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82 8
Elective Customs of the
West-Goths.
HISTORY OF THE SWEDES.
Privilege of the Upper
Swedes.
Suthermen take it up, and attend him with
greetings 3 and hostages to Swintuna4. There shall the
East-Goths meet him with their hostages, and
accompany him through their land, until the
middle of the forest HolawidhThere shall the
Sma-landers meet him, and follow him to the stream
of Juna6. There shall the West-Goths meet him
with greetings and hostages, and attend him to
Ramundaboda7. Then shall the Nerikers meet
him and accompany him through their land, and so
to the bridge of Uphoga 8. There shall the
West-men meet him with greetings and hostages, and
attend him to Eastbridge 9. Then shall the
Up-landers meet him, and follow him to Upsala. Then
hath the king come lawfully to his land and realm
with Uplanders and Suthermen, Goths and
Gott-landersand all the Smalanders ; then hath he
duly ridden his Ericsgait. III. Now hath he to
be consecrated to the crown in the church of
Upsala by the archbishop and the under-bishops.
Then hath he right to be king and to wear the
crown. Now belong to him the estate of Upsala,
the price of blood, and the heritage of the stranger2.
Then may he give fiefs to those who do him service.
If he be a good king, God grant him long life."
The older law of West-Gothland speaks only of
Swedes and Goths, but informs us more exactly
of the manner in which the reception of the new
king by the province was conducted. " The Swedes,"
it is said, " have the right to accept, and also to
reject the king. He shall pass from the upper
country with hostages into East-Gothland. Then
shall he despatch messengers to the parliament of
all the Goths3. Then shall the Lawman appoint
hostages, two from the southern and two from the
northern part of the land, and shall send with them
four other men of the country. They shall meet
him at the stream of Juna. The East-Gothland
hostages shall attend him thither and bear witness
that he has been received among them as their law
prescribes. Now let the parliament of all the Goths
be convened to meet him. When he arrives at the
Ting, he shall swear truly to all the Goths that he will
not wrest the right law of our land. Then shall the
Lawman first adjudge him to be king, and
thereafter the others whom he shall command. Then
shall the king give peace to three men, being such
as have committed no shameful crime." Such was
the strict order taken in old days, that the king
upon these occasions should only enter the province
" as the law enjoins," that the West-Goths, when
king Ragwald Curthead came to their parliament,
without having received the appointed hostages,
slew him " by reason of the disparagement he had
offered " to all the community. As this event
belongs to a period earlier than that of St. Eric, the
opinion of those who derive the Ericsgait from that
prince appears to carry no weight, although it is
expressly related of him, " that he fared all round his
kingdom in right royal fashion 4."
This royal progress, also remarkable as indicating
the ancient extent of the kingdom, remained
unchanged, although the number of provinces
entitled to vote at the election of the king increased
in process of time. The law of Upland still limits
the strict right of election to the Folklands, whose
decision in the matter was only communicated to
the rest of the provinces during the Ericsgait, for
their confirmation. It was this right of the Upper
Swedes to dispose of the crown, inherited from the
days of paganism, which, after the introduction of
Christianity, was the subject of so many contests.
It was confirmed in the law of Upland after it had
lost from the power of the magnates almost all
importance, but it was soon expressly extended to the
other provinces. The law of the Suthermen,
confirmed in 1327, says, that "all the council of
Sweden " shall take part with the Folklands in the
election ; but when the law of Upland was revised,
the justiciaries had been already received into the
council, and the provision first enacted in king
Magnus Ericson’s Land’s Law of 1347, for the
conjoint participation of all the justiciaries and
commissioners from the various provinces, was before
observed at the election of this king in 13195.
3 Grild or grid, peace, security.
4 Now Krokek, in the midst of the forest Kolmord.
5 Hohveden, the chain of wood-covered hills’, which still
forms the boundary between East-Gothland and Smaland.
6 A river running into lake Vetter at Jonkoping.
7 In the forest of Tived. The place is now called Bodame.
Here in Catholic times was a monastery in the middle of
the wood, as at Krokek in the Kolmord.
8 Over the Opboga or Arboga stream, at the east end of
the forest of Kaglan.
9 Over the Sag at Nyquarn, the frontier between Upland
and Westmanland.
1 Gutar.
2 Dulgadrap anddana-arf. The former name was applied to
a murder of which the perpetrator could not be discovered,
and for which the hundred paid the fine. The latter means
the property of foreigners who died in the kingdom without
heirs.
3 Aldra Gota Ting. So the provincial diet of the
West-Goths was called.
4 In the Legend of St. Eric. According to the Edda and
Heimskringla, Rik was the first in northern lands who took
the’title of king. Domestic legends and popular songs in
Sweden name the first king Eric. Hence perhaps
Eriks-gata in the sense of king’s way, unless with Ihre we explain
the word as " a progress round all the kingdom," since e in
composition means all. (Rile, in Swedish, is kingdom.) A
similar royal progress is mentioned both among the Franks
and in Germany. Compare Grimm, German Legal
Antiquities, p. 237.
5 The enactment in Magnus Ericson’s Land’s Law, that
all the Lawmen, with twelve "intelligent and skilled men,"
from every province, should take part in the election at
the Mora Ting, is properly derived from 1319 (if not in
point of fact still older), according to what is stated in a
manuscript of the Sudermanian law, preserved in the Royal
Library at Copenhagen. Here that regulation, in the form
in which it is found in the general codes of Magnus Ericson
and Christopher, is adopted in the second chapter of the
section " on the crown," with the remark that king Magnus had
been thus elected in 1319; although the form and oath of
election were not made public in the law-book before his
days, as he himself effected, for good example. In the same
manuscript a more detailed description of the Erics-gait is
given than in any other source. The oaths were to be taken
in Strengness, Linkiiping, Jonkoping, Skara, Orebro, and
Westeras. It is also mentioned that Magnus rode his
Erics-gait in 1335, and probably the manuscript is not much more
recent. Hence it is plain that although the old form of
election is still adopted in the Sudermanian law of 1327, only
with the addition of the council sharing therein, the
new-form, with the participation of the provincial deputies, had
already been used in king Magnus Ericson’s election, and
been confirmed by him. The author is indebted for this
observation, as well as generally for many important
illustrations of the subject, to Dr. Schlyter. A safe basis for the
history of the Swedish constitution in the older times was
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