Prehistory

Sweden's prehistory begins in the Allerød oscillation, a warm period around 12,000 BC,^[23] 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.^[24]

Sweden and its people were first described by Publius Cornelius Tacitus in his Germania (98 AD).^[25] In Germania 44 and 45 he mentions the Swedes (Suiones) as a powerful tribe with ships that had a prow at each end (longships).^[26] 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.^[27]

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.^[28] 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).

Vikings

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'.^[29] 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.^[30]

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]}

During the early stages of the Viking Age, a centre of trade in northern Europe developed at Birka on the island of Björkö, not far from where Stockholm was later constructed, in mid-latitude Sweden. Birka was founded around 750 AD as a trading port by a king or merchants trying to control trade.^[31] Birka was the Baltic link in the Dnieper Trade Route through Ladoga (Aldeigja) and Novgorod (Holmsgard) to the Byzantine Empire and the Abbasid Caliphate.^[32] It was abandoned c. AD 975, around the same time Sigtuna was founded as a Christian town some 35 km to the northeast. It has been estimated that the population in Viking Age Birka was between 500 and 1000 people.^[31] Archaeological finds indicate that Birka still was wealthy in the 9th and 10th centuries. Thousands of graves, coins, jewelry and other luxury items have been found there.^[33]

Kingdom of Sweden

The actual age of the kingdom of Sweden is unknown.^[34] Determining its age depends mostly on whether Sweden is considered a nation when the Svear (Swedes) ruled Svealand or when the Svear and the Götar (Geats) of Götaland were united under a single ruler. In the former 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 typically start the line of Swedish monarchs from when Svealand and Götaland were ruled under the same king, namely Erik the Victorious and his son Olof Skötkonung in the tenth century. These events are often described as the consolidation of Sweden, although substantial areas were conquered and incorporated later. In this context, "Götaland" primarily refers to the provinces of Östergötland and Västergötland. The island of Gotland was contested by various groups, including the Danes, the Hanseatic League, and the local Gutes. Småland was of little interest at the time due to its deep pine forests, with only the city of Kalmar and its castle holding any significant importance. There were also Swedish settlements along the southern coastline of Norrland, one of the four lands of Sweden.^{[citation needed]}

Saint Ansgar is traditionally credited with introducing Christianity to Sweden in 829, but the new religion did not begin to fully replace paganism until the 12th century. During that century, Sweden was undergoing dynastic struggles between the Erik and Sverker clans. The conflict ended when a third clan married into the Erik clan, founding the Bjälbo dynasty, which gradually consolidated Sweden into a stronger state. According to the Legend of Saint Erik and the Erik's Chronicle, Swedish kings conducted a series of Crusades to pagan Finland and started conflicts with the Rus', who by then had no further connections with Sweden.^[35] The Swedish colonisation of the coastal areas of Finland began in the 12th and 13th centuries.^[36]^[37] By the 14th century, this colonisation became more organised, and by the end of the century, several of the coastal areas of Finland were inhabited mostly by Swedes.^[38]

Except for the provinces of Scania, Blekinge, and Halland in the southwest of the Scandinavian peninsula, which were part of the Kingdom of Denmark during this period, feudalism never developed in Sweden as it did in much of Europe.^[39] As a result, the peasantry remained largely a class of free farmers throughout most of Swedish history. Slavery, also known as thralldom, was not common in Sweden,^[40] and the institution gradually diminished due to the spread of Christianity, the difficulty of obtaining slaves from lands east of the Baltic Sea, and by the development of cities before the 16th century.^[41] Indeed, both slavery and serfdom were abolished altogether by a decree of King Magnus Eriksson in 1335. Sweden remained a poor and economically underdeveloped country, where barter was the primary means of exchange.^[42]

In 1319, Sweden and Norway were united in a personal union under King Magnus Eriksson, the grandson of King Magnus Ladulås of Sweden and of King Haakon V of Norway. Magnus Eriksson also ruled Scania from 1332 to 1360. In the mid-14th century, Sweden was struck by the Black Death.^[43] The population of Sweden and most of Europe was decimated. The population did not reach its pre-1348 levels until the beginning of the 19th century, with one third of the population dying between 1349 and 1351. During this period, the cities began to acquire greater rights and were heavily influenced by German merchants of the Hanseatic League, active especially at Visby. In 1397, Queen Margaret I of Denmark (the former daughter-in-law of Magnus Eriksson) established the personal union of Sweden, Norway, and Denmark through the Kalmar Union. However, Margaret's successors, whose rule was centred in Denmark, were unable to control the Swedish nobility.

In 1520, King Christian II of Denmark, who sought to assert his claim to Sweden through military force, ordered the massacre of Swedish nobles in Stockholm, an event known as the "Stockholm Bloodbath." This atrocity incited the Swedish nobility to renew their resistance, and on 6 June 1523 (now celebrated as Sweden's National Day), they made Gustav Vasa their king.^[44] This is sometimes considered as the foundation of modern Sweden. Shortly afterwards the new king rejected Catholicism and led Sweden into the Protestant Reformation.^[45] 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.^[46] 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.^[46] The monarchy became hereditary in 1544.^[47]

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.^[48] In exchange, they offered a certain amount of protection to the joining cities.^[49] 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, Lübeck 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.^[50] 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.^[50] However, the Swedes began to resent the monopoly trading position of the Hansa (mostly consisting of German citizens). Consequently, when Gustav Vasa broke the monopoly power of the Hanseatic League, he was regarded as a hero by the Swedish people.^[51] 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.^[52]

The end of the 16th century was marked by a final phase of rivalry between the remaining Catholics and the new Protestant communities. In 1592, Gustav Vasa's Catholic grandson and king of Poland, Sigismund, ascended the Swedish throne.^[53] He pursued to strengthen Rome's influence by initiating Counter-Reformation and created a dual monarchy that temporarily became known as the Polish-Swedish Union. His despotic rule, strongly characterised by intolerance towards the Protestants, sparked a civil war that plunged Sweden into poverty.^[54] In opposition, Sigismund's uncle and successor, Charles Vasa, summoned the Uppsala Synod in 1593 which officially confirmed the modern Church of Sweden as Lutheran. Following his deposition in 1599, Sigismund attempted to reclaim the throne sparing no expense, and hostilities between Poland and Sweden continued for the next hundred years.^[55]

Swedish Empire

Sweden rose to prominence on a continental scale during the reign of king Gustavus Adolphus, seizing territories from Russia and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in multiple conflicts.^[56] During the Thirty Years' War, Sweden conquered approximately half of the Holy Roman states and defeated the Imperial army at the Battle of Breitenfeld in 1631.^[57] Gustavus Adolphus planned to become the new Holy Roman Emperor, ruling over a united Scandinavia and the Holy Roman states, but he was killed at the Battle of Lützen in 1632. After the Battle of Nördlingen in 1634, Sweden's only significant military defeat of the war, pro-Swedish sentiment among the German states faded.^[57] These German provinces broke away from Swedish power one by one, leaving Sweden with only a few northern German territories: Swedish Pomerania, Bremen-Verden and Wismar. From 1643 to 1645, during the last years of the war, Sweden and Denmark-Norway fought the Torstenson War. The result of that conflict and the conclusion of the Thirty Years' War helped establish postwar Sweden as a major force in Europe.^[57] The Peace of Westphalia in 1648 granted Sweden territories in northern Germany.

In the middle of the 17th century, Sweden was the third-largest country in Europe by land area. Sweden reached its largest territorial extent under the rule of Charles X after the treaty of Roskilde in 1658, following Charles X's crossing of the Danish Belts.^[58]^[59] The foundation of Sweden's success during this period is credited to Gustav I's major changes to the Swedish economy in the 16th century, and his introduction of Protestantism.^[60] One-third of the Finnish population died in the devastating Great Famine of 1695–1697 that struck the country.^[61] Famine also hit Sweden, killing roughly 10% of Sweden's population.^[62]

In the 17th century, Sweden was engaged in many wars, for example with Poland–Lithuania, with both sides competing for territories of today's Baltic states. The Polish–Swedish War (1626–1629) ended with a ceasefire in Stary Targ (Truce of Altmark) on 26 September 1629 that was in favour of the Swedes, to whom Poland ceded the larger part of Livonia together with its important port of Riga. The Swedes also got the right to tax Poland's trade on the Baltic (3.5% on the value of goods), and kept control of many of the cities in Royal and Ducal Prussia (including Piława (Pillau), Memel and Elbląg (Elbing). The Swedes later conducted a series of invasions into the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, known as the Deluge.^[63] After more than half a century of almost constant warfare, the Swedish economy had deteriorated. It became the lifetime task of Charles X's son, Charles XI, to rebuild the economy and refit the army.^[64] His legacy to his son, the coming ruler of Sweden, Charles XII, was one of the finest arsenals in the world, a large standing army and a great fleet.^[65] Russia, the most serious threat to Sweden at this time, had a larger army but lagged far behind in both equipment and training.^[66]

After the Battle of Narva in 1700, one of the first battles of the Great Northern War, the Russian army was so severely devastated that Sweden had an open chance to invade Russia.^[67] However, Charles XII did not pursue the Russian army, instead turning against Poland and defeating the Polish king, Augustus II the Strong, and his Saxon allies at the Battle of Kliszów in 1702.^[68] This gave Russia time to rebuild and modernise its army.

After the success of invading Poland, Charles XII decided to make an attempt at invading Russia, but this ended in a decisive Russian victory at the Battle of Poltava in 1709.^[69] After a long march exposed to Cossack raids, the Russian Tsar Peter the Great's scorched-earth techniques and the extremely cold winter of 1709, the Swedes stood weakened with a shattered morale and were enormously outnumbered against the Russian army at Poltava.^[70] The defeat meant the beginning of the end for the Swedish Empire. In addition, the plague raging in East Central Europe devastated the Swedish dominions and reached Central Sweden in 1710.^[71]^[72] Returning to Sweden in 1715, Charles XII launched two campaigns against Norway in 1716 and 1718, respectively. During the second attempt, he was shot to death during the siege of Fredriksten fortress.^[73] The Swedes were not militarily defeated at Fredriksten, but the whole structure and organisation of the campaign fell apart with the king's death. Forced to cede large areas of land in the Treaty of Nystad in 1721, Sweden also lost its place as an empire and as the dominant state on the Baltic Sea.^[74] With Sweden's lost influence, Russia emerged as an empire and became one of Europe's dominant nations. As the war finally ended in 1721, Sweden had lost an estimated 200,000 men, 150,000 of those from the area of present-day Sweden and 50,000 from the Finnish part of Sweden.^[75] Executive power was historically shared between the King and an aristocratic Privy council until 1680, followed by the King's autocratic rule initiated by the commoner estates of the Riksdag. As a reaction to the failed Great Northern War, a parliamentary system was introduced in 1719, followed by three different flavours of constitutional monarchy in 1772, 1789 and 1809, the latter granting several civil liberties. Already during the first of those three periods, the 'Era of Liberty' (1719–72) the Swedish Rikstag had developed into a very active Parliament, and this tradition continued into the nineteenth century, laying the basis for the transition towards modern democracy at the end of that century.^[76] In the 18th century, Sweden did not have enough resources to maintain its territories outside Scandinavia, and most of them were lost, culminating with the loss in 1809 of eastern Sweden to Russia, which became the highly autonomous Grand Principality of Finland in Imperial Russia.^[77]

In interest of re-establishing Swedish dominance in the Baltic Sea, Sweden allied itself against its traditional ally and benefactor, France, in the Napoleonic Wars. However, in 1810, a French Marshal, Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, was chosen as heir presumptive to Charles XIII; in 1818, he established the House of Bernadotte, taking the regnal name of Charles XIV. Sweden's role in the Battle of Leipzig gave it the authority to force Denmark–Norway, an ally of France, to cede Norway to the King of Sweden on 14 January 1814 in exchange for the northern German provinces, at the Treaty of Kiel.^[78] The Norwegian attempts to keep their status as a sovereign state were rejected by the Swedish king, Charles XIII. He launched a military campaign against Norway on 27 July 1814, ending in the Convention of Moss, which forced Norway into a personal union with Sweden under the Swedish crown, which lasted until 1905.^[79]^[80] The 1814 campaign was the last time Sweden was at war.^[81]

Modern history

The Swedish East India Company began in 1731. The obvious choice of home port was Gothenburg at Sweden's west coast, the mouth of Göta älv river is very wide and has the county's largest and best harbour for high-seas journeys. The trade continued into the 19th century, and caused the little town to become Sweden's second city.^[82] Between 1750 and 1850, the population in Sweden doubled. According to some scholars, mass emigration to America became the only way to prevent famine and rebellion; over 1% of the population emigrated annually during the 1880s.^[83] It is thought that between 1850 and 1910 more than one million Swedes moved to the United States.^[84] Nevertheless, Sweden remained poor, retaining a nearly entirely agricultural economy even as Western European countries began to industrialise.^[83]^[85]

Despite the slow rate of industrialisation into the 19th century, many important changes were taking place in the agrarian economy due to constant innovations and a rapid population growth.^[86] These innovations included government-sponsored programmes of enclosure, aggressive exploitation of agricultural lands, and the introduction of new crops such as the potato.^[86] The Swedish farming culture began to take on a critical role in Swedish politics, which has continued through modern times with modern Agrarian party (now called the Centre Party).^[87] Between 1870 and 1914, Sweden began developing the industrialised economy that exists today.^[88]

Strong grassroots movements sprang up in Sweden during the latter half of the 19th century (trade unions, temperance groups, and independent religious groups), creating a strong foundation of democratic principles. These movements precipitated Sweden's migration into a modern parliamentary democracy, achieved by the time of World War I. As the Industrial Revolution progressed during the 20th century, people gradually moved into cities to work in factories and became involved in socialist unions. A communist revolution was avoided in 1917, following the re-introduction of parliamentarism, and the country was democratised.

World War I and World War II

Sweden was officially neutral during World War I. However, under pressure from the German Empire, they did take steps which were detrimental to the Allied powers – most notably, mining the Øresund channel, thus closing it to Allied shipping, and allowing the Germans to use Swedish facilities and the Swedish cipher to transmit secret messages to their overseas embassies.^[89] Sweden also allowed volunteers to fight alongside the Germans for the White Guards against the Red Guards and Russians in the Finnish Civil War, and briefly occupied Åland in cooperation with the German Empire.

As in the First World War, Sweden remained officially neutral during World War II, although its neutrality has been disputed.^[90]^[91] Sweden was under German influence for much of the war, as ties to the rest of the world were cut off through blockades.^[90] The Swedish government unofficially supported Finland in the Winter War and the Continuation War by allowing volunteers and materiel to be shipped to Finland. However, Sweden supported Norwegian resistance against Germany, and in 1943 helped rescue Danish Jews from deportation to Nazi concentration camps.

During the last year of the war, Sweden began to play a role in humanitarian efforts, and many refugees, among them several thousand Jews from Nazi-occupied Europe, were rescued thanks to the Swedish rescue missions to internment camps and partly because Sweden served as a haven for refugees.^[92] The Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg and his colleagues ensured the safety of tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews.^[93] Nevertheless, both Swedes and others have argued that Sweden could have done more to oppose the Nazis' war efforts.^[92]

Post-war era

Sweden was officially a neutral country and remained outside NATO and Warsaw Pact membership during the Cold War, but privately Sweden's leadership had strong ties with the United States and other western governments. Following the war, Sweden took advantage of an intact industrial base, social stability and its natural resources to expand its industry to supply the rebuilding of Europe.^[94] Sweden received aid under the Marshall Plan and participated in the OECD. During most of the post-war era, the country was governed by the Swedish Social Democratic Party largely in co-operation with trade unions and industry. The government actively pursued an internationally competitive manufacturing sector of primarily large corporations.^[95]

Sweden was one of the founding states of the European Free Trade Area (EFTA). During the 1960s the EFTA countries were often referred to as the Outer Seven, as opposed to the Inner Six of the then-European Economic Community (EEC).^[96]

Like many industrialised countries, Sweden entered a period of economic decline and upheaval following the oil embargoes of 1973–74 and 1978–79.^[97] In the 1980s several key Swedish industries were significantly restructured. Shipbuilding was discontinued, wood pulp was integrated into modernised paper production, the steel industry was concentrated and specialised, and mechanical engineering was robotised.^[98] Swedish GDP per capita ranking declined during this time.^[95]

Recent history

A bursting real estate bubble caused by inadequate controls on lending combined with an international recession and a policy switch from anti-unemployment policies to anti-inflationary policies resulted in a fiscal crisis in the early 1990s.^[99] Sweden's GDP declined by around 5%. In 1992, a run on the currency caused the central bank to briefly increase interest rates to 500%.^[100]^[101]

The response of the government was to cut spending and institute a multitude of reforms to improve Sweden's competitiveness, among them reducing the welfare state and privatising public services and goods. A referendum passed with 52.3% in favour of joining the EU on 13 November 1994. Sweden joined the European Union on 1 January 1995. In a 2003 referendum the Swedish electorate voted against joining the Euro currency. Sweden held the chair of the European Union from 1 July to 31 December 2009.

On 28 September 1994, the MS Estonia sank as the ship was crossing the Baltic Sea, en route from Tallinn, Estonia, to Stockholm, Sweden. The disaster claimed the lives of 852 people (501 of them were Swedes^[102]), being one of the worst maritime disasters of the 20th century.^[103]

Until 2022, Sweden generally remained non-aligned militarily, although it participated in some joint military exercises with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and some other countries, stationed its troops under NATO command in Afghanistan, took part in EU-sponsored peacekeeping operations in Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Cyprus, and helped enforce a UN-mandated no-fly zone over Libya during the Arab Spring. In addition, there was extensive cooperation with other European countries in the area of defence technology and defence industry; some Swedish-made weaponry was used by Coalition militaries in Iraq.^[104] In response to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Sweden moved to formally join NATO, alongside Finland.^[105] After many months of delays caused by the objections of Turkey and Hungary, Sweden became a NATO member on 7 March 2024.^[106]^[107]^[108]

In recent decades Sweden has become a more culturally diverse nation due to significant immigration; in 2013, it was estimated that 15% of the population was foreign-born, and an additional 5% of the population were born to two immigrant parents. The influx of immigrants has brought new social challenges. Violent incidents have periodically occurred^[109]^[110] including the 2013 Stockholm riots.^[111] In response to these violent events, the anti-immigration opposition party, the Sweden Democrats, promoted their anti-immigration policies, while the left-wing opposition blamed growing inequality caused by the centre-right government's socioeconomic policies.^[112]

Sweden was heavily affected by the 2015 European migrant crisis, eventually forcing the government to tighten regulations of entry to the country.^[113] Some of the asylum restrictions were relaxed again later.^[114]

On 30 November 2021, Magdalena Andersson became Sweden's first female prime minister.^[115]^[116] The September 2022 general election ended in a narrow win to a bloc of right-wing parties.^[117] On 18 October 2022, Ulf Kristersson of the Moderate Party became the new Prime Minister.^[118]