The Nyköping Banquet

Portrait of Birger Magnusson

Nyköpings gästabud (The Nyköping Banquet) happened on this day 700 years ago (10 December 1317) and is one of the more well-known incidents in Swedish history. But it did not really start there. One can say that the prelude started already in 1290 when Swedish king Magnus Ladulås died.

Magnus had three sons and two daughters. The oldest son was Birger who had been elected king at the age of four, was only ten years old at the time of his father's death wherefore the Lord High Constable of Sweden, Torgils (or Torkel) Knutsson, became protector until 1298. Birger married the Danish princess Margarete who in Sweden was known as queen Märta.

Birger's two brothers Erik and Valdemar became dukes, but Erik wanted more power. With the support of Valdemar, he captured Birger at his kongsgård Håtuna by the lake Mälaren in what is known in Swedish history as Håtunaleken (The Håtuna game) on 29 September 1306. Erik and Valdemar then took their brother to the castle Nyköpingshus where they kept him imprisoned for two years.

The seal of Erik

Erik then got to power and through his marriage to the Norwegian princess Ingeborg, he hoped he would inherit the Norwegian throne as well. They got the son Magnus and the daughter Eufemia.

The relationship between the three brothers continued to be strained and the Danish and Norwegian kings felt a need to interfere. A peace treaty was sign in Helsingborg in 1310 which divided the country into three parts: Birger got eastern Sweden, Erik got western Sweden and Valdemar got Stockholm and Finland (Finland was a part of Sweden at the time.).

Some years past and the brothers relations seemed to be fine. On 10 December 1317, Birger invited his brothers to a banquet at Nyköping castle. At first everything seemed fine and queen Märta is said to have been happier than usual. When time came to go to bed however, Birger claimed that there was no room for Erik and Valdemar's soldiers in the castle, so they left to find sleeping arrangements in town instead.

In the middle of the night, the dukes were woken up and captured by Birger and his men saying: "Minns ni något av Håtunaleken? Jag minns den mycket väl. Denna är inte bättre än den." ("Do you remember the Håtuna game? I remember it very well. This one is not better.")

It is said that Erik and Valdemar were thrown barefoot into the prison in one of the towers were they starved to death.

The seal of Valdemar

The only real historical source we have is Erikskrönikan (The Erik Chronicles) which is the oldest (surviving) Swedish chronicle. The author is not known,but it is thought to have been written down some time between 1320 and 1335 (i.e. not long after the events described in this post. It is written in the old German verse meter called Knittlevers. The protagonist and hero of the chronicle is actually duke Erik Magnusson wherefore you cannot say that the chronicle is particularly reliable. It is a good source if you want to study the self-image of the aristocracy at the time though.

On 18 January 1318, the dukes wrote their wills in which it says that they are still healthy even though they are imprisoned. This information, even if they were forced to write it, goes against Erikskrönikan's description of them dying within days of the banquet and also about the terrible condition it describes they had inside the prison.

Birger thought this would make him king over all of Sweden (and Finland) again, but Erik's wife Ingeborg took up the fight for the sake of her and Erik's three year old son Magnus. That, however, is a different story worth a post in my Historical Women series wherefore I leave it for now. The Nyköping Banquet (together with Håtunaleken) is one of the most well-known events of the Swedish Middle Ages and something Swedes often remember from history lessons in school.

References

• Harrison, Dick 2002. Sveriges historia. Medeltiden, Falköping
• Harrison, Dick 2009. Norstedts Sveriges historia 600-1350, Värnamo
• Larsson, Lars-Olof 2006. Kalmarunionens tid, Falun
• Lindkvist, Thomas & Sjöberg, Maria 2016. Det svenska samhället 800-1720. Klerkernas och adelns tid, Lund
• Vetenskapsradion Historia - Nyköpings gästabud 700 år. 

Photos were borrowed here.