The topic of this study is multiperspectivity, a concept in history didactics denoting a way and predisposition to view history through many different perspectives, with regards to, among other things, historical people, events, and historiography. Using multiperspectivity in history education not only reveals the varied ways in which history is constructed, but also exposes the history of peoples previously marginalized in historical narratives, such as women, children, the poor, and various ethnic groups. Using a content analysis and coding scheme, the study examines the representtation of the era of the Swedish empire in five history textbooks for upper secondary school in Sweden. Textbooks are an important part of teaching, and as research material they can provide insight into how a given subject may be represented, which in turn makes it possible to analyse the implications of that representation. The study finds that the textbooks varied considerably regarding their multiperspectivity. Some included the perspectives of peasants, women, immigration, and the effects of religion on society, while others did not, and were instead noticeably more limited in their perspectivity. All textbooks did however focus heavily on military and political matters. The various wars Sweden was engaged in, as well as the kings – particularly Gustavus Adolphus and Charles XII – receive most attention throughout the texts, while other perspectives are, more or less depending on the textbook, given far less attention. Furthermore, the texts themselves are most often framed as a narrative of the rise and fall of an empire. These findings are in many ways congruent with previous research on history textbooks, and together with previous research on multiperspectivity, the study shows the complexity of applying this concept to history education.

This bachelor thesis examines the PC-game Europa Universalis IV and its potential as a learning tool to develop players historical consciousness. The thesis also researches and compares Europa Universalis IV:s historical content and use of history to what is characteristic of popular history. The results show that the game’s potential for developing historical consciousness lies in its contrafactual use of historical content, but because of its high abstraction of history and historical aspects the potentials are limited and problematic to evaluate. The analysis of uses of history in Europa Universalis IV shows that the game’s historical presentation is mostly exemplary and commercial.

The purpose of this study is to examine the seldom researched Swedish geopolitical interests inNorway in the first half of the 17th century, with the brief 1658 conquest of Trondheim as itscentral event of inquiry. Through the study of privy council protocols and chancellor AxelOxenstierna’s correspondence, the study builds a case for the confluence of security, commerce, andthe concepts of nations as the influencing factors that shaped Swedish imperial foreign policy in thedecades leading up to the dramatic war of 1658, yielding a theoretical construction of the Empire’sBaltic doctrine, or the Oxenstierna doctrine, as an explanatory model for Sweden’s early modernexpansion patterns. Subsequently through understanding of the Empire’s expansionist rationaleleading up to 1658, the conquest of the Norwegian province of Trondheim is put in a new light ashaving been an interruptive and complicated re-imagining of what the Swedish Empire should be.

There were many ways of bordering manliness during the historical period covered by my research. Borders have been metaphorically understood as those invisible, often non-enunciated limits that have safeguarded manliness. There were borders separating masculinity from femininity and from childishnes, but there is also a more distant border, separating masculinity from the bestial. The term un-manliness is a useful concept for this analysis, for it can be used to illuminate the different ways in which masculinity has been interrogated. The concept can also be used in comparative analyses of how tolerance towards men deviating from ideas of ideal masculinity has differed according to situation and culture. It has been my ambition to elucidate the particular attitudes, values, customs, knowledge and requirements that influenced the view of masculinity at both individual and the group level. The clearest-cut aspects of manliness and un-manliness expressed in court proceedings were those having to do with sexuality, relations within the household, and the subordinate and dominant masculinities displayed by different court-room actors. The latter, in turn, reflected contemporary social structures, including the social gap that divided the Livonian peasantry’s serfs or former serfs from the ruling Baltic-German elite. Records from the court proceedings have shown the subordinate masculinity of the defendants, subordinate not only to that of the officers of the court but to that of the witnesses. This subordination was an inevitable consequence of the nature of the accusations, regardless of whether they were deemed well-founded or false.  The defendants were placed in a situation where they were forced constantly to be on the alert, ready to defend themselves and show their best sides. As a result, they would often give extremely clear expression to their views of proper masculinity. Such actors stressed, consciously or unconsciously, certain manly traits and behaviour patterns that characterised themselves and others. Their arguments provide insights into what they thought of each other and how they conceived a man should generally be, behave and act in different situations. By the same token, they clearly showed what kinds of behaviours were considered undesirable or outright unmanly. The positioning of the borders of manliness was linked both to time and to space. Deviations have helped different societies set the borders for what they considered acceptable behaviour. There was a clear cultural and geographical border between Sweden as such, and the Swedish province Livonia. This emerges clearly when one compares Livonian results with earlier studies on bestiality in Sweden. This shows that the view of manliness and the tolerance towards certain kinds of behaviour changed as one moved East.

Denna uppsats gör med hjälp av Erwin Panofskys ikonologiska metod en analys av en serie på nitton porträtt av kända 1600-tals män. Dessa porträtt, vilka idag är placerade i biblioteket på Skoklosters slott utreds i sin ikonografi och sätts in i ett större ikonografiskt sammanhang. Porträtten har ett unikt utseende då de är målade på furupannå och sedan kontursågade kring den porträtterades huvud. Avsikten med uppsatsen är att förstå deras syfte och ursprung. Uppsatsen behandlar frågor som varför man har valt att göra dessa porträtt och om det finns en koppling mellan dessa och bibliotekskonst i stort. Likväl vilka som är avporträtterade, varför just dessa personer är det och vem som låtit göra porträtten undersöks. Det är en uppsats som till stora delar handlar om det adliga idealet på 1600-talet och hur det gav sitt uttryck i konsten. / This essay does, with the help of Erwin Panofsky’s iconological method, provide an analysis of a series of nineteen portraits of famous men of the 17th century. These portraits, which today are placed in the library of Skokloster castle, are analysed in their iconography, and placed in a larger iconographic context. The portraits all have unique appearances, since they are painted on pine panel and then sawed after the contour of the head of the portrayed. The aim with the essay is to understand purpose and origin of the portraits. The essay deals with questions such as why these portraits were chosen to be made, and if a connection exists between these works and library art in a bigger context. Who is being portrayed, why these people in particular, and who has taken the initiative of making the portraits are questions that are investigated as well. It is an essay that to a large extent treats the noble ideal of the 17th century, and how it gave its expression to art.