Talk:Great Northern War

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I would like to propose an expansion of the Norway section

I have been looking at the Norway section and was struck by how differently the Norwegian theatre appears in the article compared with the scholarly literature.

As it currently stands, the section is the briefest of the campaign sections and largely confines itself to the fact that Charles XII did indeed invade Norway and was subsequently killed before Fredriksten. That leaves the reader with a picture of the Norwegian campaigns' role in the war that is centred almost entirely on Charles's death.

One reason I think the section merits another look is that the scholarship presents the 1716 and 1718 campaigns very differently from the way it currently appears in the article. I had assumed Norway occupied a relatively modest place in the war. The size of the forces committed to the invasion alone made that assumption difficult to sustain. Historians also connect Charles' failure in Norway to developments elsewhere in the war, one (among several) being the disappearance of Sweden's capacity for offensive action after 1718.

Summary articles necessarily have to be selective, and it is not my objective to make it lengthy. My concern is that the present treatment may compress the subject to a degree that no longer reflects its treatment in the literature. If that proves to be the case, there may be a question of due weight.

Before spending time gathering material and drafting an expansion, I wanted to raise the issue here. If there have been previous discussions about the scope of the Norway section, or if there are reasons why the subject has been treated so briefly, I would be interested to hear them. Likewise, if there are subsidiary articles or source discussions that should inform any future work on the section, I would be grateful for pointers. Odd Knoter (talk) 09:23, 17 June 2026 (UTC)

One aspect that particularly caught my attention is how often discussions of Norway in the literature intersect with discussions of the Dano-Norwegian fleet, with Norway frequently described as its "backbone". That may raise a broader question of balance within the article. The Russian army features prominently because it was central to the land war. If the fleet occupied a comparable place in the war at sea, then the Norway section may offer a natural point from which to bring that aspect of the conflict more fully into the narrative. Odd Knoter (talk) 09:54, 17 June 2026 (UTC)

Well, we can just move some detail in the lede to the Norway section? There is excessive detail regarding Norway in the lede, and the year 1716 as a whole. LocalF15 (talk) 14:19, 17 June 2026 (UTC)

I concur regarding the lede. On reflection, some of that material probably belongs elsewhere, and moving part of it into the Norway section would seem a sensible revision in its own right.I have also borrowed several works from the university library, so one possibility may be to replace some of the detail currently in the lede with a more general summary of the Norwegian campaigns derived from the literature.That said, I am not yet convinced that simply relocating existing material will fully address the issue. Any information moved from the lede would still need to be integrated with what is already in the Norway section, unless the existing material proves to be redundant or better omitted altogether. My suspicion at present is that the question is not solely one of placement, although I would prefer to reserve judgement until I have worked through the sources more thoroughly.The literature may also point towards aspects of the campaigns that are not currently covered in either the lede or the Norway section. I am still in the process of assessing that.As for the material I added that is not directly related to the Norwegian campaigns, particularly the projected invasion of Sweden from Denmark, where would you suggest placing it? Unless I am mistaken, the operation represented one of the largest instances of Russo-Danish cooperation during the war, involving plans for a maritime landing of a massive force in hopes of dealing Sweden a decisive blow on home territory. It also seems relevant as an illustration of the difficulties the allies encountered in coordinating their efforts, and of the growing tensions between Russia and Denmark that became increasingly apparent during this latter phase of the War. My impression from the literature so far is that those developments have significance extending beyond the immediate fate of the operation itself. Odd Knoter (talk) 18:19, 17 June 2026 (UTC)

1718 figure

@Imonoz In Lagermark's article in Karl XII: till 200-årsdagen av hans död he states that the 60,000 figure excludes officers and other types of troops, unless I read it wrong. Here's the full excerpt:

De trupper, som funnos i Sverige i slutet av Karl XII:s tid, uppgingo till över 60,000 man, oberäknat befäl, spel och ett ett stort antal trossdrängar. Av dessa inföllo i sunnanfjällska Norge eller lågo i dess närhet omkring 40,000 man och i nordan-fjällska 7,500. LocalF15 (talk) 18:27, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

According to Petri in his article:

sammanlagda styrka uppgick till nära 65,000 man , fördelade med omkring 36,000 man därav 12,700 ryttare på gränsen till södra Norge och omkring 9,000 man i Trondhjems län. I Skåne, Halland och Bohuslän stodo sammanlagt 14,000 man tryggande mot anfall från Danmark, under det att 3,300 man voro kvarlämnade i Stockholm och resten, 3,000 man, utgjorde strategisk reserv. Stridskrafternas gruppering på hösten 1718 innebar en koncentration av 59,000 man mot Danmark-Norge, under det att endast något mer än 3,000 man kvarlämnats till östra kustens försvar. De åtgärder, som anbefallts för de vid västra gränsen anlagda proviant och furagemagasinen, uteslöto varje tanke på operationernas omläggning i östlig riktning, innan nästa års skörd var bärgad. LocalF15 (talk) 18:29, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

@LocalF15 Makes sense. And where does the figure of 70,000 come from? Nordmann? What does it include? For the sake of consistency, let me check the sources to see if the other figures includes officers or not, and I'll reach back to you. Imonoz (talk) 02:03, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, Nordmann cites another article of Petri (which I do not have access to) and Sverige och Europa 1716-1718, though I'm not sure how citations in French work. This is the footnote on page 139-140: Le chiffre donné pour les milices varie de 25.000 à 30.000, ce qui donnerait pour la Suède une armée de 65 à 70.000 hommes en 1718, à peu près la force de l'armée prussienne : voir JÄGERSKIÖLD, op. cit., pp. 284-285 et G. PETRI, Karl XII:s. Krigföring och utrikespolitik, Kungl. Krigsvetenskaps akademiens Handlingar, Stockholm, 1934, in-8°, p. 179. Le système de l'indelta subsistera en Suède jusqu'en 1873. Les officiers, en recevant leur brevet entraient en possession d'une portion de terre qu'ils étaient libre d'affer. By militia I assume he refers to the allotted troops as he does in other works.

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LocalF15 (talk) 09:19, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

There is also another source I've found, which gives another estimate of 60,000-70,000. LocalF15 (talk) 09:32, 1 July 2026 (UTC)

@LocalF15 : Thanks. Apparently, Martinsson doesn't specify whether the figure includes officers or not. However, on page 139 of the Great Northern War Compendium, he do say that the Swedish army of over 37,000 provincial troops and 23,600 enlisted troops at the outbreak of the war does not include them, so my guess is neither does the 60,000 for 1718 - nor the 40,000 for 1716 or the 45,000 towards the end of the war, for that matter. I can't find where exactly Nordmann speaks of the milita in his other work you provided, although, by allotted troops, are you sure he's not referring to the regular lines? According to Haintz, in his König Karl XII. von Schweden (volume 3, p. 153; footnote 3) the figures of 60,000 and 70,000 stems from Görtz and Stiernhöök, respectively. Malmström regards them as uncertain in his article in the Historisk tidskrift of 1886 (Volume 6, p. 75). I take it you can access them both, otherwise tell me. As to what figures to include, I'd recommend either "60,000 to 70,000", as is currently stated - 60,000 is commonly used in literature about the war AFAIK - or Petri's assessment of near 65,000. What do you think? Imonoz (talk) 02:08, 2 July 2026 (UTC)