Middle Ages
In a letter from 1268, during the reign of Valdemar Birgersson, the title marscalcus of the king is mentioned. The holder of the prestigious title is a nobleman, but it is not possible to decide much about the assignments belonging to it. It is possible that the marsk, or the constable, replaced the stabularius that previously governed the king's mounted following.
Constable Torgils Knutsson was the foremost among the powerful men that ruled Sweden during the childhood of king Birger Magnusson in the late 13th century. Later constables seem to only occasionally be called upon by the king, without having regular tasks to fulfill. Queen Margaret, who tried to reclaim power that previous kings had lost, chose to have neither a Lord High Constable nor a Lord High Steward. Her successor Eric of Pomerania was forced by the Swedish noblemen to appoint a constable. Thus, in 1435, Karl Knutsson Bonde, a future Swedish king, became the first constable for quite some time. In a suggestion to a treaty of the Kalmar union from 1436, the constable got responsibilities in two areas: law/justice and heading the country's army in war time. For most of the remaining part of the 15th century, the office was vacant.
Read more about this topic: Lord High Constable Of Sweden
Famous quotes containing the words middle ages, middle and/or ages:
“Of all the barbarous middle ages, that
Which is most barbarous is the middle age
Of man! it is—I really scarce know what;
But when we hover between fool and sage,
And don’t know justly what we would be at—
A period something like a printed page,
Black letter upon foolscap, while our hair
Grows grizzled, and we are not what we were.”
—George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)
“On the middle of that quiet floor
sits a fleet of small black ships,
square-rigged, sails furled, motionless,
their spars like burned matchsticks.”
—Elizabeth Bishop (1911–1979)
“For if we take the ages into our account, may there not be a civilization going on among brutes as well as men?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)