the svea court of appeal in the early modern period 348 We can, therefore, see how the slow professionalization of the court was linked to the changes that took place in Swedish domestic and foreign policy, the structure of society, and legal issues. The Svea Court of Appeal corps of judges had come a long way between 1614 and 1809. The idea of noble men earning their place at the court simply because of their position in society and innate abilities to master such a task was no longer viable. While the court had to make do with what was available in 1614, and the judges often split their time between judicial work and various administrative functions, this was no longer possible as the eighteenth century progressed. An increasingly professional court could no longer afford to have “part-time judges” and now even the presidents of the courts had to work their way up the career ladder. This does of course not mean that contacts and personal relations no longer mattered, but rather it reflects the emerging divide between judicial and administrative work. The judges of the Svea Court of Appeal were no longer “all-around statesmen-lawyers” but rather true lawyers with distinctly legal careers.
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