Skånelaholm Castle

Story

Skånelaholm Castle is a castle in Sigtuna Municipality, Stockholm County, Sweden.HistorySkånelaholm lies in a very old cultural landscape and may have been a crown estate manor during the early Middle Ages. The estate is mentioned for the first time in written sources in 1276, when it was sold by King Magnus III to Sko Abbey, a monastery at the site of present-day Skokloster Castle. It remained in the possession of the abbey until the Reformation, when it was confiscated by King Gustav Vasa. It thereafter was a crown estate manor for a long time. In 1618 it was let to Johan Patkull, a nobleman of Livonian extraction in service of the Swedish king (not to be confused with the more notorious Johann Patkul). The estate however remained the property of the crown until 1641 when it was bought by Anders Gyldenklou, who built the presently visible main building. It stayed in the Gyldenklou family until the 1690s, after which the estate changed ownership several times until 1742, when it was acquired by Frans Jennings. Jennings was born on Ireland but settled in Sweden and made a large fortune as a merchant in Stockholm. He was made a member of the Swedish nobility in 1742 and made Skånelaholm Castle the seat of his family. It stayed in the family until 1918. The last private owner of the estate was Herbert and Ing-Marie Rettig, who donated the castle to the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities in order to preserve it. The academy today own and administer the estate.