Åbo Bloodbath [SEP] point in time
Åbo Bloodbath
The Åbo Bloodbath () of 10 November 1599 was a public execution in the Finnish town of Turku (Åbo), then part of the Kingdom of Sweden, in the context of the War against Sigismund and the Club War. Sweden was by then in the final phase of a civil war, with one faction supporting king Sigismund III Vasa, who also was king and Grand Duke of Poland-Lithuania, and another faction supporting duke Charles of Södermanland, the later Charles IX, Sigismund's paternal uncle.
(Kurk), Stålarm commanded the forces in Finland, but was taken prisoner after Charles' forces had conquered the loyalist strongholds there in September and October 1599. Along with other opposition members, Stålarm was sentenced to death by a jury assembled from thirty-seven of Charles' followers in Åbo, but together with Kurck was spared from decapitation during the subsequent Åbo bloodbath of 10 November. Instead, Stålarm and Kurck were transferred first to Stockholm and later to Linköping, where they were again tried and sentenced to death by a