Vnv Nation Stockholm

[Mirtha Hinrichs]

Stockholmsnation is a student society and one of thirteen nations at Uppsala University. The nation has its origins in the mid-17th century and regards 1649 as its official date of foundation, although this is uncertain. A document in the archives mentions students enrolled in the nation in 1649, but this is a copy of an original that was lost in a fire in 1702, and the nation is mentioned in the protocols of the consistory (board) of the university from 1656 as having been in existence for three years, which would put the foundation date at about 1653.[1]

The old part of the nation building was designed by architect Johan Fredrik bom, and was completed in 1848. A new wing of the nation building, begun in 1961, is designed by modernist architect Peter Celsing.[2]

Sweden is a highly developed country ranked fifth in the Human Development Index.[11] It is a constitutional monarchy and a parliamentary democracy, with legislative power vested in the 349-member unicameral Riksdag. It is a unitary state, divided into 21 counties and 290 municipalities. Sweden maintains a Nordic social welfare system that provides universal health care and tertiary education for its citizens. It has the world's 14th highest GDP per capita and ranks very highly in quality of life, health, education, protection of civil liberties, economic competitiveness, income equality, gender equality and prosperity.[12][13] Sweden joined the European Union on 1 January 1995. It is also a member of the United Nations, NATO, the Nordic Council, the Schengen Area, the Council of Europe, the World Trade Organization and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

The name for Sweden is generally agreed to derive from the Proto-Indo-European root *s(w)e, meaning "one's own", referring to one's own tribe from the tribal period.[14][15][16] The native Swedish name, Sverige (a compound of the words Svea and rike, first recorded in the cognate Swēorice in Beowulf),[17] translates as "realm of the Swedes", which excluded the Geats in Gtaland.

The contemporary English variation was derived in the 17th century from Middle Dutch and Middle Low German. As early as 1287, references are found in Middle Dutch referring to a lande van sweden ("land of [the] Swedes"), with swede as the singular form.[18] In Old English the country was known as Swoland or Sworce, and in Early Modern English as Swedeland.[19] Some Finnic languages, such as Finnish and Estonian, use the terms Ruotsi and Rootsi; these variations refer to the Rus' people who inhabited the coastal areas of Roslagen in Uppland and who gave their name to Russia.[20]

Sweden's prehistory begins in the Allerd oscillation, a warm period around 12,000 BC,[21] with Late Palaeolithic reindeer-hunting camps of the Bromme culture at the edge of the ice in what is now the country's southernmost province, Scania. This period was characterised by small clans of hunter-gatherers who relied on flint technology.[22]

Sweden and its people were first described by Publius Cornelius Tacitus in his Germania (98 AD).[23] In Germania 44 and 45 he mentions the Swedes (Suiones) as a powerful tribe with ships that had a prow at each end (longships).[24] Which kings (*kuningaz) ruled these Suiones is unknown, but Norse mythology presents a long line of legendary and semi-legendary kings going back to the last centuries BC. The runic script was in use among the south Scandinavian elite by at least the second century AD, but all that has survived from the Roman Period is curt inscriptions demonstrating that the people of south Scandinavia spoke Proto-Norse at the time, a language ancestral to Swedish and other North Germanic languages.[25]

In the sixth century, Jordanes names two tribes living in Scandza, both of which are now considered to be synonymous with the Swedes: the Suetidi and Suehans.[26] The Suehans were known to the Roman world as suppliers of black fox skins and, according to Jordanes, had very fine horses, similar to those of the Thyringi of Germania (alia vero gens ibi moratur Suehans, quae velud Thyringi equis utuntur eximiis).

The Swedish Viking Age lasted roughly from the eighth century to the 11th century. It is believed that Swedish Vikings and Gutar mainly travelled east and south, going to Finland, Estonia, the Baltic countries, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, the Black Sea and even as far as Baghdad. Their routes passed through the Dnieper south to Constantinople, on which they carried out numerous raids. The Byzantine Emperor Theophilos noticed their great skills in war, and invited them to serve as his personal bodyguard, known as the Varangian Guard. The Swedish Vikings, called Rus are believed to be the founders of Kievan Rus'.[27] The Arab traveller Ibn Fadlan described these Vikings saying:

I have seen the Rus as they came on their merchant journeys and encamped by the Itil. I have never seen more perfect physical specimens, tall as date palms, blond and ruddy; they wear neither tunics nor caftans, but the men wear a garment which covers one side of the body and leaves a hand free. Each man has an axe, a sword, and a knife, and keeps each by him at all times. The swords are broad and grooved, of Frankish sort.[28]

The actions of these Swedish Vikings are commemorated on many runestones in Sweden, such as the Greece runestones and the Varangian runestones. There was also considerable participation in expeditions westwards, which are commemorated on stones such as the England runestones. The last major Swedish Viking expedition appears to have been the ill-fated expedition of Ingvar the Far-Travelled to Serkland, the region south-east of the Caspian Sea. Its members are commemorated on the Ingvar runestones, none of which mentions any survivor.[citation needed]

The actual age of the kingdom of Sweden is unknown.[32] Establishing the age depends mostly on whether Sweden should be considered a nation when the Svear (Sweonas) ruled Svealand or if the emergence of the nation started with the Svear and the Gtar (Geats) of Gtaland being united under one ruler. In the first case, Svealand was first mentioned as having one single ruler in the year 98 by Tacitus, but it is almost impossible to know for how long it had been this way. The epic poem Beowulf describes semi-legendary Swedish-Geatish wars in the sixth century.

However, historians usually start the line of Swedish monarchs from when Svealand and Gtaland were ruled under the same king, namely Eric the Victorious and his son Olof Sktkonung in the tenth century. These events are often described as the consolidation of Sweden, although substantial areas were conquered and incorporated later. Gtaland in this sense mainly includes the provinces of stergtland (East Gothia) and Vstergtland (West Gothia). The island of Gotland was disputed by other people than Swedes, at this time (Danish, Hanseatic, and Gotland-domestic). Smland was at that time of little interest to anyone due to the deep pine forests, and only the city of Kalmar with its castle was of importance. There were Swedish settlements along the southern coastline of Norrland, one of the four lands of Sweden.[citation needed]

Except for the provinces of Scania, Blekinge, and Halland in the south-west of the Scandinavian peninsula, which were parts of the Kingdom of Denmark during this time, feudalism never developed in Sweden as it did in the rest of Europe.[37] As a result, the peasantry remained largely a class of free farmers throughout most of Swedish history. Slavery (also called thralldom) was not common in Sweden,[38] and what slavery there was tended to be driven out of existence by the spread of Christianity, by the difficulty of obtaining slaves from lands east of the Baltic Sea, and by the development of cities before the 16th century.[39] Indeed, both slavery and serfdom were abolished altogether by a decree of King Magnus IV in 1335. Sweden remained a poor and economically backward country in which barter was the primary means of exchange.[40]

Many times the Swedish crown was inherited by child kings over the course of the kingdom's existence; consequently, real power was held for long periods by regents (notably those of the Sture family) chosen by the Swedish parliament. King Christian II of Denmark, who asserted his claim to Sweden by force of arms, ordered a massacre of Swedish nobles in Stockholm in 1520. This came to be known as the "Stockholm blood bath" and stirred the Swedish nobility to new resistance and, on 6 June (now Sweden's national holiday) in 1523, they made Gustav Vasa their king.[42] This is sometimes considered as the foundation of modern Sweden. Shortly afterwards the new king rejected Catholicism and led Sweden into the Protestant Reformation.The term riksdag was used for the first time in the 1540s, although the first meeting where representatives of different social groups were called to discuss and determine affairs affecting the country as a whole took place as early as 1435, in the town of Arboga.[43] During the Riksdag assemblies of 1527 and 1544, under King Gustav Vasa, representatives of all four estates of the realm (clergy, nobility, townsmen and peasants) were called on to participate for the first time.[43] The monarchy became hereditary in 1544.[44]

The Hanseatic League sought civil and commercial privileges from the princes and royalty of the countries and cities along the coasts of the Baltic Sea.[45] In exchange, they offered a certain amount of protection to the joining cities.[46] The privileges obtained by the Hansa included assurances that only Hansa citizens would be allowed to trade from the ports where they were located. They sought agreement to be free of all customs and taxes. With these concessions, Lbeck merchants flocked to Stockholm, where they soon came to dominate the city's economic life and made the port city of Stockholm into the leading commercial and industrial city of Sweden.[47] Under the Hanseatic trade, two-thirds of Stockholm's imports consisted of textiles, while the remaining third was salt. The main exports from Sweden were iron and copper.[47]However, the Swedes began to resent the monopoly trading position of the Hansa (mostly consisting of German citizens). Consequently, when Gustav Vasa or Gustav I broke the monopoly power of the Hanseatic League he was regarded as a hero by the Swedish people.[48] Furthermore, when Sweden did develop, freed itself from the Hanseatic League, and entered its golden era, the fact that the peasantry had traditionally been free meant that more of the economic benefits flowed back to them rather than going to a feudal landowning class.[49]

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