Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 18.djvu/852

* SWEDEN. 744 SWEDEN. until more than a century after his death. He was defeated and killed in 1100 by the Danish prinee ilagnus llenriksen, who made an unpro- voked attack upon Sweden, the beginning of a long series of wars between Sweden ami Den- mark, productive of national hatred and bitter- ness. The reigns of the early Swedish kings were short and storm}-. In 1389 the Swedish nobles, disgusted with the conduct of their King, Albert of Mecklenburg, offered the crown to Jlar- garet. Queen of Denmark and Xorway, daughter of Valdemar IV"., who defeated and dethroned Albert, and in 1397 brought about the union of Kalniar, by which the three Scandinavian king- doms were henceforth to remain united under a single sovereign. This union continued with inter- ruptions for more than a century, but with con- stant dissensions and wars between Denmark and the Swedisli people. The Swedes themselves were divided between the upholders of national sover- ei.i^nty and the supporters of the pretensions of the Danish kings. In the latter part of the fif- teenth century the family of Sture (q.v.) rose to eminence in the struggle for national independ- ence, Sten Sture. the Elder, being proclaimed administrator of the kingdom in 1470. In 1520 Christian II. of Denmark invaded Sweden to en- force his claim to sovereignty. The administra- tor, Sten Sture, the Younger, was defeated and mortally wounded and Christian entered Stock- holm, where he enacted a carnival of blood, exe- cuting a large number of the nobles. Sweden soon rose against the tyrant (1.521) under the lead of Gustavus Vasa, who was made adminis- trator. He shook off the hated yoke of Denmark and in 1523 became King of Sweden. In 1529 Lutheranism was formally established as the State religion of the kingdom. Gustavus Vasa organized the kingdom as a hereditary monarchy, in which the power of the nobles Avas circum- scribed and that of the clergy subordinated to that of the State. He fostered trade, manu- factures, art, learning, and science, and left a full exchequer, a standing army, and a well-ap- pointed na'y. The great work of the first Vasa sovereign was almost undone by his son and successor. Eric XIV. (15G0-68), who became insane and was deposed, being succeeded by his brother. John III. At the beginning of Eric's reign Esthonia, a fragment of the dominions of the Knights Swordbearers. submitted to Sweden. The reign of John III. (1508-92) was notable for a reaction toward Catholicism. He had married Catharine Jagellon, of the Polish royal house, and in 1587 secured the election of his son Sigismund to the throne of Poland. For this Sigismund had to pro- fess Catholicism. The great majority of the Swedes were strong Protestants, and when Sigis- mimd succeeded his father as King of Sweden and attempted to restore Catholicism he was compelled by the Diet to resign the throne in 1599. His uncle Charles, the only one of Gustavus Vasa's sons who inherited his talents as a ruler, was made administrator of the kingdom and in 1604 was crowned King as Charles IX. The policy of Charles IX. was to encourage the burgher classes at the expense of the nobility; and by his successful efforts to foster trade — in furtherance of which he laid the foundations of Goteborg and other trading ports — to develop the mineral re- sources of the country, and to reorganize the system of Swedish jurisprudence, he did much to retrieve the calamitous errors of his predecessors. (See CliAKLEiS IX.) The deposition of Sigis- mund gave rise to a long war with Poland. Cliarlcs was succeeded by his son, Gustavus 11. Adolphus (1611-32). This greatest of Swedish kings was confronted at the beginning of his reign by wars with Russia, Poland, and Den- mark, which last-named power .still owned Sca- nia and other districts at the .southern extremity of the Scandinavian Peninsula. These wars were concluded advantageously for Sweden, which acquired Ingria, Karelia, and Livonia (the last-named not formally renounced by Poland until IGUO), and the King addressed himself to the task of making Sweden the dominant power on the Baltic. In 1630 Gustavus Adolphus came to the rescue of German Protestantism, which had succumbed to the arms of Tilly and Wallen- stein. (For his victorious career in Germany, and the successes of the generals who were trained in his school, see the articles Gustavus II. Adolphus, and Thirty Years' War.) The foreign policy of Gustavus Adolphus was con- tinued after his death at Liitzen in 1632 by his able chancellor, Oxenstierna (q.v.). who directed the government during the minority of Gus- tavus's gifted but eccentric daughter Christina (1632-54). As a result Sweden was for nearly a century the great power of the north. By the Peace of Westphalia (1648) Sweden received Hither Pomerania ( west of the Oder ), the island of Rugen, and other territories in Germany, and was admitted to representation in the German Diet. Charles X. Gustavus (1654-60) waged a fierce war against the Polish King, John Casimir. in which the Swedish forces overran Poland. He conquered from Denmark the provinces of Sca- nia, Halland, and Blekinge, which rounded out the Swedish boundaries. The war with Poland was closed at his death by the Peace of Oliva (1660). Misgovernment by a regency followed during the minoritv of Charles X.'s son and suc- cessor; Charles XI.' (q.v.) (1660-97). This King was involved as the allj' of Louis XIV. in Euro- pean wars, which the regency had not left hira the resources to carry on. In 1675 the Swedes suffered a great defeat at the hands of Frederick William, the "Great Elector" of Brandenburg, at Fehrbellin. Charles XI. reorganized the govern- ment and was declared an absolute sovereign by the estates in 1693. His son, Charles XII. (1697-1718), by his military genius raised Swe- den to an extraordinary pitch of power. Not long after his accession he successfully met a joint attack by Russia, Poland, and Denmark, dealing blows that astonished the world. His inordinate ambition, however, finally brought ruin upon Sweden. Peter the Great wrested from her Karelia, Ingria, Esthonia, and Livonia. Charles met his death in an invasion of Xorway, leaving the kingdom overwhelmed with debts and again disorganized. With him the male line of the House of Vasa expired. His sister I'lrica Eleonora. who succeeded him. and her husband, Frederick of Hesse-Cassel. who shared the throne, were mere ])uppets of the nobles, whose dissen- sions as the factions of the 'Hats,' or French party, and the 'Caps,' or Russian party, brought on the country calamitous wars and almost equally disastrous treaties of peace. The weak