392 The bishop’s official was from the beginning associated with the ting-meeting in the same way as the bishop himself. He could only gradually act more freely, in connection with the position of the deaneries as special Church administration districts. In the earliest times the king was, quite as the bishop, depending on the ting and the province community. Similarly, it was therefore to the king’s interest to create a stronger central government to the disregard of the independence of the provinces. Therefore, the king and the bishop had, in many respects, interests in common towards the administration of the provinces. There are many examples to show how the king has supported the efforts made by the bishop and the Church to break the strong administrative monopoly of the province authorities. We have often supposed that the link between king and bishop was of a feudal nature, but this cannot be proved, at least not with reference to the first centuries of episcopate in Sweden. In any case, the bishop’s closer relations to the king and the central government had as a consequence that many bishops were drawn into the great throne- and party conflicts of the MiddleAges. In the same way as the king and, probably, also the law-man, the bishop disposed of a defined official property, in Swedish sources called staf oc stol.^ Even if obvious patterns from the ecclesiastical law assert themselves here, in the first place cathedra as a designation for the property of the episcopal Church, notable resemblances for the bishop’s official property can be verified with different kinds of administrative unities in the Swedish community of that time, in the first place with the king’s krona*' and his property called Uppsala öd. Quite as the king, the bishop received his official property by various ritual ceremonies at the investment, where the bishop’s pastoral staff and his throne were identified with his rule of his bishopric and his official property. In the Old Swedish laws the parish churches appear as juridical persons of their own, separated fromthe total property of the episcopal Church. This has froma long time back been supposed to be connected with the property churches.' With the eleventh century claims were laid for the Church to be separated from the secular administration, libertas ecclesi.e. This had many consequences for the organization of the Church of Sweden, not the least concerning the relations between the bishop and the Swedish community. The bishop’s crook and sec. * Crown. ' Property churches, built and administrated by its owner, a layman.
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