Scandinavian folktales are full of fascinating mythological and supernatural creatures. Some of the most common ones are giants, trolls, gnomes (”tomte”) and fairies, but also specific beings such as the Neck or Nix (”Näcken”) and…
This is based on a case-study of Älvdalen, where two sets of Witch Trials took place in 1668, and of how the society moved past the terrifying events and found reconciliation. Read part 1 here.…
How did the affected people and their societies deal with the aftermath of the witch trials? In the Nordic countries, circa 5000 people were accused of witchcraft, and around 1700 were executed (for Europe as…
When Swedish king Johan III died, on November 17, 1592, his and Katarina Jagellonica’s son Sigismund became king of Sweden. He was already king of Poland, as nephew to the former queen Anna. He was…
In my previous posts about the witch trials, we have been able to read how they played out in the Nordic countries. But how did the hysteria finally end? First, we must remember that even…
At the time of the witch hunt, Finland was a part of Sweden, and the hysteria spread there too. Just as in Iceland, witchcraft was mostly considered a male activity in Finland, and so most…
After queen Katarina Jagellonica’s death in 1583, king Johan III was 45 years old and wanted to remarry. He found his new bride among the Swedish nobility – 16-year-old Gunilla Bielke. Gunilla’s father was councillor…
In a previous post I wrote about the Danish presence in England, that began with the raid on Lindsifarne in 793. After establishing a kingdom around York/Jorvik, the English eventually drove out the Vikings from…
The darkest period of the Swedish witch trials has become known as “The Great Noise”. Between 1668 and 1676, 280 people were executed as witches, a staggering amount considering that around 400 people in total…
Just like other countries, few people had been executed for witchcraft in Sweden during the early Middle Ages. In the 15th century, only a handful men had been sentenced to death for sorcery, and in…