Äldre Geometriska Historical Maps of Sweden

Sweden Historical Maps of Sweden  Äldre Geometriska Historical Maps of Sweden



During the 1600's the kingdom of Sweden was in a period of territorial expansion. The government needed to pay for the “costs of war.” The government decided to assess the farms and natural resources for taxation. To accomplish this, all the farms and villages would be surveyed to create detailed maps. These maps show places of residence, locations of mills, and other economic interests. It was also hoped that abandoned farms or lands could be revitalized and active farms could be expanded.

Either way the goal was to increase tax revenue. Before 1645 the kingdom of Sweden included Tornedalen in the North, Finland to the East, and Småland in the South. By 1660 the kingdom expanded to include Bohuslän, Skåne, and Blekinge. The maps were bound into books, which became a tax record known as visual jordeböcker.

It should be noted, that not all villages and farms were mapped, but between 1630 and 1690 about 12,000 maps were created. These maps have been scanned and are available through Riksarkivets website at: Sveriges äldsta storskaliga kartor. The database is called: Sveriges äldsta storskaliga kartor – database.

How to find Äldre Geometriska Historical Maps of Sweden
1. Click on the link Visa kartsamlingar

2. Find the heading for the County or Province of interest. You will see one or more links under the heading for the County (län) or Province (landskap), district (Härad = hd), or parish (socken = sn). Click on the link for the time period and area of interest.
 * If you don’t know what Härad that the parish you are working in belonged to, see the film notes for your parish in the FamilySearch Catalog. If you are using ArkivDigital, click on the Archive info tab after choosing a parish.


 * If you need information about Provinces in Sweden see the Provinces in Sweden page.

4. Use the navigation pointers on the right or left side of the screen, or the drop down at the top center area to browse the images.


 * You can zoom in or out by using the + or – symbol. Click (and hold down) and drag the image to move it around the screen.

Alternative Searches
From the main page at Riksarkivet Geometriska you can choose to search the locations or the text on the maps using different tools such as:

Kartsök

Will show the coordinates for the places of residence, farm names, mills, or churches in Google Maps

Sök i kartans orginaltext och visa på karta

As all of the text on the maps have been transcribed, you can search the text on the maps for places or even people’s names. To find the transcribed text, look for the last sentence "Transkriberade kartakter för varje volym visas och laddas ner här" and click on the last word "här". At this point, you will see a list of files with dates, times, and a letter code e.g. C4. The reference C4 corresponds to a collection on the Visa kartsamlingar page, in this case the maps for C4 (Villåttinge hd) 1636–1638. Now going back to the file directory page, find the letter code and click on it. Scroll down to the bottom of the list and click on the link that has the word Register.html. From here, you will see the names of parishes and associated page numbers. Use the page number to find the map in the area of interest. The page number refers to the original page number, not the image number (Bild number) at the top, center of the navigation pane.