Gustav III of Sweden

Who was Gustav III of Sweden?

Gustav III was King of Sweden from 1771 until his death.

He was the eldest son of King Adolph Frederick and Queen Louise Ulrika, who was a sister of Frederick the Great, King of Prussia.

He was a vocal opponent of what he saw as abuses by the nobility of a permissiveness established by parliamentarian reforms that had been worked out since the death of Charles XII. He seized power from the government in a coup d'état in 1772, ending the Age of Liberty and venturing into a campaign to restore royal autocracy. This was completed by the Union and Security Act in 1789, sweeping away most of the last pretences of Riksdag rule. As a bulwark of enlightened despotism, he spent considerable public funds on cultural ventures: this contributed among his critics to controversy about his reign. Attempts to seize Norway with Russian assistance, and then to recapture the Baltic provinces by a war against Russia, were unsuccessful, although much of Sweden's former military might was restored.