The Hanseatic towns send letters to Sigurd Havtoresson
HR I,1 nr. 356 § 9 · 1365 Mrz. 27 · Stralsund
What the letter says
At the Hanseatic diet in Stralsund on 27 March 1365 envoys met from Lübeck, Rostock, Wismar, Kolberg, Stralsund, Kiel, Stettin and Greifswald. Paragraph 9 of the minutes states that the men of Rostock were given letters to take to Sir Sigurd Havtoresson and to the aldermen of the merchants in Bergen. What the letters said is not stated.
The letter in modern English
[Extract.] In the year of the Lord 1365, on the Thursday after Laetare Sunday [27 March], the council envoys of the maritime towns were gathered in Stralsund [the names of the envoys from Lübeck, Rostock, Wismar, Kolberg, Stralsund, Kiel, Stettin and Greifswald are omitted], and they dealt with the articles written below. [...] 9. Further, letters were given to the men of Rostock for Sir Sigurd Havtoresson and for the aldermen of the merchants in Bergen.
Original text
Anno Domini 1365 feria quinta post dominicam Letare nuncii consulares civitatum maritimarum [...] in Sundis congregati, infrascriptos articulos pertractabant. [...] 9. Item littere dabantur Rozstochensibus ad dominum Zyffridum Hafdorn et mercatorum oldermannos in Bergen.
Background
Sigurd Havtoresson (d. c. 1392) of Sudreim was a grandson of King Håkon V through his mother and married to Ingebjørg Erlingsdatter, who inherited Giske from her father Erling Vidkunsson. A recess is the record of a Hanseatic diet, the meeting where the towns' envoys negotiated and passed resolutions. In the spring of 1365 the towns were negotiating peace with the Danish king Valdemar Atterdag, and King Håkon VI of Norway had married Valdemar's daughter Margaret in 1363. The same record mentions letters from the kings of Norway and Sweden about the redemption of the castle of Borgholm. That the towns wrote directly to Sigurd suggests that they counted him among the most powerful men in Norway, and the following year they said so plainly (HR I,1 nr. 383). The name is written «Zyffridum Hafdorn» in the record.
People: Sigurd Havtoresson