Sankt Eriks vrede

Oförrätter, minne och politiska känslor i den senmedeltida Karlskrönikan

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to discuss the expression and intertwinement of political emotions and memory in the vernacular verse chronicle Karlskrönikan (Karl’s chronicle), written on behalf of the Swedish king Karl Knutsson (Bonde) in the 1450s. Injustice is a major theme in the chronicle, as well as in the examples discussed here. The verse chronicle cultivates the memories of past and current instances of injustice through the use of emotional scripts that involve agency and consolidate the memory of particular events. Political emotions are instrumental in the characterization and evaluation of actors, their actions and motives, which serves to communicate political messages that implicitly or explicitly refer to or involve the past. The chronicle’s reference to the wrath of Saint Erik illustrates the complex uses and meanings of wrath in political narratives. Saint Erik, patron saint of Sweden, was a prominent symbol of the realm, and the church of Uppsala in the 15th century. The reference to his wrath as an historical agent of retribution against the Danish union king involves both the notion of righteous royal wrath and the memory of how St Erik suffered martyrdom at the hands of a Danish perpetrator. The emotion scripts that inform the representation of Karl Knutsson as a legitimate ruler consistently emphasize his emotional restraint and honorable conduct both in dealing with unruly peasants and envious contenders for power.