kungliga biblioteket [hereafter KB], L 82:1:4 Åkerödagbok, fol. 615, 31 May 1758.
56 Fabian Persson, ‘Recreating the Point of Contact: The Court of Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden’, in Klaus Malettke and Chantal Grell (eds), Hofgesellschaft und Höflinge an europäischen Fürstenhöfen in der Frühen Neuzeit (Münster, 2001).
57 RA, Rådsprotokoll, 27 January 1663, by Secretary Franc.
58 RA, Rådsprotokoll, 6 July 1666, by Secretary Franc.
59 RA, Rådsprotokoll, 7 December 1669, by Secretary Bergenhielm.
60 ‘Bondeska Anekdoterna’, printed in C. Trolle Bonde (ed.), Anteckningar om Bondesläkten (Lund. 1900), vol. IX:2, p. 60.
61 ‘Nils Reuterholms journal’, printed in S. Landahl (ed.), Historiska Handlingar (Stockholm, 1957), vol. 36:2, p. 76.
62 Diet minutes, 1 August 1668, B. Taube and S. Bergh (eds.), Sveriges ridderskaps och adels riksdags-protokoll (Stockholm, 1893), vol. 10, p. 287.
63 Fryxell, Handlingar rörande Sverges historia, vol. 2, p. 206.
64 A.F. Upton, Charles XI and Swedish Absolutism (Cambridge, 1998), p. 79.
65 See for example Anna Brita Lövgren, Handläggning och inflytande. Beredning, föredragning och kontrasignering under Karl XI:s envälde (Lund, 1980).
66 RA, Rådsprotokoll, vol. 41a, fol.42, 9 March 1664, by Secretary Franc.
67 RA, Riksregistraturet, 15 December 1673, re Court Gentlemen Johan Skyttehielm and Axel Faltzburg; RA, Kungliga arkiv, Suppliker till änkedrottningen Hedvig Eleonora M-R K 198, petition from M. Reenstierna.
68 KB, L 82:1:5 Åkerödagbok, 19 October 1758, Nicodemus Tessin to Casten Feif, 5 February 1715, copy.
69 Ibid.
70 ‘Kort Berättelse om Erik Wrangels usle lefnad, uppsatt af honom sjelf’, printed in E.G. Geijer, Nya Handlingar rörande Skandinaviens historia, vol. 16 (Stockholm, 1843), pp. 309-10.
71 KB, Ep. T.4, Nicodemus Tessin to Salomon Cronhielm, Stockholm, 22 February 1716, copy.
72 Ibid.
73 Slottsarkivet, Hovkontoret Brevbok 1732, ‘Förteckning på de kongl maij:tz håfBetiente hwilcka sedan 1719 åhrs början hafwa bekommit Caracterer, doch uthan någon löns åthniutande wid kongl håfstaten’.
74 Hugo Valentin, ‘En samtida teckning af 1720 års ständer’, Historisk Tidskrift vol. 35 (1915), p. 169.
75 W. Holst, Carl Gustaf Tessin (Stockholm, 1936), p. 15.
76 Luise Ulrike to Sophie Dorotee, 24 February 1747, printed in Fritz Arnheim, Luise Ulrike, die schwedische Schwester Friedrich der Grossen. Ungedruckte Briefe an Mitglieder des preussischen Königshauses (2 vols, Gotha, 1909-10), vol. 2, p. 18.
77 Fabian Persson, ‘Building of Power: Using a New Ceremony and a New Royal Swedish Palace in the 18th Century’, in Anna Czarniecka, Przemysław Deles, Angela Sołtys (eds) Power and Architecture: Residences of Monarchs and Seats of State Authorities in Europe. Forms and Functions (15th–21st Centuries) (Warsaw, 2016).
78 Olof Jägerskiöld, Hovet och författningsfrågan 1760–1766 (Uppsala, 1943).
79 KB, Ep.T.4, Nicodemus Tessin to Salomon Cronhielm, Stockholm, 22 February 1716, copy.
80 Casten Feif to Nicodemus Tessin, Timurtasch, 17 July 1713, printed in Gustaf Anderson (ed.), Handlingar ur v Brinkmanska archivet på Trolle-Ljungby (2 vols, Örebro, 1859-65), vol. 1, pp. 172-3.
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Notes on contributors
Fabian Persson
Fabian Persson is Associate Professor at Linnaeus University (Sweden). His research focusses on early modern royal courts and aristocracy, which he has published recently in edited volumes such as The Key to Power? The Culture of Access in Early Modern Courts, 1400–1700 (2016); Dynastic Identity in Early Modern Europe: Rulers, Aristocrats and the Formation of Identities (2015); and The Politics of Female Households: Ladies in Waiting Across Early Modern Europe (2014).