In 1700, a triple alliance ofDenmark–Norway,Saxony–Poland–Lithuania andRussia launched a threefold attack on the Swedish protectorate ofHolstein-Gottorp and provinces ofLivonia andIngria, aiming to take advantage of theSwedish Empire being unaligned and ruled by a young and inexperienced king, thus initiating theGreat Northern War. Leading theSwedish army against the alliance, Charles won multiple victories despite being significantly outnumbered. A major victory over a much larger Russian army in 1700, at theBattle of Narva, compelledPeter the Great tosue for peace, an offer that Charles subsequently rejected. By 1706, Charles, now 24 years old, had forced all of his foes into submission. That year, Swedish forces under generalCarl Gustav Rehnskiöld won a decisive victory over a combined army of Saxony and Russia at theBattle of Fraustadt. Russia was now the sole remaining hostile power.
Charles's subsequentmarch on Moscow met with initial success as victory followed victory, the most significant of which was theBattle of Holowczyn where the smaller Swedish army routed a Russian army twice its size. The campaign ended with disaster when the Swedish army suffered heavy losses to a Russian force more than twice its size atPoltava. Charles had been incapacitated by a wound prior to the battle, rendering him unable to take command. The defeat was followed by theSurrender at Perevolochna. Charles spent the following years in exile in theOttoman Empire before returning to lead an assault on Norway, trying to evict the Danish king from the war once more in order to aim all his forces at the Russians. Two campaigns met with frustration and ultimate failure, concluding with his death at theSiege of Fredriksten in 1718. At the time, most of the Swedish Empire was under foreign military occupation, though Sweden itself was still free. This situation was later formalized, albeit moderated in the subsequentTreaty of Nystad. The result was the end of theSwedish Empire, and also of its effectively organizedabsolute monarchy and war machine, commencinga parliamentary government unique for continental Europe, which would last for half a century until royal autocracy was restored byGustav III.[2]
Charles was an exceptionally skilled military leader and tactician as well as an able politician, credited with introducing important tax and legal reforms. As for his famous reluctance towards peace efforts, he is quoted byVoltaire as saying upon the outbreak of the war: "I have resolved never to start an unjust war but never to end a legitimate one except by defeating my enemies". With the war consuming more than half his life and nearly all his reign, he never married and fathered no children. He was succeeded by his sisterUlrika Eleonora, who in turn was coerced to hand over all substantial powers to theRiksdag of the Estates and opted to surrender the throne to her husband Friedrich of Hesse-Kassel, who became KingFrederick I of Sweden.[3]
The fact that Charles was crowned as Charles XII does not mean that he was the twelfth king of Sweden by that name. Swedish kingsErik XIV (r. 1560–1568) andCharles IX (r. 1604–1611) gave themselves numerals after studyinga mythological history of Sweden. He was actually the sixth King Charles.[6]
Charles's parents King Charles XI and Queen Ulrica Eleonora
Prince Charles of Sweden was born on 17 June 1682O.S. in the royal castle ofTre Kronor in Stockholm. He was the first son born to KingCharles XI of Sweden and his wife, the Danish princessUlrika Eleonora. He had an older sister,Hedvig Sophia, born in 1681.[7] He spent more time with his parents than would be typical in a European royal court of the time and traveled with them from a very early age. Four more sons were born to the royal couple in the years following Charles's birth: Gustav in 1683, Ulrik in 1684, Frederick in 1685, and Charles Gustavus in 1686. However, all of these four died in infancy. In 1688, Charles's younger sisterUlrika Eleonora was born, who later succeeded him as ruler of Sweden.[8]
In 1693, Charles's mother died, and his father found consolation in spending more time with his son and heir. Charles XI brought his son with him to inspections and on other official business. Charles received an excellent education and was conscientiously prepared for the throne.[9] He learned to ride by the age of four[10] and engaged in rigorous physical training in his adolescence. He was very strong-willed and as king often stubbornly stuck to the standards which had been instilled in him by his moral and religious education. In April 1697, Charles XI died, and Prince Charles ascended the Swedish throne. Charles XI had provided for a regency for his teenaged heir, but already in November 1697 theRiksdag (Sweden's assembly ofthe Estates) recognized the fifteen-year-old Charles's majority. Charles XII was the first (and the last) Swedish ruler to inheritabsolute monarchical authority from his predecessor.[9]
Monument to Charles XII in Stockholm, with Charles pointing towards Russia. Stockholmers call this statue "the lion among four pots" ("Lejonet mellan fyra krukor") referring to the mortars. This contrasts with a nearby statue ofCharles XIII, which has lions similarly arranged; that statue is known as "the pot among four lions" ("Krukan mellan fyra lejon").[11]
Around 1700, the monarchs ofDenmark–Norway, Saxony (ruled by electorAugust II of Poland, who was also the king ofPoland-Lithuania) and Russia united in an alliance against Sweden, mainly through the efforts ofJohann Reinhold Patkul, aLivonian nobleman who turned traitor when the"great reduction" of Charles XI in 1680 stripped much of the nobility of lands and properties. In late 1699, Charles sent a minor detachment to reinforce his brother-in-law DukeFrederick IV of Holstein-Gottorp, who was attacked by Danish forces the following year. A Saxon army simultaneously invaded Swedish Livonia, and in February 1700 surroundedRiga, the most populous city of the Swedish Empire. Russia also declared war (August 1700), but stopped short of an attack onSwedish Ingria until September 1700.[12]
Charles's first campaign was against Denmark–Norway, ruled by his cousinFrederick IV of Denmark. For this campaign Charles secured the support of England and the Netherlands, both maritime powers concerned with Denmark's threats too close tothe Sound. Leading a force of 8,000 and 43 ships in an invasion ofZealand, Charles rapidly compelled the Danes to submit to thePeace of Travendal in August 1700, which indemnified Holstein.[13]Having forced Denmark–Norway to make peace within months, King Charles turned his attention upon the two other powerful neighbors, King August II (cousin to both Charles XII and Frederick IV of Denmark–Norway) andPeter the Great of Russia, who also had entered the war against him, ironically on the same day that Denmark came to terms.[12]
Russia had opened their part of the war by invading the Swedish-held territories ofLivonia andEstonia. Charles countered this by attacking the Russian besiegers at theBattle of Narva (November 1700). The Russians outnumbered the Swedish army of ten thousand men by almost four to one. Charles attacked under cover of a blizzard, effectively splitting the Russian army in two and won the battle. Many of Peter's troops who fled the battlefield drowned in theNarva River. The total number of Russian fatalities reached about 10,000 at the end of the battle, while the Swedish forces lost 667 men.[14]
Charles did not pursue the Russian army. Instead, he turned against Poland-Lithuania, which was formally neutral at this point, thereby disregarding Polish negotiation proposals supported by the Swedish parliament. Charles defeated the Polish kingAugustus II and hisSaxon allies at theBattle of Kliszow in 1702 and captured many cities of the Commonwealth. After the deposition of Augustus as king of thePolish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Charles XII putStanisław Leszczyński as his puppet on the Polish throne (1704).[15]
While Charles won several decisive battles in the Commonwealth and ultimately secured the coronation of his allyStanisław Leszczyński and thesurrender of Saxony, the Russian TsarPeter the Great embarked on a military reform plan that improved the Russian army, using the effectively organized Swedes and other European armies as role models. Russian forces managed to penetrateIngria, where they established a new city,Saint Petersburg. Charles planned aninvasion of the Russian heartland, allying himself withIvan Mazepa,Hetman of theUkrainian Cossacks. The size of the invading Swedish army was peeled off as Charles left Leszczyński with some 24,000 German and Polish troops, departing eastwards from Saxony in late 1707 with some 35,000 men, adding a further 12,500 underAdam Ludwig Lewenhaupt marching from Livonia. Charles left the homeland with a defense force of approximately 28,800 men, with a further 14,000 in Swedish Finland, as well as other garrisons in the Baltic and German provinces.[16][17]
After securing his "favorite" victory in theBattle of Holowczyn, despite being outnumbered over three to one by the new Russian army, Charles opted to march eastwards on Moscow rather than try to seizeSaint Petersburg, founded from the Swedish town ofNyenskans five years earlier.[18] Peter the Great managed, however, to ambush Lewenhaupt's army atLesnaya before Charles could combine his forces, thus losing valuable supplies, artillery and half of Lewenhaupt's men. Charles's Polish ally, Stanisław Leszczyński, was facing internal problems of his own. Charles expected the support of a massive Cossack rebellion led by Mazepa in Ukraine, with estimates suggesting Mazepa was able to muster about 40,000 troops. However, the Russians subjugated the rebellion and destroyed its capital,Baturin, before the arrival of the Swedish troops. The harsh climate took its toll as well, because Charles marched his troops to winter camp inUkraine.[19]
By the time of the decisiveBattle of Poltava, in July 1709, Charles had been wounded, one-third of his infantry was dead, and his supply train had been destroyed. The king was incapacitated by a gunshot wound to the foot and was unable to lead the Swedish forces. With the numbers of Charles's army reduced to some 23,000, with many wounded or involved on the siege of Poltava, his generalCarl Gustav Rehnskiöld had a clearly inferior force to face the fortified and modernized army of Tsar Peter, with some 45,000 men.[20] The Swedish assault ended in disaster, and the king fled south to theOttoman Empire with a small entourage, and set up camp atBender with some 1,000 of hisCaroleans ("Karoliner" in Swedish). The remainder of the army surrendered days later atPerevolochna under Lewenhaupt's command, most of them (including Lewenhaupt himself) spending the rest of their days in Russian captivity.
TheOttomans initially welcomed the Swedish king when he went toAbdurrahman Pasha, commander ofÖzü Castle, as he was about to fall into the hands of the Russian army, and he was able to take refuge in the castle at the last moment. Afterward, he settled inBender at the invitation of its governor,Ağa Yusuf Pasha.
During his stay in the Ottoman Empire, Charles earned the nicknamedemirbaş (literally "iron-head"). This word can mean stubborn or persistent, and it is usually assumed that this is why the Turks called Charles by this nickname. However, the termdemirbaş commonly referred to state-owned articles in general and the furniture, equipment, etc. in state offices in particular. Thus, the nickname may be an ironic reference to Charles's visits to Ottoman government offices over a prolonged period.[24]
Eventually, a small village named Karlstad (Varnița) had to be built near Bender to accommodate the ever-growing Swedish population there.[25]
Gülnuş Sultan convinced her son to declarewar against Russia, as she thought that Charles was a man worth taking a risk for. Later on, the Ottomans and Russians signed theTreaty of the Pruth andTreaty of Adrianople to end the hostilities between them. The treaties dissatisfied the pro-war party supported by King Charles and Stanislaw Poniatowski, who failed to reignite the conflict.
However, the Sultan Ahmed III's subjects in the empire eventually got tired of Charles's scheming. His entourage also accumulated huge debts with Bender merchants. Eventually, "crowds" of townspeople attacked the Swedish colony at Bender and Charles had to defend himself against the mobs and the Ottomanjanissaries involved. This uprising was calledkalabalık (Turkish for crowd) which afterward found a place in Swedish lexicon referring to aruckus. The janissaries did not shoot Charles during theskirmish at Bender, but captured him and put him under house-arrest atDimetoka (nowadaysDidimoticho) and Constantinople. During his semi-imprisonment the King playedchess and studied theOttoman Navy and the naval architecture of the Ottoman galleons. His sketches and designs eventually led to the famous Swedish war shipsJarramas (Yaramaz) andJilderim (Yıldırım).[citation needed]
Meanwhile, Russia and Poland regained and expanded their borders. Great Britain, an adversary of Sweden, defected from its alliance obligations while Prussia attacked Swedish holdings in Germany. Russia occupied Finland (theGreater Wrath 1713–1721). After defeats of the Swedish army, consisting mainly of Finnish troops in the Battle ofHelsinki (1713), the Battle ofPälkäne 1713 and the Battle ofStorkyro 1714, the military, administration and clergymen escaped from Finland, which fell under Russian military regime.[26]
During his five-year stay in the Ottoman Empire, Charles XII corresponded with his sister (and eventual successor), Ulrika Eleonora. According to Ragnhild Marie Hatton, a Norwegian-British historian, in some of those letters Charles expressed his desire for a peace treaty which would be defensible in the future Swedish generations' eyes. However, he emphasized that only a greater respect for Sweden in Europe would enable him to achieve such a peace treaty. Meanwhile, the Swedish Council of State (government) and Estates/Diet (Parliament) tried to keep the beleaguered Sweden somehow organized and independent. Eventually, in the autumn of 1714, their warning letter reached him. In it, those executive and legislative bodies told the absentee King that unless he quickly returned to Sweden, they would independently conclude an achievable peace treaty with Russia, Poland and Denmark. This stark admonition prompted Charles to rush back to Sweden.[27][28][page needed]
Charles traveled back to Sweden with a group of Ottomans, soldiers such as escorts and businessmen to whom he promised to repay his debts during his stay in the Ottoman Empire, but they had to wait several years before that happened. According to the prevailing church law in Sweden at that time, all who lived in the country, but were not members of the Swedish state church, would be baptized. In order for the Jewish and Muslim creditors to avoid this, Charles wrote a "free letter" so that they could practice their religions without being punished. The soldiers chose to remain in Sweden instead of making difficult trips home. They were called "Askersson" (the wordasker in Turkish means soldier).[29] However, there are accounts implying that following the long stay for Charles to repay his debts, they got paid and left the country.[30]
Charles agreed to leave Constantinople and returned toSwedish Pomerania. He made the journey on horseback, riding across Europe in just fifteen days. He traveled across the Habsburg Kingdom of Hungary to Vienna and arrived atStralsund. A medal with Charles on horseback, his long hair flying in the wind, was struck in 1714 to commemorate the speedy ride. It readsWas sorgt Ihr doch? Gott und Ich leben noch. ("What worries you so? God and I live still").[31]
After five years away, Charles arrived in Sweden to find his homeland at war with Russia, Saxony, Hannover, Great Britain and Denmark. Sweden's western enemies attacked southern and western Sweden while Russian forces traveled across Finland to attack the Stockholm district. For the first time, Sweden found itself in a defensive war. Charles's plan was to attack Denmark by striking at her possessions in Norway. It was hoped that by cutting Denmark's Norwegian supply lines the Danes would be compelled to withdraw their forces from Swedish Scania.[citation needed]
Charles invaded Norway in 1716 with a combined force of 7,000 men. He occupied the capital ofChristiania, (modern Oslo), and laid siege to theAkershus fortress there. Due to a lack of heavy siege cannons he was unable to dislodge the Norwegian forces inside. After suffering significant losses of men and materiel, Charles was forced to retreat from the capital on 29 April. In the following mid-May, Charles invaded again, this time striking the border town ofFredrikshald, nowHalden, in an attempt to capture the fortress ofFredriksten. The attacking Swedes came under heavy cannon fire from the fortress and were forced to withdraw when the Norwegians set the town of Fredrikshald on fire. Swedish casualties in Fredrikshald were estimated at 500 men. While the siege at Fredrikshald was underway, the Swedish supply fleet was attacked and defeated byTordenskjold in theBattle of Dynekilen.[32]
In 1718, Charles once more invaded Norway. With a main force of 40,000 men, he again laidsiege to the fortress of Fredriksten overlooking the town of Fredrikshald. Charles was shot in the head and killed during the siege, while he was inspecting trenches. The invasion was abandoned, and Charles's body was returned to Sweden. A second force, underCarl Gustaf Armfeldt, marched againstTrondheim with 10,000 men but was forced to retreat. In the march that ensued, many of the 5,800 remaining menperished in a severe winter storm.
While in the trenches close to the perimeter of the fortress on 30 November (11 DecemberNew Style), 1718, Charles was struck in the head by a projectile and killed. The shot struck the left side of his skull and exited from the right. He died instantly.[34]
The definitive circumstances around Charles's death remain unclear. Despite multiple investigations of the battlefield, Charles's skull and his clothes, it is not known where and when he was hit, or whether the shot came from the ranks of the enemy or from his own men.[35] There are several hypotheses as to how Charles died, though none have strong enough evidence to be deemed true. Although there were many people around the king at the time of his death, there were no known witnesses to the actual moment he was hit. A likely explanation has been that Charles was killed byDano-Norwegians as he was within reach of their guns.[36] There are two possibilities that are usually cited: that he was killed by amusket shot, or that he was killed bygrapeshot from the nearby fortress.
More theories claim he was assassinated: one is that the killer was a Swedish compatriot and asserts that enemy guns were not firing at the time Charles was struck.[36] Suspects in this claim range from a nearby soldier tired of thesiege and wanting to put an end to the war, to an assassin hired by Charles's own brother-in-law, who profited from the event by subsequently taking the throne himself asFrederick I of Sweden, that person being Frederick's aide-de-camp,André Sicre. Sicre confessed during what was claimed to be a state of delirium brought on by fever but later recanted.[36] Others suspect a plot to kill Charles by a group of wealthy Swedes who would benefit from blocking a 17% wealth tax that Charles intended to introduce.[36] TheVarberg Fortress museum displays a lead-filled brass button of Swedish origin that some claim was the projectile that killed the king.
Another odd account of Charles's death comes from Finnish writer Carl Nordling, who states that the king's surgeon, Melchior Neumann, dreamed the king had told him that he was not shot from the fortress but from "one who came creeping".[36]
Charles XII's sarcophagus in Riddarholmen Church, Stockholm
Charles's body has been exhumed on three occasions to ascertain the cause of death; in 1746, 1859 and 1917.[36] The 1859 exhumation found that the wound was in accordance with a shot from the Norwegian fort. In 1917, his head was photographed and x-rayed.Peter Englund asserted in his essay "On the death of Charles XII and other murders"[37] that the mortal wound sustained by the King, with a smaller exit wound than entry wound, would be consistent with being hit by a bullet with a speed not exceeding 150 m/s, concluding that Charles was killed by stray grapeshot from the nearby fortress. A 2022 study by theUniversity of Oulu and theUniversity of Helsinki also found that iron grapeshot was likely to have killed the king, citing evidence from ballistic experiments as well as the absence of lead fragments in Charles's skull.[38][39]
Portrait of King Charles XII (1706) by Johan David Schwartz
Charles never married and fathered no children of whom historians are aware. In his youth, he was particularly encouraged to find a suitable spouse in order to secure the succession, but he would frequently avoid the subject of sex and marriage. Possible candidates includedPrincess Sophia Hedwig of Denmark,Louisa Maria Stuart andPrincess Maria Elisabeth of Holstein-Gottorp – but of the latter he pleaded that he could never wed someone "as ugly as Satan and with such a devilish big mouth".[40] Instead, he made it clear that he would marry only someone of his own choice, and for love rather than dynastic pressures. His lack of mistresses may have been due to a strong religious faith.[41] Charles himself suggested in conversation withAxel Löwen that he actively resisted any match until peace could be secured[42] and was in some sense "married" to the military life.[43][44] But that he was "chaste" occasioned speculation in his lifetime. Much later speculation that he was a hermaphrodite was quelled in 1917 when his coffin was opened and he was shown to have beard growth.[45]
In his conversations with Löwen, he also stated that he did not lack taste for beautiful women, but that he held in his sexual desires for fear that they would get out of control if unchecked, and that if he committed to something like that, it would be forever.[42][46] Some historians suggest that he resisted a marriage with Denmark which could have caused a family rift between those who dynastically favoured Holstein-Gottorp.[47] Historians such as Blanning and Montefiore believe he was in facthomosexual.[48][49] Certainly a letter from Reuterholm suggested that Charles had indicated a closeness to PrinceMaximilian Emanuel of Württemberg-Winnental, whom Charles described as "very pretty". But writing in the 1960s, Hatton argues that Württemberg was very much heterosexual and the relationship is just as likely to have been that of teacher-pupil.[45]
Exceptional for abstaining from alcohol and sex, he felt most comfortable during warfare. Contemporaries report of his seemingly inhuman tolerance for pain and his utter lack of emotion. His brilliant campaigning and startling victories brought his country to the pinnacle of her prestige and power, although the Great Northern War resulted in Sweden's defeat and the end of the empire within years of his own death.[citation needed] In his youth, renowned Russian generalAlexander Suvorov considered Charles XII his hero together withJulius Caesar.[50] Like Charles XII, Suvorov adopted an aggressive style of tactics and campaigning, seemingly inspired by the Swedish king.[51]
Charles's death marked the end of a period of autocratic kingship andabsolutist rule in Sweden, and the subsequentAge of Liberty saw a shift of power from the monarch to the parliament of the estates.[52] Historians of the late 18th and early 19th centuries viewed Charles's death as the result of an aristocratic plot, andGustav IV Adolf, the king who refused to settle withNapoleon Bonaparte, "identified himself with Charles as a type of righteous man struggling with iniquity" (Roberts).[53] Throughout the 19th century'sromantic nationalism Charles XII was viewed as a national hero. He was idealized as a heroic, virtuous young warrior king, and his fight against Peter the Great was associated with the contemporary Swedish-Russian enmity.[54] Examples of theromantic hero idolatry of Charles XII in several genres areEsaias Tegnér's songKung Karl, den unge hjälte (1818),Johan Peter Molin's statue[54] inStockholm'sKungsträdgården (unveiled on 30 November 1868, the 150th anniversary of Charles's death)[55] andGustaf Cederström's paintingKarl XII:s likfärd ("Funeral procession of Charles XII", 1878).[56] The date of Charles's death was chosen by a student association inLund for annual torch marches beginning in 1853.[57]
In his 1901 playKarl XII,August Strindberg broke with the heroization practice by showing an introverted Charles XII in conflict with his impoverished subjects.[58] In the so-called Strindberg feud (1910–1912), his response to the "Swedish cult of Charles XII" (Steene)[59] was that Charles had been "Sweden's ruin, the great offender, a ruffian, the rowdies' idol, a counterfeiter."[60]Verner von Heidenstam however, one of his opponents in the feud, in his bookKarolinerna instead "emphasized the heroic steadfastness of the Swedish people in the somber years of trial during the long-drawn-out campaigns of Karl XII" (Scott).[61]
In the 1930s, the Swedish Nazis held celebrations on the date of Charles XII's death, and shortly before the outbreak ofWorld War II,Adolf Hitler received from Sweden a sculpture of the king at his birthday.[62] In the late 20th century, Swedish nationalists and neo-Nazis had again used 30 November as a date for their ceremonies, however these were regularly interrupted by larger counter-demonstrations and were abandoned.[63]
Apart from being a monarch, the King's interests included mathematics, and anything that would be beneficial to his warlike purposes. He is credited with having invented anoctal numeral system, as well as a more elaborate one with the base 64, which he considered more suitable for war purposes because all the boxes used for materials such asgunpowder were cubic. According to a report by contemporary scientistEmanuel Swedenborg, the King had sketched a model of his thoughts on a piece of paper and handed it to him at their meeting in Lund in 1716. The paper was reportedly still in existence a hundred years later but has since been lost.[64]
Charles fascinated many in his time. In 1731,Voltaire wrote a biography of Charles XII,History of Charles XII. Voltaire portrays the Swedish king in a positive light, against the brutal nature ofPeter the Great.[65] The English man of lettersSamuel Johnson wrote of Charles in his poem "The Vanity of Human Wishes":[citation needed]
On what Foundation stands the warrior's pride, How just his hopes let Swedish Charles decide; A frame of adamant, a soul of fire, No dangers fright him, and no labours tire; O'er love, o'er fear, extends his wide domain, Unconquered lord of pleasure and of pain; No joys to him pacific sceptres yield; War sounds the trump, he rushes to the field; Behold surrounding kings their power to combine, And one capitulate, and one resign; Peace courts his hand, but spreads her charms in vain; "Think nothing gained", he cries, "till nought remain, OnMoscow's walls till Gothic standards fly, And all be mine beneath the polar sky." The march begins in military state, And nations on his eye suspended wait; Stern Famine guards the solitary coast, And Winter barricades the realms of Frost; He comes, not want and cold his course delay; - Hide, blushing Glory, hidePultowa's day: The vanquished hero leaves his broken bands, And shows his miseries in distant lands; Condemned a needy supplicant to wait, While ladies interpose, and slaves debate. But did not Chance at length her error mend? Did no subverted empire mark his end? Did rival monarchs give the fatal wound? Or hostile millions press him to the ground? His fall was destined to a barren strand, A petty fortress, and a dubious hand; He left the name, at which the world grew pale, To point a moral or adorn a tale.
Swedish author Frans G. Bengtsson and Professor Ragnhild Hatton have written biographies of Charles XII of Sweden.[66][67][68]
In 1938,E. M. Almedingen wroteThe Lion of the North: Charles XII, King of Sweden.[69]
He is referred to in the animeLegend of the Galactic Heroes as the Swedish Meteor; whose similarity to Reinhard von Lohengramm may portend the dynasty dying out without a successor.
August Strindberg's 1901 playCarl XII is about him.
The 1925 Swedish filmCharles XII is a two-part silent epic starringGösta Ekman the Elder portraying his reign.
^In this table, the following criteria applies: "Landing" refers to a contested amphibious operation; "skirmish" refers to a limited engagement, either by parts of an army or a smaller force, with minor strategic impact or losses; "battle" refers to a larger engagement in which one or both sides fights in battle-formation to defeat the other army, with considerable strategic impact or losses; "siege" refers to a contested fortification or larger settlement, where any attempts to storm were indecisive; "assault" refers to a contested or uncontested fortification or larger settlement, where an assault played the decisive role; "blockade" refers to an attacker's attempt to starve out the garrison of a fortification or larger settlement; "operation" refers to a pre-planned military operation to seize a larger area of strategic value, in which several minor engagements are fought.
^Contemporary location written at the top; present-day location written inside parentheses.
^Liljegren 2000, p.11, "Den stormäktigste och allernådigste herren, Karl, med Guds nåde, Sveriges, Götes och Vendes konung, storfurste till Finland, hertig uti Skåne, Estland, Livland, Karelen, Bremen, Verden, Stettin, Pommern, Kassuben och Wenden, furste till Rügen, herre över Ingermanland och Wismar, så ock pfalzgreve vid Rhen i Bayern, till Jülich, Kleve och Berg hertig".
^abHerman Lindquist (in Swedish): Historian om Sverige. Storhet och Fall. (History of Sweden. Greatness and fall) ISBN 9172630922 (2000) Nordstedts förlag, Stockholm
^Bearman, P., ed. (2012) [Orig. published in print in 1965]."Demi̇rbas̲h̲".Encyclopaedia of Islam New Edition Online (EI-2 English). Brill.doi:10.1163/1573-3912_islam_SIM_1791. Retrieved29 November 2024.
^Seppo Zetterberg et al. (eds.),A Small Giant (Compendium) of the Finnish History / Suomen historian pikkujättiläinen. 2nd ed., Helsinki, (2003)[ISBN missing]
^Moers, Gerald (2000). "Im Gemeindewald der Geschichte". In Schöning, Udo (ed.).Internationalität nationaler Literaturen. Wallstein. pp. 285–286, fn. 83.
^Scott, Franklin Daniel (1988).Sweden, the nation's history. SIU Press. p. 551.
^Oredsson, Sverker (2000). "Gustav II. Adolf in Geschichtsschreibung und Kult". In Petersson, Rikke (ed.).Damals, als Schweden eine Großmacht war ... LIT. p. 59.
^Velikanov, Vladimir S. (2018).Русский вспомогательный корпус на Польско-Саксонской службе в 1704-1707 и сражение при Фрауштадте [The Russian Auxiliary Corps in Polish-Saxon service in 1704-1707 and the Battle of Fraustadt] (in Russian).Russian Academy of Sciences:Ratnoe delo. Moscow: Русские витязи. p. 42.ISBN978-5-6040158-5-8.
Bain, Robert Nisbet.Charles XII and the Collapse of the Swedish Empire, 1682–1719 (1899)online.
Bengtsson, F. G.The Life of Charles XII, King of Sweden, 1697–1718 (1960). also published asThe sword does not jest. The heroic life of King Charles XII of Sweden (St. Martin's Press 1960).
Browning, Oscar.Charles XII of Sweden (London: Hurst and Blackett, 1899).
Fielding, Henry (Translator),The Military History of Charles XII. King of Sweden, Written by the Express Order of His Majesty, by M. Gustavus Adlerfeld, to Which Is Added, an Exact Account of the Battle of Pultowa, Illustrated with Plans in Three Volumes (London: printed for J. and P. Knapton; J. Hodges; A. Millar; and J. Nourse, 1740). Reprinted by Gale Ecco, Print Editions (2010).
Gade, John (Translator),Charles the Twelfth King of Sweden: Translated from the manuscript of Carl Gustafson Klingspor (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1916). Reprinted by Merkaba Press (2017).
Glaeser, Michael.By Defeating My Enemies: Charles XII of Sweden and the Great Northern War, 1682–1721 (Helion & Co Ltd, 2020).
Hattendorf, J. B., Åsa Karlsson, Margriet Lacy-Bruijn, Augustus J. Veenendaal Jr., and Rolof van Hövell tot Westerflier,Charles XII: Warrior King (Rotterdam: Karwansaray, 2018).
Hone, Michael.Charles XII of Sweden: Versus Peter the Great of Russia (Createspace Independent Pub., 2016).
Liljegren, Bengt (2000).Karl XII : en biografi. Lund: Historiska media.ISBN978-9188930996.
Peterson, Gary Dean.Warrior kings of Sweden: the rise of an empire in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (McFarland, 2007).
Voltaire, Francois Marie Arouet de.History of Charles XII, King of Sweden (translated by W.H. Dilworth, 1760). Reprinted by True World of Books (2020).
Charles XII: on the centenary of his death 1818. The original Swedish text by Esaias Tegner, as well as parallel translations by J.E.D. Bethune (1848) and Charles Harrison-Wallace (1998) and a comment by the latter.
1Also prince of Norway 2Also prince of Poland and Lithuania 3Lost his title due to an unequal marriage 4Not Swedish prince by birth, but created prince of Sweden
