justitia et prudentia, kapitel 7 378 gely based on case law from the courts of appeal and the regulations had been drafted on the basis of the replies by the courts of appeal in Stockholm, Turku and Jönköping to a questionnaire sent out by the Crown. The enactment of the Statute of Wills in 1686 also coincided with a period of intense legislation, and the same year a major law reform was initiated which eventually resulted in the new Swedish Law Code of 1734. The period of this study is characterised by a transition from a traditional right of inheritance, in which the family was in focus, to a society of Estates, characterised by privilege in which the right of ownership based on natural law and the rights of the individual were paramount. But, at the same time, there were signs that the medieval traditions survived, as indicated by, among other things, religious elements in wills. Despite the deficient regulations governing the law of wills, the cases studied here show that in its making and application of law in the period 1640 to 1690, the Svea Court of Appeal sought to reach fair judgments based on a balance betweenJustitia andPrudentia.
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