395 can be proved also in regard to a king, an eorl, a la'w-rnan and a tingjudge, and likewise at the distribution of an inheritance, and to a certain extent at the marriage. Similarities can also be proved at the delivery of the church to the newpriest. When the bishop had been placed on his throne, he was also de facto established in his office, his diocese. He was the ruler of the bishopric and of its property, staf oc stol. He received his staff (crook) and was lead to his throne. From the Icelandic sources we can conclude that the bishop first was elected at the ting, then he went abroad and was consecrated, and at last after coming home again, he passed through the investiture and was placed in the high seat. According to the old law of Västergötland, and the Laurentii saga, the consecration by the archbishop seems to have been added last of all. In the course of time the influences of the canon law became stronger. The determination by the ting or the king was gradually replaced by the canonical election at the chapter. An act of canonical election replaced equally the determination of the king and the lawman. With the chapter as a new electing corporation the influence of the ting at the appointment of bishops came to an end. Then an opposition arose between the Church and the central government of Sweden. The appointment of bishops was played out within the relations between the Church and the province community. In the same way as the act of investiture of the king passed into an ecclesiastical consecrating, the coronation, the investiture of the bishop, led by laymen at the ting, and the conducting to the church were replaced by an ecclesiastical consecration and the enthronement of the bishop by the Church. Seen in connection with the regulations about the appointment of the king and the law-man, in the old law of Västergötland, the regulation about the appointments of bishops gives expression to the demand of the province and the ting for independence in relation to the Church and the central government of Sweden about what was understood as the concerns of the province itself. As the regulation bears the clear impress of having once been read at the ting, it probably reproduces the way of appointing a bishop in Västergötland and perhaps also in other Swedish provinces during a part of the earliest history of the Church of Sweden. Its worth is, froma historical point of view, important.
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