Sofia Gustafsson
Senior Associate Professor
I’m a senior associate professor in history. My research mainly revolves around laws and medieval urban history. I’ve also done research on the early Lutheran
perceptions by studying the priest Joen Petri Klints interpretation of omens.
Biography
I obtained my PhD in history at Stockholm University in 2007. During the years 2007-2009 I was a postdoc at Institut für vergleichende Städtegeschichte at Universität Münster, Germany and at the History department at Stockholm University. I’ve been employed at Linköping University since late 2009 and I’ve been a senior associate professor in history since 2023.
Publications
2024
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2020
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2018
Research
Medieval towns
My main research field is medieval urban history. My dissertation was a study on town administration and political culture in late medieval Swedish towns in a European context. I’ve since then deepened my studies on the same theme, often with Stockholm as example, and published texts about the town council, the large council and the relationship between Germans and Swedes in fourteenth century Stockholm.
My research has also concerned town laws and local ordinances. I’ve also published an article on the legal status of visitors to Stockholm in the late Middle Ages.
I’ve studied the “Stockholm bloodbath” in 1520, where I’ve discovered that officeholding was decisive for which Stockholm burghers were executed. I’m also writing about how the independence of Stockholm diminished in the reign of Gustav Vasa in the sixteenth century.
Interpretation of omens in the sixteenth century
I’ve spent several years researching a Swedish book of omens, which is one of the most remarkable manuscripts in Sweden from the sixteenth century. It is a 400-page thick folio, created by the priest Joen Petri Klint. It includes stories of comets, halo phenomena, deformities in humans and animals, sights of fighting troops in the sky and other signs believed to be omens of coming misery and disaster. The book also contains hundreds of colourful drawings which illustrate the phenomena.
The manuscript and its context give information on the early Lutheran conceptual world. Klint was in good company of the learned men of the time in his interpretations of signs as connected to politics, religion, and the development of society. I’ve published a monograph on Klints book of omens, transcribed the manuscript and done a biographical study on Klint.
Teaching
At Linköping University, I’m a main supervisor of PhD student Karin Ehrenkrona and assistant supervisor of PhD student Pontus Larsen. I’m also assistant supervisor of PhD student Louise Jakobsson at Karlstad University.
Some of the courses I teach at Linköping University are History 1 (both as separate course and on the Secondary School Teacher Programme), Sweden and the Swedes (for exchange students), Working with Historical Archives (in collaboration with the National Archives), and Cultural Heritage: History, Practice, and Values.