Hereditary Bastion
When Eric XIV, the son of Gustav Vasa, was crowned king in 1561, the title had been made hereditary and the kingdom was now financed not by income from royal properties and privileges, but by taxes. Furthermore, at this time the extent of the kingdom, because of the guarded foreign politics of Gustav Vasa largely unchanged during his rule, started to grow as the disintegrating Teutonic Order left the Baltic exposed to new ambitious powers, and Reval, as a consequence, asked for Swedish protection against Russia and Poland and became a Swedish dominion. Though Sweden could hardly present the level of government and bureaucracy prerequisite to have a capital in the modern sense, Stockholm was the kingdom's strongest bastion and the king's main residence. As Eric XIV's pretensions were in pair with those of Renaissance princes on the continent, he afforded himself a court the size his finance could possibly support, and the royal castle was thus the biggest employer in the city, more so when the king was present in person. In connection to his crowning in 1561, his taste for luxury caused the Crown to consume between two third and three quarter of the city's import.
Read more about this topic: Stockholm During The Early Vasa Era
Famous quotes containing the words hereditary and/or bastion:
“We bring [to government] no hereditary status or gift of infallibility and none follows us from this place.”
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)
“The bar is the male kingdom. For centuries it was the bastion of male privilege, the gathering place for men away from their women, a place where men could go to freely indulge in The Bull Session ... the release of the guilty anxiety of the oppressor class.”
—Shulamith Firestone (b. 1945)