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5- THE RIKSDAG OF VESTERAS (1527). 199
first proposed, and perhaps more than he expected, was
contained in the document called the
"
Recess of Vesteras."
The word "
recess," I may explain, was in use in Sweden
and Denmark from about the middle of the fourteenth cen
tury (1354) for a protocol or minute of the proceedings of
an assembly drawn up on its retirement (hence the name),
to which the members or their commissioners affixed their
seals in attestation of its accuracy. The important
provisions are thus summarized by Geijer, in language
which I cannot improve (p. 118):
"
The bishops, who from this time were no longer summoned
to the Council, briefly declared in a special instrument
"
that
they were content however rich or poor soever his grace would
have them to be."
The Recess of Vesteras contains :
(i) A mutual engagement to withstand all attempts at revolt
and to punish them, as also to defend the present government
against all enemies, foreign and domestic ; (2) a grant of power
to the king, to take into his own hands the castles and strong
holds of the bishops, and to fix their revenues, as well as those
of the prebends and canonries, to levy fines hitherto payable to
the bishops, and to regulate the monasteries,
"
in which there
had for a long time been woeful mis-government
"
; (3) authority
for the nobles to resume that part of their hereditary property
which had been conveyed to churches and convents since the
Inquisition (rafst) of Karl Knutsson in 1454, if the heir-at-law
could substantiate his birthright thereto, at the Ting, by
the oaths of twelve men ; (4) liberty for the preachers to pro
claim the pure word of God, "but not," the barons add,
"
uncertain miracles, human inventions and fables, as hath been
much used heretofore." Respecting the new faith, on the
other hand, the burghers and miners declare that
"
inquiry
might be made, but that the matter passed their understand
ing
"
;
as do the peasants, since
"
it was hard to judge more
deeply than understanding permitted." The answer of the
latter betrays the affection they still, for the most part, bore
to the clergy, with the exception of the mendicant friars or sack-
monks, of whose conduct they complain. Of the bishops*
castles they say that the king may take them in keeping, until
the kingdom shall be more firmly settled ;
for the article respect
ing the revenues of the Church, they believe they are unable to
answer it, but commit it to the king and his Council.
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