Coat of arms:
During far middle ages, Sweden, as other Scandinavian countries, was divided into a multitude of small Viking kingdoms. In 1392 the three Scandinavian countries: Norway, Denmark and Sweden were united by Queen of Denmark Margaret the First, under a single king, her nephew, Eric of Pomerania. The union was a rather a personal than a political one. During the fifteenth century Sweden resisted the attempts of the Danish king Karl Knutson Bonde/Karl VIII, who tried to conquer it even by armed rebellion. The Swedish Crown was estranged from that personal union in 1521 when the future king of Sweden, Gustav Vasa, became a regent. In 1544 Gustav I instituted the principle of hereditary monarchy, thus becoming the founder of modern Sweden, which gradually became one of Europe’s Great Powers.
In 1684, as a result of the abdication of Queen Christine, Vasa Dynasty ended its reign and the crown passed to Karl X Gustav member of House of Wittelsbach (Bavaria). His nephew Karl XI followed him to the throne, leading to the apogee of royal absolutism. He was followed by his sister Ulrika Eleonora who reigned along with her husband Frederic de Hessa-Cassel. After the latter’s death, Russia imposes as a king Frederic II de Holstein Gottrop - remote descendant of Karl IX of the Vasa.
Once the Napoleonic wars ended (1807) and Gustav IV Adolf painfully defeated, one of Napoleon’s marshals – Jean Baptiste Bernadotte, prince of Ponte Corvo, also known as de Karl XVI-Johan., was imposed as king of Sweden.
In 1814 Norway is reattached to the Swedish crown. Bernadotte was the only king that succeeded in surviving the Napoleonic adventure, due to his chivalrous spirit. His son, Oscar I (The godfather of famous the writer Oscar Wilde)
managed in freeing Sweden from under the threat of Russia. Oscar II followed him to the throne. During the latter’s reign Norway becomes independent (1905). As for the reign of his son Gustav V (1907-1950), Sweden witnesses a strong economic development and an unprecedented ministerial stability, the result of the development of a remarkable social system. Gustav V was a remarkable leader and a keen tennis player. He died age 90, leaving the throne to his son Gustav VI – Adolf (1950-1973), man of a vast literary culture and competent archeologist.
The Swedish Constitution in 1809 stipulated that the crown would be transmitted to the male descendents of Karl XIV Johan Bernadotte; a prince could not marry without the approval of the king and the ministerial council and the one he would marry would be only a descendant of a sovereign family. The king had to be Lutheran. In 1980 the constitution was modified so that the heir to the throne would be the first born of the sovereign indifferent if it was a girl or a boy. Thus the succession to the throne becomes cognatic.
The heir to the throne, initially his Royal Highness is the royal prince/princess of Sweden. The prices/princesses that were part of a dynasty bore the title of duke and they had a special coat of arm that included the arms in their duchy.
Genealogic tree:
