Abstract
During the Middle Ages, Stockholm was firmly connected to the economic interests of the Hanseatic League, and a majority of the merchant ships arriving and leaving had Lübeck or Danzig as their home ports. As the importance of the trading cities of northern Germany waned and they lost market share to the fast growing ports of the European north western, Atlantic coast - and foremost of them, Amsterdam - the trade of Stockholm followed this development during the first half of the 17th century. The trade and population of the Swedish capital grew four to five times during these 50 years and the economic means generated by the trade of strategic goods such as iron, copper, tar, and pitch helped the Swedish government to finance the many wars fought on the European continent. Amsterdam came to play an important role in financing the wars. The Swedish government used the most modern capital market in the world in different ways to release funds to the often-empty state treasury. Dutch economic interests in the mean time deeply penetrated the Swedish market and society in the 1600s. In this respect one dependency was merely exchanged for another.