Far Behind the FrontThe Ambitions and Shortcomings of a Military State in the 17th century

EAA – Plzen 2013Claes B Pettersson

The Emergence of a Major Power

• The Scandinavian Union of the late Middle Ages became impossible to maintain

• In its place – two nation-states, competing for control of the region

The Dissolution of the Kalmar Union (1397 – 1523)

The Nordic Seven Years War (1563 – 1570)

The Kalmar War(1611-1613)

The Baltic trade

The copper mine at FalunThe siege of Elfsborg in 1563

Guarding the Southern Border

Scandinavia in 1701

The City Fortresses of Southern Sweden in the early 17th century:

• Gothenburg (founded in 1621)• Jönköping (re-established in 1613)• Kalmar (re-built in 1613 / new site 1647) Jönköping :

• Supply base with stores for the army• Centre for strategic manufacture (arms & cloth)• Important junction (land & water)• Administrative centre for the region

Friary Royal Castle,

Border Fortress

The changing fortunes of Jönköping Castle

The Royal Castle 1550

The Border Fortress 1650

The Franciscan friary 1450

Visions for King & Council….

Draft for the new town 1617

...but hardly for the Good Citizens of Jönköping!

1620 - 1650Modernization

Reform

Resources

Imported know-how

A basis for:A military state

An efficient administration

An aggressive foreign policy

The Morass – no suitable place for a city…

Sedge

Peat cutting – for building material

Landfill and logistics in the early 17th century

Blue line – estimated shoreline before 1613Violet – landfill made by the Crown, mainly in the manufacturing areasBrown – landfill made by the burghers themselves during the first decades

Massive timber foundations

Landfill – at the Royal Chartered Arms Factory Site

Systematic landfill by the Crown 1613 – 1623 Landfill by later private owners 1623 – 1800

Henbane

A Town for King and Council?

DEN FÖRSTA TRÄKYRKAN

The Court of Appeal – begun in 1639

The Swedish Coat of Arms

Western entrance to Kristine Church – begun in 1649

Places of worship – two churches for a new town

Law and administration goes before religious needs…

The Royal Chartered Arms Factory

1620

High tech – but based on local traditions in arms manufacturing

Gunsmith’s workshop, built about 1640

Wheellock Flintlock

Matchlock

Fixture

The German Meadow Vantmakeriet 1620

• Large scale textile production (cloth)• For the army & the navy• A manufacture based on highly skilled workers, recruited in Germany

Three blocks – excavated 1982 to 2007

A visions that still remains – in the maps of 1657-58

The town as an unfinished project• Lack of resources / other priorties• A changing political situation

Cultivation instead of fortification

Flemings bastioner

1605

1617

The New Castle – a modern artillery fortress of the highest strategic importance

Drafts by Master Builder Hans Fleming – to be shown to King & Council

Re-built and modernized several times between 1595 and 1645

Bastion CarolusExcavated in 2012

Shoddy work… in exposed positions!

Considerable differences in wall thickness!

Broken sandstone ashlars

In danger of collapse from the beginning...

Built on insufficient foundations...

A hollow wall, filled with debris!

Mortar as a historic source material

Lime mortar from northern flank of bastion Carolus – built in 1609-10

Lime mortar from makeshift wall – built immediately before the siege of 1612

Propaganda versus Reality – The Jönköping metaphor

A town of great strategic value – the central, but weakest link in the chain of defence!

• where the impressive city fortifications were never built• where the castle was neither finished, nor ever fully prepared for battle• where one of the two Royal Chartered Manufactures became a total failure• where the local economy was closely linked to the aggressive foreign policy• where the international element was of great importance during the 17th century