the svea court of appeal in the early modern period 34 teenth century law, thelagman, the superior provincial judge, was to adjudicate at two different kinds of courts: four times a year at the capital of the district on certain appointed days (landsting, regional assemblies) and once a year at the “lawful assembly place” (rätt tingsplats), the traditional meeting place of the local community, in each hundred (härad) of his region on the circuit of his lagsaga or court district.62 The lagmänusually belonged to the leading families of the aristocracy and probably had wider experience of the law and more political authority to decide in difficult cases. But in the later fifteenth century, the sections of the election of the lagmanhad partly fallen into desuetude as the Protectors of Sweden (riksföreståndare) had started to appoint the lagmän without waiting for the nominees of the province or the people.63 More generally, in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, judges’ offices started to acquire feudal features. As has been shown by the research of Claësson and Blomstedt, from the late Middle Ages on, the positions of judges were more and more often enfeoffed to noblemen, who often used non-noble surrogate judges to do the actual adjudicating in the course of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.64 The judge had to resolve all cases that were heard by him if he wished to avoid a three-mark fine. The medieval law contained provisions for situations in which the judge was unable to resolve an individual case. If the judge did not know what the law was in a particular case, he could postpone it to the next assizes. The judge then had either give his sentence or take an public oath in court that he did not know what the law was in the case and refer the case to his lagman.65 As for provincial court assemblies (landsting) that used to be presided over by the lagman, this system evolved so that they became royal courts in the early fifteenth century. This change was probably intended to reduce local autonomy in judicial affairs and emphasize royal authority and royal presence in administering the highest (temporal) justice at a local level. Ever since the Middle Ages, the Swedish kings, like other European monarchs, had assumed a role as the ultimate guarantor of justice. As May Day and Midsummer, Kuningas Kristoferin maanlaki (ed. Ulkuniemi) (hereafter KrL), Käräjäkaari (hereafter R, Chapter on Procedure) 8, p. 110. 62 MEL, R 8, p. 162. 63 Almquist, Jan Eric 1946 p. 11. 64 Blomstedt, Yrjö 1958 pp. 30-208; Claësson, Sten 1987 pp. 189-198. 65 MEL, R 17, p. 164.
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