Page:History of the Literature of the Scandinavian North.djvu/338

320 tions were rather paraphrases from the Vulgate than genuine translations, but still they were of a certain importance to the development of the Swedish language, as was also the case with the collection of sermons, books for edification and other similar works, which were partly written in Swedish and partly translated from foreign tongues (as for instance Rimbert's biography of Ansgar). The first Swedish religious hymn was composed by Ericus Olai.

The are one of the most important branches of the Swedish poetical literature of the middle age. As in Denmark and Norway these ballads have their origin in the ancient poetry common to the entire North, and to it they are intimately related, both in form and contents. This subject was discussed in connection with the ballad literature of Denmark and Norway, and we may therefore now dismiss the matter by referring the reader to what we there said.

Already in the fourteenth century the learned began to imitate the style of the popular ballad, and until far into the seventeenth century this form was frequently employed in historical composition. The bishop of Linköping, (died 1391), the first one who became known as a poet of this kind, composed a song in honor of the nun Elisif, and the bishop of Strengnäs,  (died 1443), from whose pen we have the beautiful poems on freedom and on faithfulness, wrote the celebrated poem in honor of the national hero, Engelbrekt.

Upon the whole there is but little poetry of interest from this period. Among the many rhymed chronicles, composed in the ordinary style of the time, and as a rule of but little poetic value, the oldest one, the so-called "Erikskrönike" is worthy of attention for its excellent Swedish and charm-