the svea court of appeal in the early modern period 158 the rights of his sister against Per Banér and later also Erik Bielke, i.e., the husbands of his cousins, Katarina and Hebla Fleming.442 The cases also show that during the process, all sorts of arguments and more or less related accusations were thrown in. In the Planting vs. Uggla case, accusations from the claims of witchcraft and misalliance to accusations of tax evasion were presented. These accusations were also taken seriously by the opposing party, as testimonies of innocence were soon put before the next court sittings. It is also of interest that although the consequences of misalliance were consolidated only in 1622, the idea of restricting the inheritance rights of unruly noblewomen was already very much in the minds of the nobility. In his article, Rudolf Thunander has stressed the independent position of the Court of Appeal in its relation to the regent.443 This appears to have been true when it came to the way the legal process took shape. However, one cannot help noting that at least in these cases, the will of the king, previously expressed in grants, somewhat restricted the possible outcomes of the court cases. In the dispute between Joen Planting and Claes Claesson Uggla, what counted was the grant made to King JohnIII, and the King’s further decisions considering this property. It had to be respected. Claims of inheritance seemed to ultimately come to nothing because of this previous royal intervention. In the same way, as certain property had been bequeathed to King John III by Filippa Fleming and later by the same king to Klas Fleming, there was no way to seriously question the grant or to move it back to the original heirs. The property had been removed from the constraints of the law of inheritance. As Per Banér told Hieronymus Birckholtz – and one can presume a malicious undertone in articulating Birckholtz’s “mission impossible” – what had been bequeathed to the King would have to be won in a court case against the King. As there was virtually no testamentary law before 1686, wills and grants provided an opportunity to avoid some restrictions imposed by the law of inheritance. In the present cases, both noblemen and women could make last wills to the benefit of the ruler in order to protect their own interests. Such wills were drawn up by childless people who had to find support from outside their immediate family circles. 442 On gendered legal personhood, see Pylkkänen, Anu 2005. 443 Thunander, Rudolf 1995.
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