Letter of safe conduct for Ivar Ogmundsson and Sigurd Havtoresson
DN 7/164 · 13 February 1339 · Skara
What the letter says
In Skara on 13 February 1339 King Magnus Eriksson grants the knight Ivar Ogmundsson and Sigurd Havtoresson, each with 30 companions, free safe conduct to come to him, negotiate and leave again when they wish. The safe conduct is valid until Michaelmas, 29 September 1339. Four Swedish lawmen and six councillors promise together with the king that the safe conduct shall be kept.
The letter in modern English (excerpt)
Magnus, by God's grace King of Sweden, Norway and Scania, sends all who see this letter eternal greeting in the Lord. All shall know that with this letter we give and grant the noble men Sir Ivar Ogmundsson, knight, with thirty companions, and Sigurd Havtoresson with as many, or each of them separately, full security and safe and free conduct (a promise of free passage). They may come to us as often, when and where they wish, stay with us, negotiate and plead their case with us, and freely depart from us wherever they wish. The safe conduct applies on our own behalf and that of all others from now until the coming Michaelmas (29 September), without any kind of treachery or false cunning. We, Knut Jonsson, lawman in Östergötland, Knut Magnusson, lawman in Västergötland, Gustav Tunasson, lawman in Värmland, and Ulf Gudmarsson, lawman in Närke, and Nikolaus Abjørnsson, Knut Folkesson, Karl Neskonungsson, Ulf Abjørnsson, Gisle Elinasson and Karl Tukasson, councillors of our lord the king, furthermore firmly promise in good faith, together with him, that this security and this safe conduct shall be kept inviolate. As testimony of our promise our seals are hung on this letter. Given in Skara in the year of the Lord 1339, on the Saturday after Ash Wednesday.
Original text (excerpt)
Magnus dei gratia rex Svechie, Norvegie et Skanie, omnibus presens scriptum cernentibus salutem in domino sempiternam. Noverint universi, quod nos nobilibus viris, domino Jvaro Oghmundason, militi, cum triginta sequacibus, et Sighurdo Hafthorerson cum totidem, vel eorum alteri, plenam securitatem ac securum et salvum conductum, quotiens, quando et ubi voluerint, ad nostram presentiam veniendi, nobiscum moram tractandi ac placitandi, ac a nobis quocumque voluerint libere recedendi, pro nobis omni
Background
Sigurd Havtoresson of Sudreim was a grandson of King Håkon V through his mother and later married Ingeborg Erlingsdatter, who in 1354 received Giske from her father Erling Vidkunsson. Ivar Ogmundsson was another of the powerful Norwegian magnates. Safe conduct (lejde) was a promise of free and safe passage, so that a man could meet the king without being arrested. That they needed safe conduct, and that Swedish councillors had to stand surety for it, shows that there was a serious conflict between the king and a group of Norwegian magnates at the end of the 1330s. Magnus Eriksson was king of both Norway and Sweden, and many Norwegian magnates disliked that he governed much from Sweden. The letter belongs together with Bishop Håkon's letters to Bjarne Erlingsson from the same years, which show that Erling Vidkunsson's circle was also in an unsettled position. What the negotiations concretely concerned is not clear from the letter.
People: Sigurd Havtoresson