Paper presented at the conference "Urban Variation - Utopia, Planning and Practice" at Gothenburg University, Sweden on February 21st 2013. Text for the PowerPoint presentation.

1. Urban Variation – Utopia, Planning and Practice
International Symposium at the University of Gothenburg 19th to 22nd of February 2013
With Our Meager Resources...
Jönköping – an unfinished fortified town of the 17th century.
During my brief moment in the spotlight I will try to describe the development
of one Swedish 17th century town that we happen to know quite well from
three decades of archaeological excavations. Today we have access to
observations from about 40 % of the built up area from the Early Modern
Period in Jönköping. My aim is to use the history of this site as something of a
metaphor, an illustration of the Swedish realm during its so called Age of
Greatness. It exemplifies both the visions for the future, held by the Absolutist
State – and the consequences these often unrealistic plans had for ordinary
people. It is urban planning and practice seen from below, from a micro
perspective that gives us a glimpse of the true cost of these grand designs!
1. Let’s begin here. With a propaganda picture of Jönköping, made in 1690.
What we see is a fairly large town – from a Swedish point of view –
dominated by its huge fortress to the west and the new church, named
after Queen Christina, to the east. Between them, amidst all the wooden
one or two storied townhouses, we can also see the first large stone
building in the town – the Göta Hovrätt Court of Appeal.
Although widely exaggerated, the picture is correct in stressing the
importance of the military, the administration and the protestant church
for the 17th century town.
To summarize the background - Jönköping belongs to a large group of
Scandinavian towns that were relocated and provided with a new town
plan during the 17th century. The aim was to modernize and even fortify
a number of strategically important cities of the Realm, but lack of
funding and other resources prevented some of these projects to
become reality. The visions of King and Council were at times too far
removed from the somewhat harsh realities of a poorly developed
country on the fringes of Europe. Even so, these undertakings in the 17th
century were on a scale rarely seen in this part of world before. Its
lasting results meant that the Renaissance town with its rectilinear plan
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2. was to be seen as an ideal for urban life for centuries to come – and in
some respects still remain so.
2. But why Jönköping? What made this a suitable place for such an
enterprise and investment? A quick look at the map will tell us why. First
of all – this was one on the most important junctions in southern
Sweden. Roads from east to west met roads coming up from the coast
and the Danish counties of Scania and Halland. And as if that was not
enough the vast lake Vättern could provide 130 km of sailing, straight
into the Swedish heartland. Plus a fine natural and sheltered harbor. Not
to mention the fact that the surrounding hills were rich in iron – the
handling of metal being one of the cornerstones in the local economy
from the oldest times.
But this was also a border town although it surprisingly enough was
unfortified during most of the Middle Ages and well into the 16th century
until the disused Franciscan Friary was converted into a Royal Castle by
King Gustav I in 1545.
In the following century ambitious plans were made for turning the town
– after the devastating fire of 1612 – into a modern city fortress. The
central link in a chain that was meant to close the southern border of the
realm to Danish attacks. And also a town where the impressive
fortifications gave shelter to the army supplies and a strategic
manufacturing. A town for modern times indeed!
3. But in the beginning one had to look for good examples abroad. The first
draft of a new town might have been made by King Karl IX himself.
Although it looks like something scribbled on a paper napkin, the plan
gives a good picture of what he wanted. Basically, it’s a low budget
version of a city fortress protected by water and marshes in the fashion
favored in Italy and the Low Countries during the late 16th century.
We have the main street with two rows of plots with houses, a simple
wall and ditch to the east and the castle to the west. Just about as much
as you could find room for on the narrow spur of land between the two
lakes and the area with the ominous name of The Morass…
It is also worth noticing how exposed this new site was – as winter
storms on Lake Vättern can be very forceful indeed…
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3. 4. But this was just a vision – the wish of a sovereign – until the siege and
fire of 1612. When the medieval town, situated on dry and higher ground
west of the castle had become charcoal and ashes, the King and his
council acted rapidly. A decision was taken that the town should be re-
built on the new site, hitherto called “Sanden”. The citizens complained
and protested eloquently, but to no avail. The word of Gustav II Adolf
stood firm and the laying out of new plots started in 1614.
During the first years a number of drafts for the new town were made.
Some features re-occur like the canals, the inner harbor and the circle of
large fortifications, surrounding and protecting the city centre.
But it’s worth mentioning that there is also a hidden story about
resistance against the decisions of the absolutist state. Because there
was a settlement on the site of the old town! “Förstäderna” – The
Suburbs – did exist until the 1640s when the inhabitants were forced to
move. Not all good citizen obeyed orders – but unfortunately we know
too little about this group of people on the fringe today…
5. Excavations from the 1980s onwards have shown the scope of the
undertaking. An estimated 20 000 wagon loads of soil had to be
transported into the site of the new town during the first 10 years just to
build up enough ground for the first houses to be constructed upon.
But more than soil was needed – huge amounts of timber and stone for
the foundations were also carried in. For these transports peasants from
the surrounding districts were called upon by the Crown.
The Crown also ordered soldiers to take part in this work – at least for
the areas staked out for the strategic manufactures that were to play
such an important part in the 17th century town.
6. Parts of the plots given away were actually beneath the water of Lake
Munksjön. Or situated in the bog that King Karl IX quite correctly had
called the Morass on his first draft.
Here the peat was found beneath landfill and house remains during the
excavations in 2007. The weight of material put on top had compressed
the peat, causing more landfill, compressing more etc etc. No wonder
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4. that severe floods were reoccurring in the first century of the new towns
life…
7. The landfill had an interesting story to tell. These “clean” strata of sand
were first identified in the Royal Chartered Arms factory site in 2004.
What we see in the picture is sand – the original beach, covered by
debris from the building of wooden structures nearby. But on top of that
is more than 50 cm of sand, taken from a site where the archeobotanical
evidence tells us of ruderal plants from a dry, built up environment. This
was the foundation for the oldest workshops and living quarters in the
factory area – the floor planks from that simple barrack, built in the early
1620s, can be seen resting on the sand.
8. If we look at Heinrich Thomes wonderful map from 1624-25 it is possible
to trace the flow of material for landfill from the former site of the town
and from the castle where extensive work was done during these crucial
years.
We can also see some datings, taken from our dendrochronological
analysis, showing just how fast this huge undertaking progressed – the
building of a new city on virgin – and quite unsuitable – ground. Another
important detail is the thin lines showing the planned city fortifications,
existing toll fences and the vast marshes to the south east.
Thomes map is special because it gives a true description of the state of
things in this vast construction site after ten years of hard work. It was
made for someone with a good grasp of the local situation – probably
the King himself. And a number of details have been compared to the
archaeological evidence over the years. It is worth noticing that a brand
new church has been added. It was paid for by the King himself and
replaced S:t Nicholas, the large medieval town church that had remained
in use for more than ten years after the fire of 1612. And just as in
Kalmar this, the last stone building in the old town was blown up. Thome
writes “ruins of Church” on his map.
9. As for the timber, it has been possible to identify the place where many
of these large pine trees, used in the first phase of ground work, came
from. They were taken from the nearby Royal Manor of Ryhov, an estate
created by the Crown in the 1550s to supply the castle and its garrison.
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5. 10. But as the years went by work on the Grand Design of a New Jönköping
slowly came to a halt. About half the area planned for the city was
actually used in the 17th and early 18th centuries. And although the town
was seen as of the greatest importance to the defense of Sweden, there
were never enough resources to start building the ring of fortifications in
earnest. Instead one generation of simple toll fences followed another.
And as only the northern half of the system of canals was dug, the
ditches and the inner harbor filled with stagnant water… But at least the
monumental space in the form of a square had been added.
11. The Peace Treaty of Roskilde in 1658 changed everything. Jönköping was
no longer a border town and the area staked out for the fortifications
could be used for other purposes. But even so, traces of what was to
have been are still visible in the maps from the mid 18th century with
cultivated plots instead of houses and the first stretch of a wall street
leading to these small gardens.
12. So much for the fortifications. But let’s have a look at the monuments of
the civil settlement – the grand and costly buildings of Jönköping in the
17th century. It’s worth noticing the Swedish Coats of Arms right above
the main entrance to Christine Church – a town church named in honor
of the daughter of the founder of the new Jönköping. It’s also telling that
a stone church was not of the highest priority. Instead the new Court of
Appeal was. The symbol of a reformed judicial system was built 10 years
before the church was started. The congregation had to endure for
another decade or two in its barnlike little timber church. After all,
Jönköping was a project for the strong State and its administration.
13. Another important undertaking was the foundation of two Royal
Chartered factories in 1620. By centralizing strategic production for the
army and navy to the fortified new town the flow of vital supplies for the
armed forces was secured. Theoretically. In reality most of the local
gunsmiths choose to stay in their farms, spread all over the region. And
the authorities and director had to give in. What mattered was the
production of guns, not the organization in detail of that production.
Still, the manufacturing of firearms in Jönköping (later on in Huskvarna)
became of great importance. It was a high tech world characterized by
rapid development and an early example of division of labor. It was a
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6. craft based upon a long local tradition that was transformed into a kind
of early industry.
14. The other Royal Chartered Factory in Jönköping was quite another story
altogether. Here a group of local businessmen were asked to start a large
scale production of textiles, mainly cloth for the army and navy. Know-
how was brought in from abroad by hiring skilled craftsmen in Germany.
They came to establish an enclave in the central part of town, called the
German Meadow. There they were settled; being a group favored by the
State, well paid and able to uphold a more modern, continental urban
lifestyle than their Swedish neighbors. We know of tensions from written
sources, and the archaeological material indicates such problems too.
As for the production it started with unrealistic goals and the local raw
material, the wool, proved to be insufficient in quality. Another problem
was that it proved difficult to engage Swedish workers in the production
of textiles. After less than 30 years the manufacturing came to a halt, the
reasons mentioned above combined with devastating floods and a
period of peace – meaning no more orders coming in from the Crown…
15. Finally – let’s have a look at the Jönköping castle, its development and
some clues to a troubled building history provided by archaeology in the
last two years.
Originally it was a Franciscan friary, founded in 1283. It was taken over
by the Crown after the dissolution of the religious houses in Sweden and
transformed into a castle after the Dacke rebellion in 1542-43. During
the Nordic Seven Years War the castle was burnt by its retreating
defenders in 1567 and left as a ruin. Re-building started in 1595 and was
led by Dutch master builder Hans Fleming. The result was a modern
artillery fortress with corner bastions, curtain walls with casemates and a
large bailey. It withstood a short siege in the summer of 1612 but apart
from that was never tested in battle. The building activities were
continued on and off until the late 1650s, when Jönköping Castle became
obsolete because of the Roskilde Peace Treaty in 1658. The central
buildings were used by the local administration until the devastating fire
of 1737 while the fortifications were left to slowly fall into decay.
16. In 2011 – 12 excavations in the SE-corner of the 10 hectare fortress have
revealed surprising differences in the quality of the walls. The west and
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7. north flank of the bastion vary a lot in thickness and where one would
have expected solid walls, they turned out to be hollow and filled with
debris. This was an example of a surprisingly shoddy workmanship;
something that would have endangered the safety of the castle in case of
a siege.
17. Furthermore, the bastion Carolus was built on insufficient foundations
and had in fact been in danger of a collapse almost since day 1. Fleming
himself asked the King in 1617 if the bastion could be torn down, as
serious cracks in the masonry had been noticed. Parts of the walls had
also started to sink. However he was not allowed to do so by the King, as
the political situation was considered too threatening.
18. Other defects revealed by the excavations of Fleming’s fortress include
the exclusion of a planned casemated gallery for musketeers in the
lakeside (eastern) wall. It was probably given up as a means to save some
money for the Crown during the financial crisis of the 1610s, caused by
the huge ransom to be paid to Denmark to get the castle of Elfsborg back
after the Kalmar War.
More important was that a section of wall on the lakeside was obviously
never built at all. King Gustav II Adolf did complain in 1630, asking “why
the hole in the eastern wall of Jönköping castle had not been filled”. Two
years later he asked that question again… And our archaeological
evidence tells us the same thing. A simple earth wall, nothing more, was
all there ever was. Furthermore, the NE bastion remained an earth
structure. The reason for these defects in a major fortress was that the
chosen ground couldn’t bear the weight of a stone building. The lessons
from bastion Carolus were learned the hard way, leaving the fortress
with one weak and dangerous spot.
19. Even the mortar in the walls still standing tells the same story about the
varying quality. In some parts the lime mortar is an almost perfect
mixture, while in other sections such as the makeshift wall from 1612,
the adhesiveness must have been low indeed. Haste and pressure makes
no good conditions for high quality craftsmanship…
20. To sum it up – if the excavated parts of these 17th century fortifications
are representative for the quality of all defensive structures surrounding
the castle, then the central link in the chain of fortresses was indeed
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8. weak. Modern plans and a highly qualified master builder like Fleming
could do little if the surveys undertaken left out important facts, if the
funding was insufficient or if the work force was untrained or unsuitable
for the task.
21. And to a large extent this is the story of the new city of Jönköping.
Although it was undeniably important to the Crown, the resources to
finish the task of building the Ideal Town were never present. The Visions
may have been grand enough, but the harsh realities were that other
projects – such as Gothenburg and Kalmar – had a higher priority. It is
also worth noticing the ambivalence shown by the Government towards
this city fortress project when decisions were changed or reversed. So…
The city fortifications stayed on the drawing table
Only about half of the area originally intended for the new town
was actually used
The castle might have looked impressive enough, but had a
number of concealed weaknesses.
One Royal Chartered Factory, meant to modernize textile
production in Sweden, became a failure.
An economy based on war production was vulnerable – and
what was probably the worst crisis ever in the history of the
town came in 1721 when the Age of Greatness ended. Jönköping
had to adjust to more peaceful times and that process was
indeed a difficult one …
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