Pride of the communes

Social change in the military organization of 16th century Sweden

Martin Neuding Skoog

The improvement of state military efficiency was a profound aspect of early European state-building. A number of scholars who have studied parallel European processes argue for Protection-selling as the foremost impetus for state-building, where rulers offered protection in exchange for taxation (and submission).’ Conversely, the population also felt the need for protection against military violence and certainly shared the same basic goal with the state of a strengthened defence of the realm.² Therefore, I consider the early modern improvement of state military efficiency as a result of a bargaining process over fundamentally shared long-term security goals. A key feature of this process was the changing strategies for the recruitment of military personnel. In this study, I will discuss certain social consequences of these changing military strategies in 16th century Sweden.

The weak and decentralized late medieval Swedish state struggled with insufficient financial and organizational means to manage periodic military crises. These deficiencies eventually incited both military, political, institutional, and, arguably, social change. Gustavus I (r. 1521-1560) organized a permanent army and by the time of his death, he had created the second-inline European fiscal-military state - a process that seems to have succeeded faster in Sweden than in other comparable countries.³ In this process, the local military institutions of medieval society were dismantled and replaced with one dominant and state-run military hierarchy.⁴ In consequence, the military transformation during the 16th century propelled the centralization of political power and the process of state formation.

During the late Middle Ages, a semi-autonomous peasant militia was mobilized in times of war. Gustavus I gradually replaced this militia with enlisted units and, eventually, with a conscription system where regular troops served in permanent units directly under royal command. Earlier studies of the social origins of the armies of the early Vasa dynasty suggest that men from several economic strata of the peasant group served, but that the pressure to serve increasingly lay on the destitute in local society.⁵ A similar picture of the changing social character of armies in early modern Europe emerges in other European studies.⁶ When the mode of recruitment changed, we may assume that the social conditions of military service also changed. So, what about the earlier period? Little is known of the social composition of the earlier militia organization. In spite of the fragmented medieval Swedish sources, I want to compare and contrast the social aspects of military recruitment during the late medieval and early Vasa period.

The purpose of this chapter is to study the interconnections between the military-institutional transformation and social organization and change in local Swedish society during the 16th century. I will elaborate on the question of how state military demands shaped the structure of social forces, and in what ways social forces reacted to changing military demands. Thomas Ertman makes an interesting point of studying the before-and-after structure of a number of European states in the early modern state-building process.⁷ In this study, I will apply an analogous concept to a specific social stratum in this process. I will examine the political status, goals, and agency of the landed upper strata of the Swedish peasantry as well as the potential benefits of cooperation with the emerging new state. I argue that the social composition of men in the medieval militia partly differed from that of the armies of the early Vasa dynasty. In my view, the social shifts in the military units were not simply a consequence of demands from above but also depended on the agency of local society and the mediator role of the upper peasant social stratum. My perspective takes inspiration from the works of Jan Glete, who emphasizes the importance of aggregation of political interest as a key component in successful state-building.⁸ The representatives of the weak and somewhat crude 16th century state were dependent on the cooperation and consent of local society. Early state-building was clearly an interactive process. Here, I am less interested in expressions of resistance to this political process, and more in what roles different groups played in terms of cooperation and support for this enterprise.

The late medieval peasant militia

Late medieval Swedish warfare was mainly defensive and the coordinating state was largely dependent on what resources it could borrow from largely autonomous social forces in local society.⁹ During the Sture era (1470-1520), the regents depended greatly on the peasant militia in order to establish a self-determining and autonomous rule in Sweden in relation to the Danish kings. The peasant militia demonstrated its military importance on a number of military campaigns and represented the most important military resource.¹⁰ Even though the militia was led and commanded by the nobility, the ruler had no unconditional right to simply conscript peasants. Instead, legal practises were applied.¹¹ According to the law of the realm, every able-bodied man had a general obligation to aid in defence. In face of war, the law prescribed that local negotiations in every province and district must precede mobilization, to determine what aid the peasantry ‘shall or should’ give the king.¹² The law prescribed military duties in very general

Pride of the communes 93 terms and neither regulated the quantity nor mode of service. The purpose of the negotiations was to determine the length of service, amount of provisions, equipment, and the quota of men to field.¹³ Consequently, the rulers’ access to the militia depended on continuous negotiations with the peasantry, which offered opportunities for the peasants to assert a degree of informal political power. Apart from legal and rhetorical instruments, the rulers also offered to lower collective taxes among the peasantry. During the civil war of 1469, King Karl Knutsson promised the peasants in several districts that he would lower their tax rate by one-third, for the next 3 years, in exchange for mobilizing the militia.¹⁴ Similar offers are frequently mentioned in negotiations between rulers and peasant collectives during this period.¹⁵ Apart from any patriotic notions, this economic incentive of course proved attractive for local society.

Perhaps the most explicit example of collective bargaining is the military contract between the peasant community in the district of Kalmar and the governor of the realm, Sten Sture the Younger (r. 1512-1520). According to the contract, the whole district was fully exempt from taxes in exchange for keeping 1000 crossbowmen in perpetual readiness.¹⁶ This illustrates the regent’s high esteem for the peasant militia and blurs the social distinction between the peasantry and the lesser nobility, where tax exemption in exchange for military service was the very foundation of the social status of the latter group.

The medieval coordinating Swedish state, thus, waged war with largely autonomous resources borrowed from local society, in a continuous bargaining process where the peasantry was incited by different means to serve. The offers and requests of the state created plenty of room for political bargaining, where the peasantry may sometimes have been able to reach advantageous deals. This, however, does not rule out the common interest of an effective defence. There was clearly social pressure from within local society to serve. In the summer of 1511, when the peasants in the district of Kalmar heard the news of Danish atrocities on Oland, they instantly declared themselves ready to mobilize. The peasant assembly also ruled that any peasant who tried to evade militia service by staying at home should be hanged in the gateway of his own farmstead.¹⁷ Another example of the strong peasant resolve to defend the realm is the lynching of the castellan Erik Eriksson (Gyllenstierna) in July 1502 by the Vestrogothian peasantry, because of his premature surrender of Alvsborg Castle to the Danish army.¹⁸ During the late Middle Ages, we may conclude that military service was not only a matter of top-down demands but also a serious concern for local society itself.

So, who served in the medieval militia? Perhaps the oldest source that provides some clue to this is The Poem About King Albrekt (1388/1389), which describes the sufferings of the Swedish peasantry under the rex ini-ustus, Albrecht of Mecklenburg.¹⁹ The epic complains of how the German bailiffs enticed the peasants’ farmhands to abandon their masters and toserve the bailiffs as soldiers instead. This drained the agricultural labour force and the fields lay fallow. In their elevated new social position, these ‘foxes’ (the former farmhands) scourged and mistreated the peasantry and freely helped themselves to their food. The chronicler suggested that some of them should be hanged and others be returned to their true peasant masters.²⁰ This narrative clearly relates to the prevailing political conflict at the time. But it also points to the notion that it was not good for the lowest social strata of the peasant community to take up a martial role unless designated to do so by their peasant masters.

In the sources as well as in earlier research, the peasantry (‘allmogen’) in often treated as a coherent and homogenous group. Apart from the different status of noble tenant farmers, crown tenants, and freeholder peasants, there must also have been a clear differentiation in terms of wealth. It largely seems as if the group of landed and wealthy peasants controlled and dominated the militia. A tangible argument for this is the mention of mounted troops within the militia - even though mounts was not a requirement for militia service. In the Karl’s Chronicle’s account of the Swedish campaign to Scania in 1452, the numerous peasant troops are described as follows:

Some of them were mounted and wore plate armour, equipped like men-at-arms.

On these men you could rely,

facing the [opposing] Danish men-at-arms they wouldn’t flinch.

They were skilled to cock and discharge [their crossbows] from horseback,

performing as good as the men-at-arms.

Their arrows were truly sharp,

and went through both horse and man.¹¹

These mounted, armoured, and martially skilled commoners clearly must have been men of some economic standing. Additional letters also speak of mounted militiamen and during the reign of Svante Nilsson, sources even describe the whole militia of Dalecarlia as mounted.²² The medieval laws and statutes state that peasants were obliged to own military arms, which testify to the martial character of late medieval Swedish peasant society.²³ Several 15th century statutes also tried to discourage peasants from carrying arms and armour in public or at social gatherings, which implies that the peasantry sought ways to manifest their martial identity in the public sphere.²⁴ Warfare was no marginal phenomenon, but a central pursuit for which the peasants were well prepared to the extent of their economic standing. The apparent skill and wealth of the mounted soldiers clearly suggest that at least part of the militias were composed of commoners with some standing. There are, however, no preserved militia muster rolls or mentions thereof, which suggest a low level of administrative transparency.

The selection of individual soldiers could not have been carried out from above, but from the peasant collectives themselves. The potential political advantages must have functioned as an incentive to serve and attracted the most affluent commoners. This group presumably took great pride in their military service and used the campaigns as a social arena in which they could promote their martial prowess. When the peasant communes fielded their militia, it undoubtedly represented an individual as well as collective demonstration of military power.

These circumstances are also echoed in Gustavus I’s rhetoric in 1542, when he replied to the Dalecarlia peasants’ complaints of new fees and taxes. He reminded them, ‘... in the old days, you marched to war and served as men-at-arms [hofman] yourselves, for a half or even a whole year, leaving your homes and families to go to Russia, Kalmar and other places.’²⁵ In a similar open letter to the peasantry of the southern provinces, the king emphasized how the militiamen had often left their homes for long periods, leaving their wives and children to go hungry and starve as fields and pastures lay untilled. Under the Sture regents, they served without complaint and still paid their taxes. But now, ‘when they did not need to serve themselves anymore, they complained more than ever.’²⁶ Clearly, a large proportion of the landed peasantry served in the late medieval peasant militia and did so with pride and courage. As I will argue, the military role of this social category changed during the following period.

In the conclusion of this section about the late medieval period, I want to emphasize that the peasant social group, further than hitherto, needs to be analytically stratified in terms of military potential. The upper peasant strata seem to have controlled and dominated the militia and its military role has hitherto not been fully appreciated. This key group did not retain its military prominence in the 16th century transition from one military-political system to another. Still, in some way, it seems to have retained its political significance. In the following section, I will contrast the roles of the medieval and the 16th century peasant elite. I want to study how this group adapted to the changing military-political structure, in what ways its strategies changed, and what part it played in the greater state-building process.

Enlistment and conscription during the Early Vasa dynasty

The perhaps most significant result of Gustavus I’s long reign 1521-1560 was a thorough reorganization of the Swedish military institutions. By 1560, a large royal army had been created, while all other autonomous and separate military institutions of medieval society had been dismantled. Even though Gustavus I seized the throne largely thanks to the efforts of the peasant militia, several letters and proclamations testify to the king’s low esteem for it.²⁷ Already at the diet of Strangnas in 1523, the king argued for phasing out the militia. He emphasized the great benefits inherent in a new system where he organized the defence of the realm, while the peasants henceforth should ‘... sit at home, tend to their fields, feed their wives and children and no longer march away to get killed.’²⁸ The men addressed here were clearly freeholder husbands. During the 1530s, the king sought to introduce a tax-funded military organization and to degrade the militia to a passive emergency reserve.²⁹ In order to avoid the lawful negotiations with peasant collectives, the king’s men started to enlist individuals directly under royal command for a comparatively generous cash payment.³⁰ In the martially seasoned Swedish society, there was an ample supply of able men eager to enlist and the cash contracts must have been especially compelling for the poorer echelons of society.

With the permanent army organization, Gustavus I offered a persuasive alternative to the decentralized late medieval military organization. In the continuous discussion concerning the defence of the realm, the king frequently also repeated his claim that he had introduced a much more rational military organization than that of his predecessors.³¹ The late medieval rulers were bound to negotiate with local assemblies for contributions of manpower in exchange for collective benefits. The new recruitment for individual pay effectively circumvented negotiations and political consent from the peasant assemblies. As a long-term consequence, the collective military and political importance of local society diminished.

However, the modest finances of the Crown did not allow for Gustavus I to employ the increasing number of modern infantry units required. The royal council offered a solution in 1544, where it laid out the legal foundations for a new army institution. Sven A. Nilsson argues that the enormous costs of the enlisted army 1521-1543 created an impossible financial situation and that the economy was the main reason for the reform in 1544.³² In these decisions, the lawful duty of every adult male to aid the king in the defence of the realm was explicitly emphasized, while the customary local negotiations for allowances were legally abolished. They were replaced with a fixed maximum quota of males available for service, to be conscripted without prior negotiations. Additionally, military duty now also included participation in wars of aggression.³³

What men served in this new army? The frequent earlier mobilization of peasant militia created an ample local supply of martially seasoned men. In the king’s enlistment commissions during the 1530s and 1540s, he repeatedly instructed his officials to have their pick among the best marksmen skilled with crossbows and harquebus.³⁴ The enlisted soldiers often seem to have brought their own weapons. During the Dacke rebellion, this was often a prerequisite to enter royal service.³⁵ The purchase of arms represented an investment and implies that these men both had martial experience and was reasonably prosperous. This also meant that the lowest economic strata of rural society were excluded from enlistment. Gustavus I eventually solved the armament problem through the establishment of weapons’ manufacturing industries and the organizing of royal arsenals. The cost of individual munitions was henceforth simply withdrawn from the soldier’s initial pay.

In this way, individuals could be recruited and armed irrespective of their economic means. Arsenals thus became a precondition for the conscription system introduced in 1544.³⁶

The new soldiers, who served perpetually in assigned units, received a modest annual sum for being ready for service and received a monthly salary during campaigns.³⁷ The first formalized articles of war, issued by the king in 1545, also clearly altered the judicial standing of the new soldiers in contrast to the older militia.³⁸ Another important aspect of this process was that the soldiers also received cloth as part of their pay. In 1548, the king explicitly stated that the soldiers in his service should dress in bright colours so as to be visually distinguishable from the common peasantry.³⁹ Even though this was a domestic ‘budget army,’ it represented something qualitatively different in comparison to the militias of the past. From this point on, there was no longer room for political negotiations in order to mobilize the army.

The generous enlistment contracts from the period 1521-1544 had been concluded voluntarily with select individuals.⁴⁰ During the whole period from the onset of Gustavus I’s reign and up to the Dacke Rebellion, the king regularly asked his bailiffs and commissioners to recruit able, young, and unmarried men all over the realm who wished to serve for cash.⁴¹ After the feud had been concluded, the king even reproached some bailiffs who had forcefully enlisted elderly freeholder husbands. They should rather stay home and tend to their fields because he had no use for them in his service.⁴² This clearly indicates that the conscript system was not indiscriminate. As Pihlstrbm shows, the conscription quota of soldiers in Dalecarlia in the late 1540s was evenly divided among each parish according to its demography.⁴³ This was thus no forceful or arbitrary enlistment, but conscription of men in agreement with local society, where each county promised to place a number of men at the crown’s disposal.⁴⁴ The king emphasized that the men must enter royal service of their own free will. All able young men of every parish should be gathered in one place, where the landed peasants could survey and chose whom to nominate. The king also ruled that any rural tailor, shoemaker, or other young men who tried to abscond from the selection should immediately be conscripted.⁴⁵

A number of sources emphasize that men who currently did not serve a master - such as rural artisans, tailors, shoemakers, skinners, or day labourers - were considered liable for service and could be freely conscripted.⁴⁶ The general preference for this social category certainly suited the landed peasantry well. If there was an element of compulsion in the new conscription system - as some scholars claim - it was largely a consequence of decisions in local society.⁴⁷ Increasingly, the dispossessed strata in rural society was liable for military service, and because of the new permanent character of the service, this meant a life as a soldier. The increasing references to refractory soldiers and desertions testify to the decreasing appeal of military service among the conscripted men.⁴⁸

During the Middle Ages, the local negotiations over quantity, mode, and length of militia service had empowered the peasantry politically and created a bargaining position. In the new conscription system, this was abolished. Now it was mainly a question of what individuals to nominate. The elites in peasant society, who used to take pride in mounted service at the head of the militia, no longer found the political or economic incentive to serve themselves. During the later 16th century, the crown’s administrative penetration into local society increased markedly and its representatives introduced comprehensive muster rolls to keep track of the nominated soldiers. In this process, the landed peasantry largely seems to have refrained from military service themselves and, instead, to have taken up a new role as mediators between the state and local society. This must have facilitated the process of conscription.

On different local levels, county and parish assemblies regulated both judicial and administrative matters. Trustees (Toluman and Lanstnan) were appointed among the wealthiest peasants in local peasant society to preside over these assemblies.⁴⁹ In cooperation with crown representatives, the local trustees appointed the men to conscript. The royal decrees were designed in a way which clearly favoured the well-to-do freeholders. In the new conscript system - just as earlier - the prominent peasants of local society were given a mandate to decide who should serve. The diminishing economic and political incentive for military service must have had an effect on their choice of men to select. Obviously, the affluent and wealthy peasants would no longer volunteer for service themselves. During the Nordic Seven Years’ War (1563-1570), the freeholder peasants could claim the right not to serve themselves as long as they cooperated with the crown to provide others who would.⁵⁰ Increasingly, the men called up to serve also hired replacements, which became a widespread problem as the hirelings were rarely fit for service. Eventually, a system was introduced to ascertain the quality of the replacements, and as Nils Erik Villstrand emphasizes, in 17th century Finland, this practice developed into something of an institution.⁵¹

As Nilsson points out, during the war with Russia (1570-1595) fought overseas in Livonia and Ingria, the soldiers must have realized that they now served in an army where the service obligations superseded those of the peasant militia.⁵² One obvious difference between the militia and the permanent army was that the new campaigns across the Baltic Sea were exceedingly long and often continued for years, in contrast to the militia, which was rarely mobilized for more than a few months. Swedish society became increasingly war weary and the shift from defensive to offensive warfare overseas certainly gave military service a decreasing appeal.

During the period 1543-1563, the infantry in the royal Swedish army increased from around 2000-25,876 men, which represented a near exponential growth of the standing military forces.⁵³ In spite of the decreasing appeal for military service, the vast increase in conscripted men was not accompanied by large insurrections or rebellions. This testifies to a certain degree of contentment with this process among the subjects. How was this pervasive

Pride of the communes 99 organizational transition made politically acceptable? One interpretation of why the peasantry approved of the new conscript system was their dislike of the transitional system prevailing from 1521 to 1544, where men freely entered lucrative individual contracts beyond the political control of the peasant assemblies. In the new conscript system, the prominent members of the peasant assemblies directed the selection of men nominated to serve. If there were cases of forced conscription in this system, it was the consequence of an ominous new alliance between the crown and the peasant elites.

During the Nordic Seven Year’s War, Sweden fought an arduous and devastating defensive war against Denmark. In his instructions, King Eric XIV (1560-1568) repeatedly emphasized how the steady recruitment of troops depended on the cooperation between state officials and peasant trustees in local society.⁵⁴ In 1577, King John III restated that conscription must be carried out in the presence of the local assemblies. This testifies to the continuous collective character of the recruitment enterprises. The king also declared that those who neither owned land nor paid full tax - such as rural craftsmen, farmhands, and unmarried men - were particularly suited to serve in the army.⁵⁵ This instruction can be interpreted as advice to the local assemblies as to who to choose for conscription. A similar instruction was further outlined in the king’s warrant for the army captains in 1583, where the instruction was repeated to primarily conscript the social surplus. All households should assemble their sons, farmhands, and servants in one place on a certain day. All men suitable to serve should then be carefully registered in order to facilitate the selection for conscription.⁵⁶

The surplus social group pointed out by the king might well have been enlarged at the time. The substantial general population growth in Europe during the course of the 16th century also affected Sweden. In many places, it led to a scarcity of land, rising food prices, and a downward pressure on wages, which in turn created a growing stratum of the impoverished. The consequence was often economic polarization and social tension.⁵⁷

Beside the destitute social category, a large proportion of the conscripted soldiers were also cottage farmers. In 1575, King Johan instructed the army commanders to collaborate with bailiffs and peasant representatives, to ascertain that the burden of conscription was evenly distributed so that no farmstead was left without male labourers altogether.⁵⁸ In spite of this, on several occasions during campaigns of his reign, soldiers petitioned for leave to go home and tend to their farms, because they were too poor to hire farmhands to maintain their households.⁵⁹ Socially, the mass of conscripted soldiers were still a mixed body of men composed of the destitute as well as masters of households. The lower social strata of cottage or tenant farmers probably mostly represented the second category. Even though sources sometimes still mention landed peasants as soldiers, the number of destitute men was on the increase.⁶⁰

The royal recruitment decrees of 1577 and 1583 certainly targeted young and unmarried non-property owners, such as farmers’ youngest sons,

labourers, and local craftsmen. Hallenberg underlines that the organized recruitment of men with no permanent position created a social distance between the landed peasants and conscripted soldiers, where the former were often encouraged to control and discipline the latter.⁶¹ The pressure of near-constant warfare 1554-1595 seems to have pitted different strata of common society against each other. Increasingly, the wealthy peasants seem to have collaborated with the crown in identifying ‘cannon fodder’ amongst the sons of petty farmers and the indigent labour workers of local society. The continuous negotiations between state representatives and the peasant elites also seem to have represented empowering interactions, through which the more influential peasants could maintain local influence. The deals struck between the crown and the local peasant elites thus promoted the authority of the landed peasants over marginalized groups in local society. This process seems largely to have been propelled by the military-institutional changes of this period.

Lastly, this issue also seems connected to social identity. The question of whether early modern Swedish society was militarized has been a matter of debate in earlier research. Gunnar Arteus claims that Swedish politics and government economy were militarized to a considerable extent during the rule of the Vasa dynasty (1560-1611), but that there seems to have been no militarization of minds outside the army, and no rise in the social prestige of the military during this period.⁶² The results of this present study concur with Arteus’ statement. With The allotment system of the late 17th century, the military organization was eventually fully integrated into local society. Throughout the 16th century however, local rural society neither integrated into the military organization nor yet identified itself with it. The military command increasingly considered rural society a pool of human resources. In this process, the peasant elites lost their age-old military pride and identity and instead largely took up the roles as political mediators in the local assemblies, where they still upheld political influence and facilitated the crown’s conscription of their poor and less fortunate neighbours.

Conclusions

In different ways, the Swedish peasant communes clearly had a very important military role throughout the period discussed here. But the forms of political influence and the terms of military service fundamentally changed during the course of the 16th century. Even though there were recurrent debates about the terms of service, the peasantry recognized the importance of the defence of the realm and clearly shared a long-term security goal with the crown. The significant change was that the peasantry handed over control of their military forces to the crown altogether. In this process, the social composition of men serving in the army also changed.

The accentuated social stratification in peasant society during the 16th century coincides, chronologically, with the changes within military

Pride of the communes 101 organization and the increased demand for military labour. It is known from previous research that the element of coercion in military recruitment seems to have increased during this period, and that it was increasingly directed towards the destitute members of rural society. What has been less clear, however, is that the late medieval militia was rather different in this respect. The locally organized militia also included the most prominent members of peasant society - who took pride in their martial prowess in the defence of the realm. When institutional change eventually removed the political and economic incentives for campaigning, this stratum of peasant society refrained from military service themselves. Instead, the peasant elites increasingly rose as agents of state-building during this process. These men were not integrated into the growing state administration but acted as mediators, facilitating the conscription of others. The negotiations over military manpower represented empowering interactions in which the upper strata of peasant society, in their role as mediators, were able to maintain local political power in exchange for providing able men for the crown. They were often appointed as trustees in the local political assemblies and thus obviously had a great say in the selection of men. This social shift is thus an example of local reaction and adaptation to larger military-institutional changes, where the peasant elite lost its military identity at the same time as it increasingly acted as a mediator between the state representatives and the lower social strata.

From now on, Swedish state policy was geared towards offensive warfare abroad, with long and arduous campaigns across the Baltic Sea. The wealthy landowning peasant group, which had taken pride in representing local society in the defence of the medieval realm, no longer saw benefits from service in this new state-run army. The conscription of growing permanent forces offered no economic or political advantages and the upper strata of peasant society no longer had any incentives to serve. Military service, therefore, increasingly became a matter for the young, destitute, and dispossessed male social surplus in rural society. This central component of the state-building process was made possible through the new role of the peasant elites as mediators between the state and local society. When these mediators provided the crown with manpower from the lower social strata in exchange for increased local power, they certainly facilitated the expansion and consolidation of the early modern Swedish military state.

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Notes

• 1 See for instance: Lane 1979; Tilly 1985.
• 2 Glete 2006, pp. 194-195.
• 3 Glete 2006; Lindegren 1985; Skoog 2018, pp. 496-498.
• 4 Skoog 2018.
• 5 Hallenberg 2019; Hallenberg Sc Holm 2016; Huhtamies 2002; Larsson 1967.
• 6 See for instance: Kroener 1982; Parrott 2012, pp. 156-173.
• 7 Ertman 1997.
• 8 Glete 2006, p. 8, 192-194.
• 9 For the ‘Coordinating State’ concept, see: Mann 1986, pp. 416-449.
• 10 Skoog 2018.
• 11 Skoog 2018, pp. 357-364, 383-388.
• 12 Schlyter, 1862, p. 11; Schlyter, 1869, p. 17: In the code of Kristoffer the word tolerably (‘drageligast’) is also inserted after ‘shall or should,’ emphasizing the importance of negotiations to determine the draft.
• 13 Skoog 2018, p. 397, 547-548.
• 14 Hadorph, 1676, pp. 252f.
• 15 ASB, pp. 12, 59f, 152; SDHK 26862; GIR 1545, p. 595; Gillingstam 1952, p. 411; Styffe 1870, p. CCXXII; Styffe 1875, p. CCXXV.
• 16 [Emil Hildebrand], 1900, p. 302.
• 17 BSH 5:365.
• 18 Skoog 2012, pp. 24-25.
• 19 Vilhelmsdotter 1999, pp. 91-92, 129f, 197.
• 20 Klemming 1881-1882, p. 182.
• 21 Klemming 1866, p. 295. Both Schtick and Ferm dates the production of this text closely to the actual events (Schtick 1976, p. 343; Ferm 2010, pp. 958-959).
• 22 BSH 5:182; SDHK 34038. The early 14th century district law of Uppland mentions peasants in possession of suitable horses, war saddles and weaponry (Schlyter 1834, p. 113).
• 23 Yrwing 1965, p. 303; Schlyter 1838, p. 190.

Hadorph 1687, pp. 43, 45, 47, 55; SDHK 43993; Hafström 1975, p. 511;

Larsson 1984, p. 230; Bjarne Larsson 1994, p. 70; Cederholm 2007, p. 89.

GIR 1542, p. 383 (My italics).

GIR 1542, p. 397 (My italics). See also: GIR 1532-1533, pp. 186-188.

GIR 1532-1533, pp. 24, 30f; GIR 1535, pp. 138f; Barkman 1937, p. 159;

Viljanti 1957, p. 40.

GIR 1521-1524, p. 125. See also: GIR 1540, p. 141-144.

Hallenberg & Holm 2016, p. 253.

RA, Räntekammarböcker, vol 4, pp. 22b-26b, 27b-35; GIR 1534, p. 127f; Barkman 1937, p. 322; Hammarström 1956, p. 353; Viljanti 1957, pp. 167f; Skoog 2018, pp. 443f.

GIR 1540-1541, pp. 141ff; GIR 1542, p. 408.

Nilsson 1989, p. 4. For other interpretations of the reasons, see: Larsson 1967, pp. 251 f, 263-267; Hallenberg & Holm 2016, p. 50.

Skoog (2018), pp. 422, 471. In 1544, the maximum quota was set for six peasants to produce one soldier (with the exception of Smaland). This quota was later set to ten peasants, which prevailed well into the 17th century.

GIR 1532-1533, p. 29, 46; GIR 1534, p. 148, 319; GIR 1542, p. 124; GIR 1543, p. 271,302.

GIR 1534, p. 319; GIR 1542, p. 198; GIR 1543, p. 18, 33,37,41,155,169,264;

RA, Räntekammarböcker, vol 7, del 1, pp. 31b, 32b, 33, 33b, 35b, 38b, 40b.

GIR 1542, p. 207; GIR 1543, pp. 329ff; GIR 1545, p. 581; GIR 1555, p. 47;

Viljanti 1957, p. 115; Hallenberg 2001, p. 197.

Pihlström 1902, p. 26.

GIR 1545, p. 16-21; Petri 1926, p. 63.

GIR 1548, p. 189.

Viljanti 1957, p. 39; Petri 1926, p. 45; Pihlström 1902, p. 7.

Klemming 1870, p. 56; GIR 1521-1524, p. 124f; GIR 1532-1533, pp. 46, 97;

GIR 1534, pp. 148-149; GIR 1542, pp. 88, 95, 124, 152; GIR 1543, pp. 18, 33, 37, 41, 168; Skoog, 2018, pp. 457f.

GIR 1545, p. 368f.

Pihlström 1902, pp. 7f.

Viljanti 1957, p. 41; Larsson 1967, p. 257.

GIR 1545, p. 369.

GIR 1530-1531, p. 445; GIR 1532-1533, p. 36, 40; GIR 1534, p. 148; GIR 1540-1541, p. If, 297ff; GIR 1555, p. 226; Pihlström 1902, p. 8; Villstrand 1992, pp. 121-123.

Fagerlund 2003, p. 15; Barkman 1931, p. 107; Viljanti 1957, pp. 40-42.

Huhtamies 2002; Larsson 1967, pp. 256f; Nilsson 1989, pp. 4-6.

Lindegren 1980, pp. 133-140.

Hallenberg & Holm, 2016, pp. 81-85.

Villstrand 1992, pp. 219-228.

Nilsson 1989, p. 5.

Generalstaben 1926, p. 22-24; Barkman 1931, p. 109.

RA, RR 1562, 19/8.; Barkman 1938-1939, p. 203.

Hallenberg &l Holm, 2016, pp. 98-102; Lindberg 1964, p. 28.

RA, RR 1583, 6/4.

Parrott 2012, p. 157.

RA, RR 1575, 28/6.

RA, Skrivelser till Konungen, Johan IILl, Abraham Nilsson’s foot soldiers (undated 1582).

Hallenberg & Holm, 2016, p. 100.

Hallenberg 2019, pp. 113-114.

Arteus 1986, pp. 136-137.

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