Alv Knutsson

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Alv Knutsson (* around 1420, † 1496 ) was a Norwegian landowner, chief and member of the Norwegian Imperial Council.

family

His parents were the Lagmann in Västergötland and Swedish Councilor Knut Jonsson from the Tre Rosor family († 1457) and his wife Agnes Alvsdotter († around 1499). Before 1458 he married Magnhild Oddsdotter (around 1425-1499), daughter of Odd Bottolvsson to Finn Voss and his wife Botild Torsteinsdotter. By inheritance and his marriage, he was Norway's greatest secular landowner in the 15th century. He became a Reichsrat, but was never heavily involved in politics.

Through his maternal family, he belonged to the top nobility of Norway. Through his marriage to Magnhild, two noble families were connected. This was a natural consequence of the Great Plague in the late Middle Ages . It had caused an agricultural crisis. The value of the land fell rapidly. Marriage contracts made up for this loss a little. But the nobility was thinned out. Many had to look for their spouse abroad, others had to marry socially inferior persons.

The grandfather of Magnhilds Bottolv Eindridesson († 1388) lived on Finn after the Great Plague. He belonged to the noble class of the squires (væpnar). He was the son of Eindrinde Bottolvsson on Kvam and married to Åsa Håvardsdotter from Rogne. As a result, three lower nobility families from Vestlandet - Finn, Kvam and Rogne - were united. Much of the property of the Kvam and Rogne families came together to the Finne family and a large estate. This explains why the two sons of Bottolv Eindridesson and his wife Åsa had no problems marrying into the high aristocracy. The son Håvard Bottolfsson had Gjertrud, the daughter of the knight Jakob Fastulvsson and his wife Elsebe Ottesdotter Rømer , the son Odd had married Botild Torsteinsdotter. Their daughter Magnhild, Alv Knutsson's wife, had previously been married to the knight Bengt Harniktsson, who had been killed by farmers in Gudbrandsdalen around 1446, and also to a Sigurd. With this she had the son Karl Sigurdsson Skaktavl, later Bishop of Hamar (bishop from 1446 to 1487).

The real estate

When the inheritance was divided up after his father's death, he received his Norwegian property, his brother the Swedish. In 1482 he was able to acquire the Manvik estate in Brunlanes (now part of Larvik ), an inheritance from his maternal grandmother. Through his marriage to Magnhild he got estates in Hedmark . The largest acquisition came in 1490 when he inherited Hans Sigurdsson. He received the manors Giske and Sudrheim with the associated lands.

politics

He lived mostly in Grefsheim in Nes . From there the couple continued their land purchases, so that they owned goods scattered all over southern Norway. Due to the administration of all these goods, he only took part in imperial politics to a small extent. However, there are many indications that after the death of Christoph von Bayern in 1448 he actively supported Karl Kutsson as his successor and that he was one of the 15 personalities who received the knighthood on the occasion of Charles' coronation celebrations on November 20, 1449 in Trondheim. Karl Knutsson could not hold out against Christian I. Alv Knutsson was reconciled with King Christian. Probably at this time he also joined the Reichsrat. In any case, he took part in the Diet in Skara in 1458 as a knight. Since he had estates and manors in Eastern Norway and in Sunnmøre, he was a member of the Nordafjelske and the Sunnafjelske group of the Imperial Council. in the 1470s he administered Andenes and Sunnfjord Len for the Munkeliv monastery and in 1485 he is mentioned as the fortress commander of Bergenhus. But that was only temporary, since in 1489 Otte Mattson Rømer held this position.

The dispute with Hartvig Krummedike

Alv Knutsson came into conflict with the powerful Hartvig Krummedike on Brunla. This conflict turned into bitter enmity, which ended with his murder of Vogt Hartvig Krummedikes in 1460. It has been suggested that the cause of this enmity was the murder of Erik Sæmundsson in 1449 or 1450, instigated by Krummedike, who was imperial administrator under King Karl Knutssons. Alv Knutsson was half-Swedish and Erik Sæmundsson was the father-in-law of his brother Jöns Knutsson. But there could also have been other reasons. King Christian I had worked hard for the reconciliation of these two, but without success. The Norwegian Imperial Council had also exerted corresponding pressure, so that a reconciliation came about on the Lord's Day in Copenhagen in 1489. The hatred broke out again in the next generation, and a fatal argument broke out between Alv's sons Odd and Knut and Hartvik Krummedike's son Henrik .

progeny

Alv Knutsson and his wife Manhild had sons Knut and Odd and daughter Karine. Odd Alvsson died childless in 1497. Knut transferred his entire property to his sister Karine in Grefsheim.

Footnotes

  1. Diplomatarium Norvegicum Vol. 1 No. 945 .

literature

Halvard Bjørkvik: "Alv Knutsson" in: Norsk biografisk leksikon .