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Strength of the popular element. SWEDEN IN TI1E MIDDLE AGE.
by companionship in arms with the king 7, the first
nobility of service, as nobility of birth had arisen
out of kindred with the king (for all nobility
springs out of the royal house) ; and among the
Germanic peoples domiciled by conquest, this
warlike household of the kings became afterwards
the root whence by the hereditary descent of the
fiefs, that feudal monarchy grew up which once
governed Europe. To Scandinavia this system, in
its full developement, ever remained unknown ;
for in Denmark alone, of the northern countries
in this age, were fiefs hereditarily descendible, or
such as approximated to that condition, with the
consequences thence flowing both for king and
people, introduced through foreign influence6.
Within the limits of the peninsula itself, the old
state of things continued, but with Christianity as
a new subject of dissension. Among the powerful
families, who neither constituted a feudal nobility,
nor wished to be transformed into a mere nobility
of vassalage, the recollection so much the longer
survived, that the ancient royalty had been a
many-headed polycracy. We see in effect the old and
untameable race of independent chiefs, driven from
the sea, wasting their own forces and those of the
country in intestine strife, especially in Norway, a
land disjointed by nature, and violently united by
Harald the Fair-haired, whose older history is
entirely made up of such struggles, and tynes away
at their close ; as stillness reigns upon a field of
battle, when the leaders lie slain.
The contests of the Swedish middle age are
characterized, both at its commencement and its
end, by enhanced activity of popular influence,
although in dissimilar shapes. Reposing on the
religion established by Odin, the sovereignty of the
Upsala kings formed the key-stone of the old
Swedish federative system, and supplied the germ
of a political unity, which never afterwards wholly
perished. This unity was betimes so conspicuous,
that the government struck the first distant
observers as a monarchy, although, even according to
the earliest account (that of Tacitus), embracing
several commonwealths. It was discovered on
closer examination that here popular power
bore as great a part in public affairs as kingly
domination ; and hence the same constitution
which to the teachers of Christianity had appeared
monarchical at a distance, assumed to them, when
residing in the country, the aspect of democracy.
With the fall of the old religion, the bond which had
linked together the separate provincial
confederations was dissolved. After the extinction of the
dynasty of Upsala, conflict arose between the rival
races, each claiming to nominate the sovereign of
the whole realm, first the West-Goths, the earliest
to embrace Christianity, after them the East-Goths ;
on the other side the Upper Swedes. This
antagonism lasted long, with frequent changes of
dynasty, until the Swedes, at length becoming
Christians, were placed in a condition again to
vindicate the prerogatives which they had
possessed under the old form of society. In the letter
? The well-known Comitatus of Tacitus.
8 " What has produced a greater change in the course of
government among our ancestors than this, that the people
gradually lost their freedom ?" says Tyge Rothe of Denmark.
Polity of the North, ii. 248. " The feudal system was
imported earlier into Denmark than into the other countries of
the north." Ibid. 269.
Mode of election.
The Ericsgait.
of the law, the ancient confederation was again
renewed, but stripped of its former vitality, under
the influence of the church and the nobility, and a
regal authority which rested upon their support,
and was eventually overthrown by their joint
encroachments. The aristocracy then sought a
bulwark for their power in the Union, until the
danger of foreign oppression appeased the rivalries
of provinces and races, and called forth the Swedish
people united by adversity, under Engelbert and
the Stures, to conflict under Gustavus Vasa to
victory.
The transition from one state to the other is
formed by the royalty of the Folkungers, which we
have already described as leagued with the church
and the nobility. This is pre-eminently the
monarchy of the Swedish middle age ; many of its
features were borrowed from the feudal monarchy ;
it is in fact characterized by the ascendency of the
aristocracy. And yet, how little is all this to be
remarked in the legislation of that age !
According to the law, Sweden was an elective
monarchy, although the kingship originally went
by inheritance, and the elective and hereditary
principles were afterwards intermingled. The
eldest son commonly followed his father upon the
throne, and even when it was contested by rival
houses, as by those of Eric and Swerker, both sides
appealed to their hereditary right. In older times
it was not unusual for two brothers to reign
conjointly, and the hereditary right appears generally to
have been attached rather to the family than to
the person. In proportion as the elective scheme
obtained preponderance, the kings showed greater
solicitude for the performance of homage to their
sons during their own lifetime. The right of
election belonged primarily to the Folklands, or the
inhabitants of Upland, and was first extended in the
age of the Folkungers to delegates of the other
provinces in elective diets, which now became
general. But let us hear the law itself speak !
In the law of Upland, amended by king Birger,
and confirmed by him in 129G, the three first
chapters of the section relating to the crown
(Konunga-balken), which we give, with slight modification, in
their ancient form, run as follows : I. " Now when
these lands behove to choose a king, then shall the
three Folklands first take him ; these are
Tiunda-land, Attundaland, and Fiadhundraland. To the
Lawman of Upland it belongs, first to doom him at
Upsala to be king ; then all the Lawmen one after
another, of the Suthermen, of the East-Goths, of
the Ten Hundreds9, of the West-Goths, the
Neri-kers, and the Westmen x. They shall ordain him
to the crown and the kingship, that he may bear
sway and govern the realm, strengthen the law and
keep peace in the land. Then is the estate of
Upsala to be awarded to him. II. Now hath he to
ride his Ericsgait; they shall attend upon him,
give hostages and swear oaths ; let him give laws
to them and swear peace. From Upsala they shall
accompany him to Strengianess 2. There shall the
9 Tiohaerad was the south-eastern part of Smaland, which
constituted a separate jurisdiction, while the north-eastern
portion was subject to the justiciary of East-Gothland.
Compare Collins and Schlyter on the law of East-Gothland, -399.
1 The inhabitants of Nerike and W’estmanland.
2 An old place of sacrifice for the Suthermanlanders or
Sudermanians (locus idolorum in the legend of St. Eskill),
now the town of Strengnas (or Strengness).
g
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