The oldest kingdom in the world

A review of "Historiska problem och utvecklingslinjer" by Curt Weibull

This is a somewhat obscure product, a collection of lectures by Swedish historian Curt Weibull. My copy is dated 1949. About a century ago, Curt and his brother Lauritz Weibull played an important part in deconstructing Swedish nationalist history-writing in favor of a source-critical approach. Before the Weibulls, ideas such as “Sweden is the oldest kingdom in the world” were fairly common, post-Weibull this was no longer possible. Sweden was demoted to a more modest position as an emerging but small kingdom during the 11th century AD.

However, the Weibulls kept the Uppland-centric approach, according to which the area around Old Uppsala (with its pagan temple) was seen as the effective cradle of Sweden. Today, historians would rather date the formative phase of the Swedish kingdom to the 12th and 13th centuries, and place its “cradle” in Götaland, Västergötland in particular. The process was connected to the introduction of Christianity in the form of the Catholic Church (which favored a strong royal power). Meanwhile in Uppsala, the pagan “temple” has been demoted to something more like a shrine. That being said, the Weibull brothers are still seen as trail-blazers for serious historiography.

Only one of the lectures in this collection deals with 11th century Sweden. Another deals with Finland, attacking the Greater Swedish notion that southwest Finland has been Swedish since time immemorial (or at least the Copper Stone Age). Curt Weibull also takes on the legend that Finland was conquered by a 12th century “crusade” led by the Swedish king St Erik. Other lectures deal with Gustavus Adolphus, Wallenstein's death and – somewhat unexpectedly – the resignation of Bismarck. All lectures are in Swedish (a slightly archaic Swedish, at that) and while I found them interesting, they are probably of little use to the general American reader…