Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - First part - II. The Swedish People - 1. Survey of its History. By E. Svensén, Author, Stockholm - Modern Times (from 1523 onwards)
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84
II. TH B SWEDISH PEOPLE.
creased their power as well as their riches. Lordly castles, filled with foreign booty,
arose in all parts of the country, and the fiefs which the nobles received in
payment for their services to the country, made them masters of a share of the
land which was continually increasing in extent. The Edict of Reduction (or
Compulsion, Forfeiture), whereby the estates of the nobles so obtained reverted
to the Crown, became at last an inevitable necessity, and this tremendous
economical revolution, which completely broke the power of the nobility and
transformed its members, in a considerable measure, into a nobility of state officials,
was carried out in due legal form by Charles XI. The constitution of the Church
was fixed at the same time, and its clergy reached the height of their ecclesiastical
and political greatness during the 17th century.
Skokloster Palace. At Lake Mälaren.
Radical changes were made in the Form of Government. Gustavus Adolphus
prepared, and Axel Oxenstierna carried out in 1634, the reform of the
administration, which made national unity complete, and piaecd at its head a monarchical
power, supported by a powerful Council, composed of the chief representatives of
the highest noble families and forming an excellently organized ruling body or
board. The balance of power within the State was sometimes disturbed to the
advantage of the nobles, owing to the great wealth of that class, and also to
the increased influence accruing to the Council during the long regencies. But
the kingly power had everywhere emerged from the thirty years’ war with increased
strength, and royal absolutism soon made its triumphal march through Europe:
Sweden could not long remain untouched by this movement. The great extremities
in which the state found itself after the wars entered upon by the feeble Regency
during the youth of Charles XI, aroused a general ill-will against the Council and
nobility, and the powerful measures which were found necessary for the rescue
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