Johannes Magnus (a modified form of
Johannes Magni, a Latin translation of his birth name
Johan Månsson) was born March 19, 1488 in Linköping,
SwedenSweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe...
and died March 22, 1544 in Rome. He was the last
CatholicThe word Catholic is derived from the Greek adjective , meaning "universal". In the context of Christian ecclesiology, it has a rich history and several usages. For some, the term "Catholic Church" refers to the church in full communion with the Bishop of Rome, made up of the Latin Rite and the 22...
ArchbishopIn Christianity, an archbishop is an elevated bishop. In many Christian Churches, this means that they lead a diocese of particular importance called an archdiocese, or in the Anglican Communion an Ecclesiastical Province, but this is not always the case. An archbishop is equivalent to a bishop in...
in Sweden, and also a theologian, genealogist, and historian.
Life
Johannes Magnus was born in Linköping, son of the burgess Måns Pedersson and his wife Kristina. (His own later claims to be descended from a noble family named Store are unverified.)
Magnus was selected by King
Gustav I of SwedenGustav I, born Gustav Eriksson and later known as Gustav Vasa , was King of Sweden from 1523 until his death. He was the first monarch of the House of Vasa, an influential noble family which came to be the royal house of Sweden for much of the 16th and 17th centuries...
(Vasa) to become Archbishop, in 1523. As he was about to travel to Rome to be ordained, a
papal bullA Papal bull is a particular type of letters patent or charter issued by a pope. It is named after the bulla that was appended to the end to authenticate it....
from
Pope Clement VIIPope Clement VII , born Giulio di Giuliano de' Medici, was a cardinal from 1513 to 1523 and was Pope from 1523 to 1534.-Early life:...
was received, stating that the previous Archbishop
Gustav TrolleGustav Eriksson Trolle was Archbishop of Uppsala, Sweden, in two sessions, during the turbulent Reformation events.After returning from studies abroad, in Cologne and Rome, he was in 1513 elected vicar in Linköping. One year later he became Archbishop of Uppsala...
, who was at the time in exile abroad, should be reinstated. The papal bull declared the deposing of Trolle unlawful.
However, Gustav Trolle was deemed a traitor to the country, and Gustav Vasa could not reinstate him. Instead he ignored the papal bull and took it upon himself to install Magnus without papal acceptance. Before long, however, Johannes Magnus rebelled by declaring his discontent with the Lutheran teachings spread by the brothers
OlausOlof Persson , better known under the Latin form of his name, Olaus Petri , was a clergyman, writer, and a major contibutor to the Protestant Reformation in Sweden. His brother, Laurentius Petri, became the first Evangelical Lutheran Archbishop of Sweden...
and
Laurentius PetriLaurentius Petri Nericius was a Swedish clergyman and the first Evangelical Lutheran Archbishop of Sweden. He and his brother Olaus Petri are, together with the King Gustav Vasa, regarded as the main Protestant reformers of Sweden...
, under the supervision of King Gustav Vasa. The King then sent him off to Russia as a diplomat in 1526. Johannes Magnus was careful not to return home during that time, realizing that he was unwanted. Gustav Vasa appointed a new archbishop,
Laurentius PetriLaurentius Petri Nericius was a Swedish clergyman and the first Evangelical Lutheran Archbishop of Sweden. He and his brother Olaus Petri are, together with the King Gustav Vasa, regarded as the main Protestant reformers of Sweden...
, in 1531, and Johannes realized that his time as archbishop was over.
His brother,
Olaus MagnusOlaus Magnus was a Swedish ecclesiastic and writer, who did pioneering work for the interest of Nordic people. He was reported as born in October 1490 in Östergötland, and died on August 1, 1557. Magnus, Latin for the Swedish Stor “great”, is a Latin family name taken personally, and not a...
, had meanwhile travelled to Rome to explain the matter of Gustav Trolle to the Pope. In 1533 the Pope finished investigating the Trolle matter and decided that Magnus was the most appropriate successor, and Magnus travelled to Rome to be ordained. However, as Sweden now no longer took direction from the Vatican, both brothers remained in Italy for the remainder of their lives.
Magnus spent his time in Venezia and Rome, where he wrote two historical works about Sweden:
Historia de omnibus Gothorum Sueonumque regibus and
Historia metropolitanæ ecclesiæ Upsaliensis, which are important for their historical information, but are also filled with tales that have no reliable foundation. After the death of Johannes in 1544, the line of Swedish archbishops consecrated by the Pope ended.
Works
The
Historia de omnibus gothorum sueonumque regibus ("History of all Kings of Goths and Swedes") is a work on Swedish history, which was printed posthumously in
RomeRome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated municipality , with over 2.7 million residents in , while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat to be 3.46 million. The metropolitan area of Rome is estimated by OECD to have a population of 3.7 million...
in 1554, by Johannes' brother
Olaus MagnusOlaus Magnus was a Swedish ecclesiastic and writer, who did pioneering work for the interest of Nordic people. He was reported as born in October 1490 in Östergötland, and died on August 1, 1557. Magnus, Latin for the Swedish Stor “great”, is a Latin family name taken personally, and not a...
. Olaus sent it to
SwedenSweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe...
with a dedication to the dukes
EricEric XIV was King of Sweden from 1560 until he was deposed in 1568. Eric XIV was the son of Gustav I of Sweden and Catherine of Saxe-Lauenburg . He was also ruler of Estonia, after its conquest by Sweden in 1561...
,
JohnJohn III was King of Sweden from 1568 until his death. He was the son of King Gustav I of Sweden and his second wife Margaret Leijonhufvud. He was also quite autonomously the ruler of Finland from 1556 to 1563...
,
MagnusMagnus Vasa , prince of Sweden, Duke of Östergötland from 1555. Magnus was the third son of king Gustav Vasa. His mother was queen Margareta Leijonhufvud....
and
CharlesCharles IX , was King of Sweden from 1604 until his death. He was the youngest son of King Gustav I of Sweden and his second wife, Margaret Leijonhufvud, brother of Eric XIV and John III of Sweden, and uncle of Sigismund III Vasa king of both Sweden and Poland...
. It was subsequently republished several times. It appeared in a Swedish translation by Er. Schroderus for the first time in 1620. It is a very unreliable source for early Swedish history.
Johannes Magnus made creative use of Jordanes'
GeticaDe origine actibusque Getarum , or the Getica, written by Jordanes in 551, is a summary of a voluminous account by Cassiodorus of the origin and history of the Gothic people, the now lost Libri XII De Rebus Gestis Gothorum...
and of
Saxo GrammaticusSaxo Grammaticus also known as Saxo cognomine Longus was a Danish historian, thought to have been a secular clerk or secretary to Absalon, Archbishop of Lund. He is the author of the first full history of Denmark.- Life :...
to depict a history of the Swedish people, of their kings, and of the "Goths abroad". He states that
MagogMagog, Hebrew מגוג, Greek Μαγωγ, [ ma'gog ], is the second of the seven sons of Japheth mentioned in the Table of Nations in Genesis 10. It may represent Hebrew for "from Gog", though this is far from certain....
, son of Jafeth, was Sweden's first king. The first 16 volumes are taken up by the period before AD 1000 in a strange mixture of tales from earlier writers and his own fiction. Johannes Magnus invented a list of kings of Sweden with five Erics before Eric the Victorious, where he started counting from Jordanes'
BerigBerig is a legendary king of the Goths appearing in the Getica by Jordanes. According to Jordanes, Berig led his people on three ships from Scandza to Gothiscandza . They settled and then attacked the Rugians who lived on the shore and drove them away from their homes, subsequently winning a...
as Eric I. He also invented six Charleses before Karl Sverkersson. This is how Gustav Vasa's sons could style themselves as Eric XIV and
Charles IXCharles IX , was King of Sweden from 1604 until his death. He was the youngest son of King Gustav I of Sweden and his second wife, Margaret Leijonhufvud, brother of Eric XIV and John III of Sweden, and uncle of Sigismund III Vasa king of both Sweden and Poland...
. While the work describes these fictional Erics and Charleses in generally positive terms, it also includes a few invented tyrants with names similar to king Gustav.
The work is exceedingly patriotic and displays a glowing hatred of anything Danish.
Sources
http://runeberg.org/sbh/b0115.html Svenskt biografiskt handlexikon
See also