Taking Sigtuna: Precolonial Time and Estonian Historical Fiction of the 1930s
Taking Sigtuna: Precolonial Time and Estonian Historical Fiction of the 1930s

Summary/Abstract: In 1187 Sigtuna was attacked and destroyed completely. As one of four major, town-sized settlements in 12th century northern Sweden, it was an interim capital city, rising to power in the 11th century due to geopolitical shifts in the Mälari valley. (Tarvel 2007: 25) Sigtuna was founded in the 970s, and from 1070 on it was the bishop’s seat, until Uppsala came to the fore between 1134 and 1164. Its several stone churches were built like fortresses against Viking raids, and tradesmen used them as secure warehouses. From the 990s on until about 1130, Sigtuna was the first known location in Sweden for the minting of coins. If mythologized history recounts that after its destruction, the island town of Sigtuna was never to be rebuilt, and Stockholm replaced it as a centre of commerce, more balanced historical research accords less power to the invaders: city life went on in Sigtuna, as evidenced by the Pope`s plans in 1215–1216 to move the archbishop`s residence from Uppsala to Sigtuna, the establishment of a Dominican monastery there in 1237, and the building of the large, stone Church of St. Lawrence in the second half of the 13th century. (Ib. 27) Who took Sigtuna? This question has provoked the curiosity of historians for hundreds of years, but remains an unsolved puzzle, only modestly treated in Swedish historiography. (Ib.)

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