2024

Impola, Petteri

This chapter compares how Swedish and Finnish doctoral dissertations from 1850 to 2020 have studied the social structures in early modern Swedish estate society: how estates and other social and professional groups, and individuals, are examined; which groups have been studied the most and the least, and why; and whether there have been any changes in research priorities. This exploration reveals national (dis)similarities of interest in social groups between researchers in Sweden, still a constitutional monarchy, and the Republic of Finland, which did not become independent until 1917. In Sweden, the nobility and royalty were by far the most studied groups for a long time, but in the late twentieth century, research turned sharply toward the peasants and other groups lower in the social hierarchy. In Finland, peasants have always been a popular subject of research, and changes in interests have not been as drastic as in Swedish historiography. In both countries, the clergy has been the second most examined estate, while the burghers have been the least studied. This chapter also considers how, especially in recent decades, there has been greater emphasis on gender aspects and the household and family as basic social units of patriarchal estate society.