Happy Christmas!

What to see: Paris at Christmas time

New books: The landowners

Jorden de ärvde (“The Land They Inherited”) has been one of the most talked-about non-fiction books in Sweden this autumn. In it, the journalist Björn af Kleen looks at the large estates still in the possession of the nobility and tries to explain how they have managed to hang on to them.
At the centre is the entail system, known as “fideikommiss” in Swedish, whereby the estate with all its land, buildings and collections is inherited undivided by the eldest son of each generation. Most countries abolished this system a rather long time ago, while Sweden only took steps to do so in the second half of the 20th century. Fifty years ago there were 111 entailed estates in Sweden and in 1964 it was decided by law that they would be dissolved upon the death of the incumbent.
There was, however, an article saying that an entail might be prolonged if the estate was of significant cultural value. This article was meant specifically for Skokloster Castle, but the author explores how several other landowners have won government approval for the prolongation of the entail connected to their estates.
This is not unproblematic, as it has deprived younger siblings, daughters in particular, of their inheritance. Occasionally entails have been prolonged in direct contravention of a late landowner’s will, thereby creating some rather bitter family feuds. The author provides several examples of this, such as Johan af Petersens’s falling out with his siblings and demanding the eviction of his 90-year-old mother from the manor, describing “Mummy’s occupation of the Big House at Erstavik” as “a criminal act”.
There are several quite detailed descriptions of such family feuds, and as a reader one may sometimes feel that the author goes a bit too far in washing other people’s dirty linen in public. One of the landowners portrayed in the book, Baron Carl Gripenstedt, has already taken legal action, but later withdrew the case.
In the second part of the book, Björn af Kleen investigates in what other ways the nobility and the landowners (not all of whom are noble) have tried to maintain their privileges and way of life. Several landowners are interviewed in the book and they implicitly provide a quite fascinating insight into their mentality and how they see the world.

New books: Carl XIV Johan’s favourite architect

Fredrik Blom (1781-1853) was an officer-turned-architect who became a leading protagonist of Swedish neoclassicism and the favourite architect of King Carl XIV Johan. Among his best-known works are Rosendal Palace, the former Carl Johan’s Church (popularly known as Skeppsholmskyrkan) and his transportable houses, but he also put his mark on Stockholm through several other monumental buildings. Blom valued functionality and his works are mostly quite simplistic – in my view sometimes too simple to be called elegant.
The art historian Carine Lundberg never finished her planned book on Fredrik Blom, meaning that until now no major study of him has been available. The military historian Thomas Roth tries to rectify this with his new book Fredrik Blom – Karl Johans arkitekt, published by Bokförlaget Signum in October, but does not quite succeed.
The author takes a mostly chronological approach to the life and work of Fredrik Blom, interspersed with some more thematic chapters. He identifies Blom’s buildings and gives quite detailed descriptions of what they look like. Roth is mostly concerned with the exteriors, and we learn little about Blom’s interiors. Rosendal Palace, arguably Blom’s most important work, is not dealt with as thoroughly as would seem natural – the author is content to note that the small palace has been the subject of another book some years ago.
The greatest problems about this book are that it seems the author does not really understand architecture and that he sees Blom in a much too isolated way. His buildings are seen in relation neither to each other nor to the works of other architects of the time. The author’s knowledge of architecture seems to stop at headings such as “neoclassicism”, “empire style” and “neo-Gothic”, but of course these styles are diverse and complex. Roth several times refers to “Blom’s style”, but does not say much about what was characteristic of his style and what set him apart from other architects’ works.
Without further ado, Roth includes Krontorp Manor among Fredrik Blom’s works, proclaiming that he is convinced by the art historian Hans-Olof Boström’s theory that Blom is a more likely architect than Hans D. F. Linstow, to whom Krontorp has traditionally been ascribed. He does not enter into Boström’s arguments (which are debatable), but only says that “the style and the similarities with Elghammar” indicates that Blom was the architect. There are other possible explanations for the similarities between Krontorp and Elghammar, and in fact Krontorp is very untypical of Blom’s style, in fact of Swedish neoclassicism in general. It is also difficult to understand how Roth is thinking when he writes that Norrnäs Manor is reminiscent of Rosendal Palace.
Only in the penultimate paragraph of this book does the author try to put Blom into context. Then he says that Blom’s style was most strongly inspired by Desprez, Quarenghi and Palladio, but that the architect most closely related to Blom’s style was Carl Ludvig Engel. It is beyond me how Thomas Roth has reached such a conclusion – in fact Engel’s elegant, richly ornamented buildings must be considered almost the opposite of the simplicity characteristic of Fredrik Blom’s works.
The author is obviously very knowledgeable about Fredrik Blom and has apparently put much work into this book. But this isolated knowledge is not enough and the absence of a context coupled with Roth’s limited understanding of architecture in general makes it a less valuable book that in might otherwise have been. As it is, it demonstrates that knowledge and understanding may in fact not be as closely related as is generally assumed.

New books: Royal Haga

Many were disappointed when the great book series on the Swedish royal palaces, after three years and five volumes, was cancelled in 2005 because the publisher Byggförlaget closed down its business. As earlier mentioned the Royal Court and the Swedish Property Board this year reached an agreement with Gullers Förlag to resume the series, but after another change of publisher the series ended up with Votum Förlag in Karlstad. In November Votum published the first volume of the resurrected series: Haga – Ett kungligt kulturarv, edited by Ingrid Sjöström.
In contrast to the other royal palaces, Haga is actually more of a domain than a palace, as the huge Haga Palace was never completed. The small Haga Palace, the future home of Crown Princess Victoria and Daniel Westling, and Gustaf III’s Pavilion may however be found on the estate in addition to numerous other buildings.
This English landscape park sits by Brunnsviken in Solna, just outside the border to the city of Stockholm. It may be reached on foot from the capital and is a green lung much loved by the inhabitants of Stockholm. With Ulriksdal and Djurgården, Haga since 1994 makes up the National City Park, the only of its kind in the world.
Two volumes on Haga in this series had originally been planned, but with the changed circumstances it has all been comprised into one. Probably as a consequence of this, the type is somewhat smaller than in the previous books, but otherwise the design and layout is the same as in the volumes on the palaces Rosendal, Rosersberg, Drottningholm, China and Strömsholm. It is profusely and beautifully illustrated with maps, paintings, architectural drawings, sketches and photos. The prominent Danish architectural photographer Jens Lindhe has taken the new photos for this book, and among the authors are Sweden’s leading experts on the relevant topics.
The historian Jonas Nordin opens the book with a chapter on Gustaf III’s Haga. It was Gustaf III who “discovered” Haga, acquired it as his private property and developed it. The King enjoyed withdrawing to the peace and simplicity of Haga, which also played a significant part in the staging of his public persona.
Gustaf III had great plans for Haga and the art historian Magnus Olausson devotes an extensive chapter to the pleasure park and some of its follies and other buildings. The greatest plan of all was for the erection of a huge palace on a hill in the Haga Park. Only the foundation walls of this grandiose project had been built by the time the King was assassinated and it was left unfinished. If the unfinished palace was meant to be the Swedish Versailles, the smaller Gustaf III’s Pavilion, which was completed about the time of the King’s death, is the northern Petit Trianon. Both the large palace and the smaller pavilion are dealt with in an interesting chapter by Göran Alm, head of the Bernadotte Library.
Stina Olinder Haubo looks at the interiors of Gustaf III’s Pavilion and Thérèse von Lampe interprets its allegorical decorations. Tomas Lidman, Sweden’s national archivist, writes about the pavilion’s library, how it left Sweden with Gustaf IV Adolf and was repatriated much later.
Anita Ankarcrona takes a look at the poet Carl Michael Bellman’s relation to Haga. It is a rather short chapter and Haga in poetry and literature is a topic which I think could have been dealt with more extensively in this book.
The historian Mikael Alm writes about Gustaf IV Adolf and Haga, while the art historian Ursula Sjöberg devotes a chapter to the small Haga Palace, which was built during his reign to house the royal children. Ingrid Sjöström takes a look at Haga during the 19th century before Ursula Sjöberg returns to give us the story of Haga Palace as the home of Prince August and his widow Princess Teresia, who lived there until her death in 1914.
A small weakness of this kind of book is that the thematic approach means that some minor issues fall between chairs and therefore go unmentioned. We read that Haga Palace was a royal residence until 1918, but not a word is said about who stayed there after Princess Teresia’s death (the answer is Prince Erik).
Catharina Nolin deals with the Haga Park in the 19th and early 20th century and Paul Wilund writes about the restoration work at Haga during the 20th century. Gustaf III’s Pavilion is today often considered the very essence of Swedish 18th century still, but Wilund points out that the restorations are not wholly truthful.
The so far last royal residents at Haga were Prince Gustaf Adolf and Princess Sibylla, who came to live there after their wedding in 1932. The Princess remained there for three years after her husband was killed in 1947. Göran Alm writes about the interiors of Haga Palace in their days, while Ingrid Sjöström tells the story of their five children – the present King and his four sisters, who were collectively known as “the Haga Princesses” in what amounted to a cult in the 1940s.
Sjöström also writes about the other buildings in the park in the 20th century and about the use of Haga Palace as a government guest house from the 1960s until this year, when the right of disposal was returned to the King in order to make Haga the Crown Princess couple’s home. Christian Laine finishes the book with short chapters on the Royal National City Park and the pleasure parks around Brunnsviken – and the challenges they are faced by.
This book is not entirely flawless, but all in all it is a great book and a treasure throve of information about this royal estate held in great affection by the people of Stockholm. Its high standard in all respects promises well for the continuation of the book series. The second volume on Drottningholm is expected in the spring, to be followed by books on Tullgarn, Ulriksdal, Gripsholm and three volumes on the Royal Palace itself.

On this date: A president resigns – and dies

Many presidential resignations have come as a result of great personal or political drama, but few have ended in such drama as Kyösti Kallio’s. Kallio had become President of Finland in 1937 and was still in office when the Soviet Union attacked Finland in 1939. As the leader of a small country which had been attacked by a great power, Kallio received much sympathy when he travelled abroad to plead his country’s case and when he, in a radio speech, appealed to the world to support Finland.
By then the President’s health was causing grave concerns. Kallio had suffered a major heart attack in 1939, and in November 1940 he announced that he would be resigning out of health reasons. Because of the turbulent world situation a regular presidential election was not held, but the electoral college of the previous presidential election (1937) was reassembled. On 19 December 1940 it elected Prime Minister Risto Ryti President.
Shortly thereafter, Kallio, no longer President of Finland, left the Presidential Palace and drove to Helsinki’s railway station, where a train was waiting to take him back home to Nivala. And there, on the platform, right in front of the guard of honour, the band playing a march, Kyösti Kallio collapsed and died. The photo (now in the public domain) was taken by Hugo Sundström just seconds before.

What to see: Stockholm at Christmas time

While Oslo puts up the same hideous decorations from the 1980s every year, Stockholm, like Paris, is one of those cities which really puts an effort into its Christmas decorations. These photos are from 2008 and 2009.

Royal jewels: The Norwegian emerald parure

The emerald parure is the grandest set of jewellery in the hands of the Norwegian royal family and is as such always worn by the Queen for the most important state occasions – the wedding of the Crown Prince and the Emperor of Japan’s state visit being two examples. It has also been worn for three British coronations.
An oft-repeated legend says that the jewels originally belonged to Empress Joséphine of the French – some even maintain that the tiara was worn by her to her and Napoléon’s coronation in Notre-Dame in December 1804. However, this seems likely to be a legend invented by the Swedish writer Sigyn Reimers in the 1950s.
In fact there is no parure in any of the relevant inventories of the Empress’s jewels whose description matches the Norwegian parure. According to an oral tradition in the royal family the emeralds themselves are from a Russian mine which is now extinct. As far as I know, emeralds were not found in Russia until the 1830s, while the Empress died in 1814.
But the emerald parure did certainly belong to Joséphine’s daughter-in-law, Duchess Auguste Amalie of Leuchtenberg. In her will she left it to her daughter, ex-Empress Amélie of Brazil, while her eldest daughter, Queen Josephina of Norway and Sweden, inherited a sapphire parure which to this day is frequently worn by Queen Silvia.
As the Brazilian Empress’s only child predeceased her, she left her jewels to her sister Josephina upon her death in 1873. The Swedish courtier Countess Mina Bonde apparently owned a portrait of Queen Josephina in old age wearing the emerald parure, but the current whereabouts of this painting are unknown.
After Josephina’s death in 1873, the emeralds passed to her daughter-in-law Queen Sophia. Upon her death in 1913, Sophia left them in her will to her youngest daughter-in-law, Princess Ingeborg. Ingeborg frequently wore the parure, but also made some rather unfortunate changes to it. She removed the drop-shaped emeralds on either side of the centre stone of the tiara and made earrings out of them and she also removed most of the seven pendants from the necklace and distributed them between her children.
It has often been said that Princess Ingeborg gave the emerald parure to her middle daughter, Crown Princess Märtha of Norway, when she gave birth to a son, the present King of Norway, in 1937. This is however incorrect. Princess Ingeborg gave the parure to her daughter, wrapped in a scarf, at the Central Station in Stockholm in August 1940 when the Crown Princess embarked for the USA. With Norway occupied by Nazi Germany, Ingeborg was not sure if she would ever see her daughter again or if Märtha would ever be able to return to Norway. The emeralds were supposed to be her “life insurance” – the intention was to sell the emeralds one by one if they got in a desperate financial situation.
Luckily this was never necessary and Crown Princess Märtha was able to return to Norway in 1945. She died already in 1954 and her mother, who outlived her by four years, expressed the wish that the emeralds should be inherited by Märtha’s son and be part of the Norwegian “crown jewels”.
Märtha’s daughter, Princess Astrid, borrowed them on some occasions when she was first lady of Norway, but since 1968 they have been worn by her sister-in-law, Queen Sonja. (The portrait of the Queen is by Cathrine Wessel/the Royal Court).

Book news: Swedish royal weddings

I have been spending some days in Stockholm and while there I learnt about an upcoming book which seems interesting. Lena Rangström, who works at the Royal Armoury, has written En brud för kung och fosterland - Kungliga svenska bröllop från Gustav Vasa till Carl XVI Gustaf, which will be published by Atlantis in early March and run to 448 pages. The book deals with Swedish royal weddings since the 16th century and will look at both the political significance, the negotiations behind the marriages and the ceremonies in connection with the weddings.
The cover shows a detail of Per Krafft the Younger’s painting of the wedding of Crown Prince Oscar and Princess Joséphine of Leuchtenberg on 19 June 1823.
The book will be closely related to a major exhibiton at the Royal Armoury titled “Bröllop för kung och fosterland” (“Weddings for king and country”), which will include the museum’s unique collection of royal wedding dresses from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. The exhibition will be opened on 19 May, a month before the wedding of Crown Princess Victoria and Daniel Westling, and close on 3 October.

What to see: The Royal Burial Ground, Haga

While all Swedish monarchs who died between 1632 and 1950, with one exception, rest in the Riddarholmen Church, most of the country’s 20th century royals are buried in the Royal Burial Ground in the Haga Park in Solna, just outside Stockholm.
The idea to create a royal cemetery came from Prince Carl around 1910. This coincided with new ideas about burials in general but also with the fact that there was little space left in the Bernadotte mausoleum in the Riddarholmen Church and the erection of another mausoleum to that historic church was not considered desirable.
Princess Ingeborg supported her husband’s wish to be buried outdoors and they were joined by Crown Princess Margareta, who, after witnessing Dowager Queen Sophia’s solemn funeral in January 1914, wrote that she did not want to be buried in the Riddarholmen Church, but “out in the nature at some place where also my family may get their last resting place”.
Prince Carl had suggested that an area of the Drottningholm Park might be set aside for a royal burial ground, but when there was procrastination, he threatened to acquire a burial spot for himself and his family at the public Northern Cemetery – like his brother, Prince Oscar Bernadotte, was to do.
In the end one settled for a small island in the Haga Park. Prince Carl took a lease on it in 1915 and had the buildings on it demolished. He also presented some drawings for a mausoleum which were probably made by the architect Ferdinand Boberg, a friend of the family. One did however settle for a more “natural” solutions, with crypts built into the landscape and covered with large stone slabs. Boberg did however design a granite cross which was erected at the highest point of the Royal Burial Ground and probably also the bridge and the gate seen in the first photo.
The Royal Burial Ground was ready in 1922 and the body of Crown Princess Margareta, who had died suddenly two years before, was brought there from its temporary resting place in the Cathedral of Stockholm. Her grave is seen in the second photo. She has later been joined by her husband, King Gustaf VI Adolf, who died in 1973, and his second wife, Queen Louise, who passed away in 1965 – probably the latter’s stillborn daughter is also buried there.
In front of the granite cross is the grave of the parents of the present King of Sweden – Prince Gustaf Adolf, who was killed in a plane accident in 1947, and Princess Sibylla, who died from cancer in 1972 (third photo).
Next to the grave of Gustaf VI Adolf and his wives is the tomb of his third son, the much-loved Prince Bertil, who died in 1997 (fourth picture). Thereafter comes the grave of Prince Carl (died 1951) and Princess Ingeborg (photo 5) – the latter’s date of death is, interestingly, given as 11 March 1958, although she was found dead in the morning of the 12th. Their son, Prince Carl Bernadotte, in 2003 became the so far last person to be laid to rest in the Royal Burial Ground.
Finally there is the grave of Gustaf VI Adolf’s second son, Sigvard, who died at 94 in 2002 (sixth picture). Several years passed before the tombstone was ready and I am told that this was because of the dispute over his title. Prince Sigvard had been stripped of his royal titles when he married a commoner in 1934 and was later accorded the title “Count Sigvard Bernadotte af Wisborg”. But in 1983 he assumed the title “Prince Sigvard Bernadotte”, which the King refused to acknowledge and at the time of Sigvard’s death, the issue had been sent to Strasbourg. In the end one settled for the text “Sigvard Bernadotte, born Prince of Sweden”, which everyone could agree was the case. The name and date of birth of his third wife, Marianne, has already been added to the gravestone with only the date of death left blank, which seems quite morbid to me as she is still alive and kicking.
The Royal Burial Ground is open to the public one day a week between May and August.