Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - VI. Steno Sturé the Elder. King John. Suanto Sturé. Steno Sturé the Younger, and Christian the Tyrant. A.D. 1470—1520
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HISTORY OF THE SWEDES. Johv?te°d to’sTedl!"’
War with Russia.
Indecisive movements.
royal displeasure. Lastly, it is laid down that every
good man, whether of the clergy or laity, should he
king over his own peasants, excepting in such cases
as concerned the rights of the sovereign. " And
though these were hard terms, yet king Hans
promised with oath, letter, and seal, that he would
hold by them."
The Calmar Recess of 1483, marks the highest
point of aristocratic power in Sweden, and shows
the end towards which the efforts of the nobles
were directed. With respect to the fulfilment of
its more immediate object, Steno Sture well
understood how to interpose hindrance and delays. " For
though Sweden (to make use of the words of
Olave Peterson) was promised and secured to
king Hans by treaty, yet full fourteen years passed
before he obtained possession of it, partly because
the debts of king Christian were still unpaid,
partly also, because the Swedes were not well
inclined to the measure. In these fourteen years
many prolonged conferences were held between
the nobles of both kingdoms, that peace might be
made and king Hans might obtain Sweden, but the
matter made very slow progress, and was put off
from one meeting to another. From all the
proposals of the Swedes, it was easy to perceive that
they wanted inclination and good-will to king
Christian, else would they not so long have deferred
the matter."
Among the subjects of dispute between Denmark
and Sweden, was the isle of Gottland. By king
Christian it had been pledged to Olave Axelson
Tott; its next possessor was his brother Iwar, to
whom Charles Canuteson gave his daughter in
marriage, in the hope thereby to reannex Gottland
to the Swedish crown. But this potent Danish
family, which had joined the administrator out
of enmity to Christian, soon showed the former
that their support was not to be counted upon.
Upon the demise of Eric Axelson, who held
Finland in fief, he left the Finnish castles, contrary to
his promise, not to his brother-in-law the
administrator, but to his brothers Lawrence and Iwar,
who took possession of the land on their own
account. From this cause a feud at length arose
between Steno Sture and Iwar, of which the end was,
that the latter in 1487 ceded the isle of
Gottland to king John, and himself sought refuge in
Denmark. This domestic quarrel revealed the
dispositions of the magnates towards the
administrator. Already in 1484 it had been proposed to
deprive him of power, and he himself more than
once offered to abdicate his office. Its functions
were in their very nature indefinite, and the
ambiguity of his position could scarcely fail to exercise
an influence on his public conduct.
This vacillation was especially shown in the war
with Russia, which, after several preluding
disturbances, became really formidable by the Russian
invasion of Finland, in 1495. While Canute PosstJ
with admirable courage defended Wiborg, which
5 The so called explosion of Wiborg, by which Canute
Posse is said to have destroyed CO,000 Russians at once, is
spoken of by no contemporary, though we are told that the
Russians had in this siege amazingly large cannons of
twenty-four feet in length (bombardas et machinas magnas
et mirabiles aliquas in longitudine xxiv. pedum), and that
their retreat was occasioned by miracles.
6 The standard was lost in the present campaign, and this
was made one of the charges against Steno Sture.
the Russians in vain besieged during three months5,
Steno Sture assembled an army, the greatest that
Sweden had seen in his time, and computed at
more than forty thousand in number, placing
himself at its head under the banner of St. Eric 6,
which was brought with great solemnity from the
cathedral of Upsala. But the passage of the army
was delayed to so late a period of the autumn, that
great part of it perished by tempests and cold, and
when the administrator at length reached Abo, he
kept his attention so immoveably fixed on his
rivals in Sweden, that the Russians were allowed to
devastate Finland with impunity. After a short
interval, he relinquished the command to Suanto,
son of Nicholas Sture’, who, while the administrator
and the council were secretly watching one another,
crossed the gulf in the summer of 1496 to Narva,
and took and destroyed Ivangorod. A new army
was raised in Sweden, and transported to Finland
in the autumn of the same year, but these
preparations were fruitless, especially as animosities now
broke out between the two Sture’s. Suanto Sture’,
who maintained that he had been wronged in
various points, and left ultimately without support
in Finland, abandoned the army of his own
authority. He was soon followed by the incensed
administrator. Hastening to shut himself up in the
castle of Stockholm, he thence carried on a
negotiation with the council, which now renounced fealty
and obedience to his authority. He was accused
of having needlessly intermeddled in the quarrels
of Livonia 7, while Finland was left defenceless ;
of having withheld from Suanto Stur£ his
inheritance, and called him a runaway from the banner
of the kingdom ; of having designed to introduce
peasants into the government, and to annul the
council by preventing new members from being
chosen in the places of those who had gone out;
lastly, of having hindered the fulfilment of the
convention of Calmar, although not long ago, in 1494,
he had made a solemn covenant with the council
for its execution.
Calamities of different kinds had darkened the
last years of the government of Steno Sture, great
drought and failure of crops, terrible storms, the
burning of Stockholm, and a renewal of the ravages
of the plague. A papal excommunication issued
against the guardian, because he withheld the
revenues claimed by the Danish queen dowager8
in respect of her dower in Sweden, gave his enemies
a new pretext for their opposition, and the confusion
of public affairs was increased by the competition
also of several foreign princes for the Swedish
crown9.
King John now repaired to Sweden at the
invitation of the council. Steno Sture’ betook himself
into Dalecarlia, and threatened to become a second
Engelbert. The Dalecarlians despatched letters to
the Westmanlanders, the Upianders, and the
peasantry of all Norrland, calling on them to join in
"loving brotherhood," to avert injury and
perpetual ruin from their country, their dear lord and
captain, and their own hearths. To king Hans
7 By giving assistance to the Archbishop of Riga in 1185,
in his war against the Grand Master of Livonia.
8 Dorothy of Brandenburg, the wife first of Christopher,
and afterwards of Christian I., died in 1495.
9 Duke Frederic, brother of King John, and also the
emperor’s son Maximilian, who had sent an envoy and great
presents to Lord Steno, according to Olave Peterson.
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