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1523.]
Attempt to quell
the revolt.
GUSTAVUS VASA. THE LIBERATION.
Rout of
Brunneburn.
103
vied in ardour for him, as burgomasters of the town,
and maintained an active correspondence with the
king2. So early as the tenth of February, 1521,
they wrote to him " that some disturbance had been
excited by Gustavus Ericson, which it might be
feared would extend to several provinces." Letters
of the magistracy of Stockholm, which were sent
over the whole kingdom, warned the people to
avoid all participation in the revolt. Relief was
supplicated from the king; additions were made to
the fortifications of the capital, sloops and barks
were equipped, in order, as it was said, to deprive
"Gustavus Ericson and his company of malefactors
of all opportunity of quitting the country," but
really to keep the approaches on the side of the sea
open, which were obstructed by the fishers and
peasants of the islets, who had begun to take arms
for Gustavus. Special admonitory letters were
despatched to Helsingland and Dalecarlia, signed by
Gustavus Trolle, his father Eric Trolle’, and Canute
Bennetson (Sparre) of Engsoe, styling themselves
the council of the realm of Sweden, by which,
however, say the chronicles, the royal cause was rather
damaged than strengthened. " For when the
Dalesmen and miners heard the letter, they said it was
manifest to them that the council at this time was
but small and thin, since it consisted of only three
men, and these of little weight."
Gustavus Trolle, the Danish bishops, Canute
Bennetson above-named, and Henry of Mellen,
the king’s lieutenant at Westerns, (where they had
recently been assembled with commissioners from
the magistracy of Stockholm, by bishop Otho,) now
marched with six thousand men of horse and foot
towards the Dal river, and encamped at the ferry of
Brunback. On the other side the Dalecarlians
guarded this frontier of their country, under the
command of Peter Swenson of Viderboda, a
powerful miner, whom Gustavus had appointed their
captain in his absence. When those in the Danish
camp observed how the Dalesmen shot their arrows
across the stream, bishop Beldenacke is said to
have inquired of the Swedish lords present, (to use
the words of the chronicles,) " how great a force
the tract above the Long Wood (the forest on the
boundary between Westmanland and Dalecarlia)
could furnish at the utmost ?" Answer was made
to him, full twenty thousand men. Yet further
he asked, where so many mouths might obtain
sustenance ? To this it was replied, that the people
were not used to dainty meats. They drunk for the
most part nothing but water, and, if need were,
could be satisfied with bark-bread. Then
Beldenacke declared, "men who eat wood and drink
water the devil himself could not overcome,
much less any one else : brethren, let us leave this
place !" The story makes the Danes hereupon
prepare for breaking up their encampment.
However this may be, it is certain that Peter Swenson,
with the Dalesmen, crossed the Dal secretly, by a
circuit, at Utsund’s Ferry, surprised the camp, and
put the foe to the rout. An old lay of the Dales
still sings :—
Fir-hoppers 3 and ptarmigans in the tree,
The Dale-arrow hits right well ;
With bloodhound Christian, the foe of the free,
’Twill hardly better mell.
Headlong the Jutes tumbled in Brunneback’s elf,
While the waters purled merrily round ;
And sad they grieved that Christian’s self
Had not like fortune found.
So now the Jutes ran all with might and main,
Loud raising this pitiful dirge ;
The fiend or he the porse-beer 4 might drain,
That was brewed in the Dale-carl’s forge 5.
Gustavus had himself dealt with the inhabitants
of Helsingland and Gestricland, in order to insure
himself against leaving foes in his rear ; and, after
his return to the Dales, he prepared for an
expedition into the lower country. He assembled his
troops at Hedemora, and sought to inure them to
habits of order and obedience by military exercises.
The Dale peasant had no fire-arms, and knew little
of discipline ; his weapons were the axe, the bow,
the pike, and the sling; the latter sometimes
throwing pieces of red-hot iron 6. Gustavus instructed
his men to fashion their arrows in a more effective
shape, and increased the length of the spear by four
or five feet, with a view to repel the attacks of
cavalry7. He caused monetary tokens to be struck;
an expedient which seems to have been not
uncommon in Sweden, since, from a remote period, even
leather money is mentioned8. The coins now struck
at Hedemora were of copper, with a small
admixture of silver, similar to those introduced by the
king, and called Christian’s kllppings; on one side
was the impress of an armed man, on the other,
arrows laid cross-wise, with three crowns.
Gustavus broke up from his quarters,and marched
across the Long Wood into Westmanland. His
course lay through districts which bore traces yet
fresh of the enemy’s passage. The peasantry rose
2 Gorius Hoist, while the town was yet reeking with the
blood of the leading inhabitants, gave the king a great
banquet, with dancirg and other revelry. See his own note
thereupon in the minute-book of the town of Stockholm,
quoted by Muhrberg, Memoirs of the Academy, iv. 86.
Claus Boye escaped the massacre from the circumstance of
his corpulence hindering the soldiers in their hurry from
pulling him through the prison-doors.
3 Squirrels.
4 Beer supposed to be flavoured with wild rosemary. See
p. 90, n. 1. T.
5 Snoskrafvorna och Furufnatten i trad
Val Dalpilen rakar uppa,
Christiern den bloderacken ock med
Skull ingalunda biittre ga.
Sa korde de Jutar i Brunneback’s elf,
Sa vattnet dem porlade om,
De sorjde derofwer att Christiern sjelf
Han ej der tillika omkom.
Sa togo de Jutar nu alle till flykt
Och leto slikt omkeligt quad ;
Hin ma mer dricka det Porsol de bryggt,
I smedjan vid Dalkarlens stad.
In another old ballad on the same affair it is said—
Brunneback’s elf is deep and broad,
With drowning Jutes its waves we load ;
So from Sweden the Danes were chased out.
Brunback’s elf ar val djup, ocksa bred,
Falivilom,
Der sankte vi sa mange Jutar nCd,
Falivilivilivom,
Sa korde de Dansken ur Sverige,
Falivilom.
(The termination back, brook, answers to burn in English,
as Brunneburn. Trans.)
6 Olaus Magnus, vii. 16.
7 Ibid. c. 5.
8 Coriaria pecunia certis argenteis punctis, quibus valor in
pondere et numero pensaretur, variata. Ibid. c. 12.
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