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The relative locations of New Netherland (in magenta) and New Sweden (in blue) in North America with modern state boundaries and postal abbreviations shown. By the middle of the 17th century, Sweden had reached its greatest territorial extent and was one of the great powers of Europe; it was the stormaktstiden ("age of greatness" or "great power period"). [3]
Swedish overseas colonies. Sweden established colonies in the Americas in the mid-17th century, including the colony of New Sweden (1638–1655) on the Delaware River in what is now Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, as well as two possessions in the Caribbean during the 18th and 19th centuries.
New Sweden was a Swedish colony founded by Peter Minuit in 1638 along the Delaware River. The colony, centered on Fort Christina, thrived for a number of years under the administration of Johan Printz, attracting Swedish and Finnish settlers who engaged in farming and fur trading with the Lenape and Susquehannock.
Fort Christina, also called Fort Altena, was the first Swedish settlement in North America and the principal settlement of the New Sweden colony. Built in 1638 and named after Christina, Queen of Sweden, it was located approximately 1 mi (1.6 km) east of the present-day downtown Wilmington, Delaware, at the confluence of the Brandywine River and the Christina River, approximately 2 mi (3 km ...
A modern map which approximates the relative size and location of the settled areas of New Netherland and New Sweden, which was never officially recognized by the Dutch Republic In the 1667 Treaty of Breda ending the Second Anglo-Dutch War when the Dutch exchanged their claims on their North American colony of New Netherlands for the status quo ...
Map of New Sweden c. 1650 Seal of the Swedish governor of Saint Barthélemy, 1784–1878. By the middle of the 17th century, the Swedish Empire had reached its greatest territorial extent. The Swedes sought to extend their influence by creating an agricultural and fur trading colony to bypass French, English and Dutch merchants. The charter ...
New Sweden was incorporated into New Netherland in 1655, and ceased to be an official territory of the Realm of Sweden. However, many Swedish and Finnish colonists remained and were allowed some political and cultural autonomy. A victim of one of the earliest recorded murders in North America was an immigrant from Sweden.
The historian H. A. Barton has suggested that the greatest significance of New Sweden was the strong and long-lasting interest in America that the colony generated in Sweden. America was seen as the standard-bearer of liberalism and personal freedom, and became an ideal for liberal Swedes.