AHC: Longer lasting pagan Sweden

[LordCalner]

Have Sweden remain pagan for longer, not nessecarily to the modern day.
Bonus points for having christianity and native norse faith cooexist in the realm as equal religions for a significant amount of time.
Extra bonus points if you manage something creative with Sweyn the Sacrificer

 

[Lalli]

Of course you could butterfly Christianity completely so Sweden never converts. But it is probably too simple.

But one idea could be that Charlemagne fails on conquest of Germanic tribesor then his grandsons fight over his empire and spreading of Christianity to Northern Europe is delayed.

 

[Brunaburh]

Have Sweden remain pagan for longer, not nessecarily to the modern day.
Bonus points for having christianity and navive norse faith cooexist in the realm as equal religions for a significant amount of time.
Extra bonus points if you manage something creative with Sweyn the Sacrificer

I assume that is the same person as Blot-Sweyn?

 

[LordCalner]

I assume that is the same person as Blot-Sweyn?

Yes

 

[Billy the Goat]

Realistically your best POD is to have the whole of Scandinavia for longer and put up a stronger resistance to Christianization as a Pagan Scandinavia all on it's own would face constant crusades from both nations to its south and from its Nordic brothers with out any real ally

 

[Byzantion]

Realistically your best POD is to have the whole of Scandinavia for longer and put up a stronger resistance to Christianization as a Pagan Scandinavia all on it's own would face constant crusades from both nations to its south and from its Nordic brothers with out any real ally

So also the Frisians and maybe the Saxons staying Norse Pagans would help.

 

[Dancing Fool]

Bonus points for having christianity and native norse faith cooexist in the realm as equal religions for a significant amount of time.

I used to wonder why more countries didn’t hit upon religious liberty, which would seem to also make for a stable social arrangement.

But—

You need some set of civic virtues as glue holding society together. And before the idea that Earth and the Universe could just evolve on their own, God as creator seemed “obvious” to most people. [even though most people really aren’t all that religious and can excuse their own sins, as compromises with reality and so forth]

Anyway, religious liberty is a taller order than it might seem.

 

[Evil Crusader]

I used to wonder why more countries didn’t hit upon religious liberty, which would seem to also make for a stable social arrangement.

But—

You need some set of civic virtues as glue holding society together. And before the idea that Earth and the Universe could just evolve on their own, God as creator seemed “obvious” to most people. [even though most people really aren’t all that religious and can excuse their own sins, as compromises with reality and so forth]

Anyway, religious liberty is a taller order than it might seem.

Polytheist religions can coexist to a degree, because they're not strictly mutually incompatible and favorable theology for coexistence can be developed. The main problem in such an arrangement is that there will be factions tied to the various cults (because that's the easiest path to tribalism) and those may well tear the realm apart, vying for influence, leading to a common outcome of one faith eventually dominating.
But monotheism and polytheism don't mesh well together at all, because their claims are muturally incompatible - even accounting for variations of 'natural law' where the polytheist religion's virtues are found to be in accordance to the monotheist's tenets, they'll want to do the 'charitable' thing and convince them to skip the middleman ('you don't really need to pray Thor/Hercules/Buddha, you know'). To have them coexist, you'd need to stack the situation together against the least organized faith, but evne that will prove a volatile arrangement.

 

[kholieken]

Even polytheism coexistences is limited. Usually there are "state cult" that participation is mandatory for all citizens, while other pantheon only operate as small cults for specialized grouping. China had heaven worship and Confucian rites. Rome had their own pantheons which priest is patrician officials. Greek polis also had their own state cult. India is dominated by Shaivaism, Vishnu, Jain who closely associated with royal rite and government.

Religious liberty or civic virtues is very difficult to do without dividing society, even modern ideology often failed to unify society.

Coexistence between Christianity and Swedish Paganism is nearly impossible. One Groups would want royal support and become state official religion. Having Christianity stay as minority "foreign" faith while Nordic Pagan held royal power is much easier.

 

[von Adler]

Norse pagan faith and christianity co-existed for a couple of hundred years, and it took a long time for christianity to stamp out the old faith - in some senses they never did, as parts of it morphed into folklore and exists to this day. During the 1100-1200s, statues of Frej and Freja were claimed as "local saints", installed in churches and brought out to bless the fields every Spring, to the complaints of local priests, who mostly went unheard as long as the congreation otherwise tithed and followed church law.

That said, if you count by runestones, at least the families wealthy enough to erect them were majority (even if barely) christian long before Blot-Sven were elected King. What complicates matters is that christianity is heavily intermingled with the creation of a unified centralised Kingdom in Sweden - the church benefitted from patronage from the elite, the elite benefitted from central administration, capable monk and priest administrators and above all a literate tradition that eased administration of larger realms.

We don't know for sure, but it is probably that the election of Blot-Sven was more a reaction against encroaching centralisation and curtailing of old rights than it was a religious move.

Denmark and Norway had the advantage of everything being close to the sea - the King's army could be anywhere in the Kingdom in a couple of weeks. That was not the case with Sweden, which is also why Sweden unified much later, and integrated large parts (like Småland, Hälsingland and Medelpad) in the 13th century. IMHO, it is going to be hard to have a Kingdom of Sweden without christianity, because writing letters, wills, instructions and laws are pretty much required to keep the geographically spread out Kingdom together.

You could have the decentralising powers that resulted in Blot-Sven win the power struggle. Most of Sweden will be christian, but the church as an institution will be weak or even non-existing. Other institutions, such as the monastaries, canon law, bishops and probably things like the national ledung will also be absent, and Sweden will remain three different Kingdoms and a bunch of Peasant Republics ruled by their respective thing (Småland, Gotland, Gästrikland, Medelpad and so on).

 

[LordCalner]

Norse pagan faith and christianity co-existed for a couple of hundred years, and it took a long time for christianity to stamp out the old faith - in some senses they never did, as parts of it morphed into folklore and exists to this day. During the 1100-1200s, statues of Frej and Freja were claimed as "local saints", installed in churches and brought out to bless the fields every Spring, to the complaints of local priests, who mostly went unheard as long as the congreation otherwise tithed and followed church law.

That said, if you count by runestones, at least the families wealthy enough to erect them were majority (even if barely) christian long before Blot-Sven were elected King. What complicates matters is that christianity is heavily intermingled with the creation of a unified centralised Kingdom in Sweden - the church benefitted from patronage from the elite, the elite benefitted from central administration, capable monk and priest administrators and above all a literate tradition that eased administration of larger realms.

We don't know for sure, but it is probably that the election of Blot-Sven was more a reaction against encroaching centralisation and curtailing of old rights than it was a religious move.

Denmark and Norway had the advantage of everything being close to the sea - the King's army could be anywhere in the Kingdom in a couple of weeks. That was not the case with Sweden, which is also why Sweden unified much later, and integrated large parts (like Småland, Hälsingland and Medelpad) in the 13th century. IMHO, it is going to be hard to have a Kingdom of Sweden without christianity, because writing letters, wills, instructions and laws are pretty much required to keep the geographically spread out Kingdom together.

You could have the decentralising powers that resulted in Blot-Sven win the power struggle. Most of Sweden will be christian, but the church as an institution will be weak or even non-existing. Other institutions, such as the monastaries, canon law, bishops and probably things like the national ledung will also be absent, and Sweden will remain three different Kingdoms and a bunch of Peasant Republics ruled by their respective thing (Småland, Gotland, Gästrikland, Medelpad and so on).

All true, do you think there is any way these things can organicaly grow on its own or by Exchange of ideas with christian realms? Maybe like a sort of pagan HRE arrangemang between the different swedish realms?

Even though their intention is of nothing to change i belive there would be some sort of gradual change, nothing stands still, for example the norse of 800 and 1000 are quite different societies and rome of Augustus and the rome of diocletian are also different.

 

[von Adler]

All true, do you think there is any way these things can organicaly grow on its own or by Exchange of ideas with christian realms? Maybe like a sort of pagan HRE arrangemang between the different swedish realms?

Even though their intention is of nothing to change i belive there would be some sort of gradual change, nothing stands still, for example the norse of 800 and 1000 are quite different societies and rome of Augustus and the rome of diocletian are also different.

Yeah, the county laws and the ledung system will probably come into existance regardless, and the pressure from raids (either by Norwegians or Danes, or across the Baltics) will require larger ledung areas and lead to the concentration into larger and larger things.

I suppose it is possible to gain some kind of Swedish Kingdom without christianisation - perhaps if both the Orthodox and Catholic church get stuck in the Baltics and Lithuania trying to gain control and convert the pagans there, leaving Scandinavia to its own (religious) devices. How Sweden will import literacy, paper making and administration and tax censuses without the catholic church I don't know. I suppose it is possible.

Militarily, Sweden should be capable of resisting Danish and Norwegian "crusades" - the people of Värend and Finnveden were used to utterly crushing Danish army with traditional brötar in the forests.

 

[LordCalner]

Yeah, the county laws and the ledung system will probably come into existance regardless, and the pressure from raids (either by Norwegians or Danes, or across the Baltics) will require larger ledung areas and lead to the concentration into larger and larger things.

I suppose it is possible to gain some kind of Swedish Kingdom without christianisation - perhaps if both the Orthodox and Catholic church get stuck in the Baltics and Lithuania trying to gain control and convert the pagans there, leaving Scandinavia to its own (religious) devices. How Sweden will import literacy, paper making and administration and tax censuses without the catholic church I don't know. I suppose it is possible.

Militarily, Sweden should be capable of resisting Danish and Norwegian "crusades" - the people of Värend and Finnveden were used to utterly crushing Danish army with traditional brötar in the forests.

Wouldnt an increase in centralisation itself lead to preassure fo literacy and new ways of taxation and thus censuses?

 

[von Adler]

Wouldnt an increase in centralisation itself lead to preassure fo literacy and new ways of taxation and thus censuses?

Yes. And christianity was the easy solution there. You'll have to stunt the spread of the faith and have Sweden import those things some other way in order for paganism to survive longer.

 

[LordCalner]

Yes. And christianity was the easy solution there. You'll have to stunt the spread of the faith and have Sweden import those things some other way in order for paganism to survive longer.

Cant it build on the extant runic literacy? Or is that a dead end?

 

[Billy the Goat]

I used to wonder why more countries didn’t hit upon religious liberty, which would seem to also make for a stable social arrangement.

But—

You need some set of civic virtues as glue holding society together. And before the idea that Earth and the Universe could just evolve on their own, God as creator seemed “obvious” to most people. [even though most people really aren’t all that religious and can excuse their own sins, as compromises with reality and so forth]

Anyway, religious liberty is a taller order than it might seem.

i think even if Sweden or some other Nordic country remains pagan there'd still likely be a noticeable population of Christianity unless they're actively persecuted (which would just make any future crusades even worse). I think another way to have some form of religious liberty even if Sweden becomes "officially" Christian is if something from like the reformation happening during its Christianization with Sweden deciding to install some form of legal religious coexistence not just to avoid violence between pagans and Christian but between different Christian denomination .

 

[LordCalner]

From what it sounds sweden would be some sort of Scandinavian lithuania, converting relatively late

 

[Dancing Fool]

between different Christian denomination

This would be a very direct, excellent reason for religious liberty.

 

[von Adler]

Cant it build on the extant runic literacy? Or is that a dead end?

Sure, the runic alphabet is good enough for writing and it was used for simple notes, magic enchantments, property identification and so on, often made in birch bark, other bark or wood, of which few survive. What you need is the creation of a literate tradition, ink and paper/parchment.

 

[Augenis]

Re: the literacy question, the Lithuanian answer was to adopt a foreign form of writing, in their case chancery Slavonic, although for them it was different than for Sweden since a large portion of the country was Orthodox and retained a tolerated Orthodox Church from which to draw literate priesthood from.