Suomalaiset kirkkoherrat Ruotsin valtion rakentajina 1550-luvulta 1610-luvulle

Abstract

This dissertation and the four separate articles contained therein examine Finnish pastors as builders of the Swedish state from the 1550s to the 1610s. The subject is studied from three perspectives. First, the relationship between the crown and the church (and the pastors) is explored. Second, the study investigates the relationship between the pastors and local communities. The third aspect connects the first two as it sheds light on the pastors’ role as intermediators between local communities and the crown. These perspectives provide the essential frameworks in which state build-ing took place: the centers of the realm, the local communities, and interaction be-tween the two. The source material about 16th-century pastors is scarce and fragmented. Due to this fragmentation, several parallel sources were used to approach the theme in a diverse and multi-perspective manner. The prosopographic method was used to compile scattered source data into databases. The created databases were analyzed by qualitative and qualitative methods. The analysis focuses on the activity and per-sonal agency of the pastors in local communities. The research is based on the con-fessional paradigm, new cultural history, new social history and micro-history. The most significant results can be summarized as follows. With the Refor-mation, the king and secular authorities tried to take over the church and its actors, but study of the appointment processes of the pastors revealed that the coup was not entirely successful. Instead, the pastors maintained their relatively free position in the local communities. However, by controlling the salaries of the pastors, the crown could bend them to its will. The relationship between the pastors and parishioners was examined from the viewpoint of bureaucratization. The study shows that pas-tors maintained their trust-based relationship with the peasantry, contrary to many secular office-holders. By studying the role of pastors in conflicts, it was noticed that the pastors passed on information from local communities to central government. This kind of activity benefitted the crown and other secular authorities, local com-munities and the pastors themselves. Thus, it was as an empowering interaction, which advanced the state building process. Overall, the study concludes that, de-spite the increasingly constrained position of the pastors, they maintained their role as important local authorities and actors. This indicates that local communities and their actors were not fully subordinated, and that meaningful state building took place in local communities.