Stockholm During The Early Vasa Era - Fortifications

Fortifications

In medieval times, the city walls were the responsibility of the city council, which used a half to two third of the tax collected for the construction and maintenance of the defensive structures. The city was, together with Kalmar which also had a city wall, in reward exempt from the tax paid by other Swedish cities. Gustav Vasa installing himself on the throne didn't affect these responsibilities, but decisions on what structures to build where did. The extent to which the king controlled the city became apparent in the mid 1530s when he heavy-handedly stroke down on a German conspiracy and had all small arms in the city transferred from the town hall to the royal palace. He thus had the southern city gate, still damaged since Christian II's siege in 1520, rebuilt during the 1520s, and then had towers with flanking walls constructed along the western shore of Riddarholmen and by the northern gate, fortifications further reinforced during the following two decades. Due to land elevation the number of navigable approaches to the city through the Stockholm Archipelago had been reduced to one, and the defence of the eastern shore could therefore be relocated out of town to Vaxholm.