Charles XII, King of Sweden

CARLO XII, king of SVEZIA. — Son of Carlo XI and Ulrica Eleonora of Denmark, born on 17 June 1682, killed during the siege of Fredrikshald (Norway) on 30 November 1718. Having assumed direct power at the age of fifteen, after a regency of seven months (April–November 1697), shortened by the will of the regents and the Riksdag, he ruled according to the strictest absolutism. Attacked (1699) in his possessions beyond the Baltic by Denmark, Russia, and Poland-Saxony, which had joined forces to divide them among themselves, he defeated them separately, with audacious and ingenious tactics: first the Danes, then the Poles, and finally the Russians (Narva, 30 November 1700). Through a fatal strategic error, however, he wished to complete the conquest of Poland, thereby leaving Peter of Russia seven precious years in which to recover. Pursuing Augustus II into Saxony, he compelled him to conclude the Peace of Altranstädt (14 September 1706) and to recognize Stanislao Leszczyński; but he then turned against Russia with only 34,000 men, losing a large part of them in fruitless advances and the remainder in the defeat suffered at Poltava (8 August 1709). Having crossed, wounded, into Turkish territory, he was detained there, voluntarily half a prisoner, for five years, deluded by the hope of turning the Turks against the Russians. Returning to Svezia (November 1714), he resumed feverish preparations for war and administrative reforms. A strict Protestant, he had a translation of the Bible published (1703), a work begun under his father; and, reviving Sweden’s traditional role as protector of Lutheranism, he wrested concessions from the emperor in favor of the Lutherans of Austrian Silesia.