Swenske Songer eller Wisor (First Swedish Hymnal)
Swenske songer eller wisor
A verified public-domain excerpt for this text is still being set. The folio is catalogued and linked below; an original Sub Rosa rendering will follow.
What it is
The first preserved hymnal in the Swedish language, containing 47 hymns published in 1536, largely anonymous but attributed chiefly to Olavus Petri — the reformer installed in Stockholm by King Gustav I Vasa (founder of the Vasa dynasty) after the Diet of Västerås declared Sweden Lutheran in 1527. Petri edited three successive Swedish hymnals (1526, 1530, 1536), and this 1536 collection represents the settled form of Swedish Lutheran congregational song under Vasa patronage. Many hymns are translations of Latin and German originals. The hymnal was reprinted repeatedly until replaced by the Uppsala Psalmboken of 1645.
Why it still matters
Several of these 16th-century Swedish hymns remain in modern Swedish hymnals; their direct vernacular piety is accessible to any Lutheran or Protestant seeking Reformation-era congregational song.
Kept alongside
Cantus Sororum (Birgittine Office of Our Lady)
Ordo Cantus Sororum Ordinis Sancti Salvatoris
The Cantus Sororum is the distinctive divine office of the Birgittine sisters, constructed by Birgitta and Petrus of Skänninge as a weekly Marian office cycle based on lessons from Birgitta's Sermo Angelicus. It is the only known medieval liturgical repertory composed specifically for performance by women. The mother-house at Vadstena Abbey — founded and endowed by the Folkunga King Magnus Eriksson in 1346 — was the original home of this office, and approximately 22 notated manuscripts survive from Vadstena and daughter-houses. The Birgittine Database (birgittine.org) catalogs 3,600 entries from these manuscripts covering c.1500–1881.
Den svenska psalmboken 1695 (The Carolina Psalter)
Den svenska psalmboken
The first official hymnal of the Church of Sweden, known as the Carolina Psalter after King Charles XI (Carolina = Charles), published in 1695. Jesper Swedberg — court chaplain to Charles XI — was its driving force, and the psalter was accepted by the king. Containing around 482 hymns in Swedish along with a few in Latin, it found its way into nearly every Swedish home and remained the state church's official hymnal until 1819 (and in Finland until 1886). Swedberg later served as bishop of Skara and father of the mystic Emanuel Swedenborg. The 1697 koralbok (music edition) accompanied it.
Sermo Angelicus
The Sermo Angelicus consists of 21 lessons — three for each day of the week — said by Birgitta to have been dictated by an angel and addressed to the Virgin Mary's role in salvation history. These lessons formed the lections for the Matins of the Birgittine sisters' distinctive office at Vadstena and all daughter-houses. The text was composed in Rome c.1353–1354 and became the theological heart of the Birgittine liturgy endowed by the Folkunga royal house. The Museum of the Bible holds an illuminated Birgittine manuscript containing the Sermo Angelicus as part of the sisters' office book.