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;. SKOTKONUNG, SIGFRID AND UNWAN. 75
intention, are said to have passed a statute (placitum),
together with their king, that if he wished to be a Christian
he should hold as his own the best district of Sweden,
wherever he desired to live, and might there establish a
Church and Christianity, but should not use force to make
any of the people give up the worship of the gods, and only
admit such as wished of his own free will to be converted
to Christ. The king, gladly accepting this statute,
founded a Church to God and a Bishopric in West Goth
land, which is close to the Danes or Norwegians. This is
the great City of Skara, for which, on the petition of the
most Christian king, Thurgot was first ordained by Arch
bishop Unwan (1013 A.D. 1029 A.D.).
20
He vigorously
discharged his mission to the Gentiles, and, by his labour,
gained to Christ the two noble peoples of the Goths."
Although this gives a different reason for Skotkonung s
unpopularity from that which is recorded in the Saga, the
facts all fit well together, and agree with the well-known
dislike of the Swedes to religious persecution and their
adherence to the old precedents from the time of Biorn,
which allowed each to maintain or advance their faith by
persuasion. We shall have other evidence of this feeling
later on.
The foundation of the see of Skara is, therefore, fixed to
about the year 1020 A.D., a year or two before Skotkonung s
death.
No doubt Skotkonung s request to Archbishop Unwan
to consecrate a bishop for Skara was a very acceptable one.
There was a natural, and sometimes a very strong,
jealousy on the part of the Archbishops of Hamburg
against the English missionaries, who were brought in first
by Tryggvason, and then by St. Olaf, and also by Knut.
In any case5
it was during the pontificate of Unwan, but, per
haps, about its close, as it is recorded in connection with the
death of Haraldson, 1030 A.D.
20
Thurgot s name is not, however, mentioned in the early
lists of the Bishops of Skara in Scr. Rer. Suec., t. III., cp.
Rhyzelius :
Episcoposcopia, pp. 163-4. (See the names in note
23).
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