The reign of Sverker I Stenkilsätten (1247-1285)
Sverker I Stenkilsätten (1247-1285)
Sverker was the only son of king Magnus the first. He was at the time of his ascension already 35 years old and had ruled the duchy of Finland for more than a decade. Thus he was well prepared for his task. To posterity Sverker the first is known as Sverker the Steadfast, the reason for this being his demonstrably remarkable resilience.
When he first assumed the kingship he inherited a veteran army, a huge cash reserve and a quest to quell the heathens. And that is just what he tired to do. Since the time of king Torgils the mad the county of Kalmar had been in the hands of the muslims under the Emir of Mallorca. This is what he now sought to rectify as he declared war, bringing the more than 120 000 man strong Emirate upon him. The count itself was quickly subdued and the king then gathered a host in Skåne, expecting to repel the invading mallorcans. What happened was instead that the polish based kingdom of the Fatimids, exiled from Egypt by the crusades of the previous century, declared war on his vassal, the duke of Pommerania. Of course king Sverker saw no alternative but to coming to his vassals aid, and he raised a second army to wage the war against the Fatimid kingdom. As that war dragged on, and wave upon wave of mallorcans landed in Skåne, both the manpower and the finances of the kingdom were drained. On top of that the war against the Fatimids was going badly. When the fatimid king Wladyslaw offered peace Sverker took it, losing all of Pommerania. Now able to focus he defeated the Emirate by outlasting them. Sending armies from Spain to Scandinavia proved too costly for the mallorcans to bear. A peace was signed in which the Swedish suzerainity of Kalmar was confirmed.
Having used up his fathers wealth and gaining one impoverished province at the cost of three would probably have broken a lesser man, but not king Sverker. After rebuilding his finances he set out to compensate the loss of Pommerania by conquering Prussia from the pagan tribe of Sambians instead. This conquest was completed in only three months and Sverkers fortunes were restored. Meanwhile his inept vassal, the duke of Sjaelland, had lost the county of Sjaelland to the Fatimids. Now the king had lost control of the sound, and with it the control of the Baltic. Still he was not discouraged.
Since the Emirate of Mallorca had lost the county of Kalmar they had managed to embroil themselves in a war with the Kingdom of Norway, and they were now conquering that land at a frightening speed. To prevent all the spoils from going to his rival the Emir, king Sverker declared war on Norway himself. After a short but brutal war, both the counties of Medelpad and Trondelag were conquered. The mallorcans refused to be stopped though, chasing the Norwegian king from province to province. The counties of Agder, Rogaland and Herjedalen all fell, and finally the Norwegians were chased out of Scandinavia when even Lappland was conquered, this time by the tenacious Fatimids.
Sverker now saw himself surrounded by strong muslim kingdoms on three sides, to the north, south and west. To solve the equation he decided to forge an alliance with the powerful kingdom of Germany. This intimidated both his muslim rivals so that he could deal with them one at a time. This was put on hold when the Pope once again called a crusade to liberate the eternal city of Rome. Sverker saw this as an opportunity to avenge his great-grandfather and gain everlasting glory. Since he was not a great warrior himself he decided to send his marshal AbuBakr, a renegade from the fatimid court, instead. “To fight the heathens, send a heathen” he is supposed to have said. This crusade fared much better and the great marshal returned from Italy having conquered four counties, including Rome, and set up the new vassal duchy of Benveneto in place of the scheikdoms he found.
Sverkers next job was to build up the land. He built many castles and palaces, as well as larger and more magnificent churches. Economically he benefited his realm by introducing pigholding in many provinces and building smithies in the provinces of Svealand. His troubles were not yet over though. In 1267 his vassal, the count of Werle, declared his allegiance to the king to be void and instead pledged allegiance to the king of Germany. Now faced with a war with the powerful Germans king Sverker quickly seized his errant vassals lands and gifted them to the more reliable count of Mecklemburg, making him the new duke of Pommerania, a title still held within the realm. Just as this was done the news reached the court of the treachery of the duke of Benveneto, he had used the strained situation to his advantage and declared himself independent as well. Weary of war king Sverker let him go, citing the costs of waging war so far away as his reason.
The war with the Germans never really took of, the reason for this being that king Ernst of Germany had looked himself in an interminable war with the Mongols of the Golden Horde, sending thousands of young men to die every year. After a couple of years the war ended with a white peace and the kingdom of Sweden settled in for a long period of peace and prosperity.
Though Sverker fought no more wars he still had the satisfaction of seeing his rivals founder. The emirate of Mallorca slowly disintegrated over the next decade as the French nobles rallied and retook their lands at the same time as the Emir lost control over his overseas vassals, leaving isolated and weak scheikdoms on Swedens borders. The Germans were slowly being ground down in a never ending war on the Russian steppes, constantly outmanouvered by the Mongol horse archers. The Fatimids had mired themselves in a quagmire of feuding Hungarian counts and dukes and had lost control over their vassals in Norrland.
Privately the king was also a resilient man, he survived five wives and only suffered at the loss of the last one. Gormflaeth daughter of the count of Ulaid was only 17 when she married the then 63 year old king Sverker. Despite their enormous difference in age they apparently loved each other dearly. Gormflaeth bore Sverker two children, princess Beata and prince Styrbjörn. Beata was the light of their life and she was the only one who’s company the king tolerated when his young wife died in labour, pregnant with their third child. At this final setback the Kings will broke. He took ill and over the next few years he withdrew himself from public life, sitting in a chair on the terrace of his new palace and watching the sun set every day. In his 72nd year his illness worsened into pneumonia and he died that winter, he was 73 years old, having ruled for 38 years.