Much Finnish Land, Very Swedish, Now

[TheWalttu]

Provinces of Finland and Österbotten are currently Swedish, but I think that the game would benefit from changing them to finnish culture due to easier acceptance of the finnish culture and more logical province defections.

In my last game Denmark conquered modern Sweden + Åland, while Novgorod took Finnish area. Then many years later when Swedish cores in Tavastland, Nyland, Viborg and Savolax were gone, Novgorod went trough a civilwar or something becouse of Muscovy and rebels spawned in Finland. Novgorod lost to the rebels and Sweden and Finland got their indepence. So Sweden had only Finland and Österbotten, while Finland had Tavastland, Nyland, Viborg and Savolax. This is Blasphemy!

You could argue that the area was swedish-speaking in coastal areas, but doesn't game balance go before realism?

 

[ThePatriotOfDreumel]

Wiz: "No"

 

[Incompetent]

It's especially problematic because Sweden is a primary culture tag. It will *never* lose its cores on Finland and Osterbötten, even if Finland has been independent for centuries, and Finland is not allowed to de-Swedify the country whilst Sweden still exists. It's undeniable that there was a significant Swedish-speaking population in Finland, which accounted for most of the elite, but saying that these people would always and eternally be loyal to Sweden flies in the face of history. (Also, if elite culture is how we're determining province culture, every Estonian and Latvian province should be German culture.)

 

[AirikrStrife]

While I'm a swede with fenno-swedish roots I still agree with the speaker of this thread that the swedish presence in Finland is too strong compared to the finnish. The most reasonable way to handle this in my opinion is to create more provinces in finland and northern fennoscandia, a region currently very clumsily drawn (kola province stretching far into finnish lappland). I'd suggest about 2-3 new provinces in the region to balance out the cultures.

 

[TheWalttu]

Another problem is that should fenno-swedes be represented by swedish or finnish culture or by a completely new one. I don't know what to say about that, so maybe it's something for fenno-swedes to decide by themselves.

 

[AirikrStrife]

A good question. I do believe that it'd be enough to use swedish as culture for fenno-swedes. Why, they never developed a new language (like for instance the pontic greeks), fenno-swedish or eastern swedish is not more divergent from main swedish then other dialects of swedish such as scanian or jamts, and they still retained an ethnic identity as Swedes. I can't say for sure how modern fenno-swedes would argue since I only know two, but back in the 15th century then the swedish presence were still somewhat new I don't think they would have considered themself anything but swedes (in comparison to modern fenno-swedes who balances a finnish-swedish identity)

 

[Mustajuttu]

In the 12th century there was a lot of great harvests in sweden. This resulted in a baby boom. Now because of Swedish laws the eldest son inherited all of the land, and the rest of the sons was expected to move.

Now in the swedish east coast during this time wasn't like it's today because of the ice-age pressing the ground down, there was less area to work on among with many other reasons why it was hard to find land in "mainland Sweden"

Finland on the other hand was home to tribes, Tribes that since viking age had great relations with Swedes. Thise tribes was nomadic and lived on the move. But spent most of the time in what today is Tavastland. The tribes moved to the coast during the summer for fishing and the coast is where the summer comes first so it's an obvious location to spend the spring.

Now back to the Swedes. When the first Swedes settled in Finland it was in harmony and with good relations to the tribes. the tribes could still use the coast to fish and do what they now did other than fishing. This is proven by the lack of originally finnish towns name on the west coast. and the few there is Tavastehus which is now Hämenlinna which isn't a coastal town I know. but generally the town with finnish origins is named after the Tavasts

In Sweden the general view is that Finland was conquered in a series of Crusades. Now this is most likely not true. If this was the case there would be a letter from King Erik to the Bishop of Rome (aka the Pope) telling the news that the finnish heretics is now under a Catholic king. But this letter doesn't exist.

The most likely scenario is that Finland became Swedish after a couple of decades of emigration from Sweden to Finland.

Now why would the finns allow swedes to just come over and install their religion and king to the region without a battle?

This is mainly because of the rivalry between Novgorod and Sweden, the finns would likely have prefered the western influence over the russian. The finnish tribes was in constant disputes over land with the Novgorodians, The Swedes on the other hand had always respected the Finnish tribes. There was also alot of obvious advantages in accepting the catholic church, Being catholic opened contact with the European mainland. One could learn how to write and read, and go to university.

Swedish laws during this period the so called västgötalagen was also easy for the finns to accept because it was simmilar to the laws the finns had prior to the swedish integration.

Balance over realism is a good argument indeed but Finland, Åland, and Österbotten still is largely swedish speaking because the first to settle there permanently was swedes.