STOCKHOLM, the capital of Sweden, on the east coast, not far south of the junction of the Baltic Sea and the Gulf of Bothnia. The population of Stockholm in 1751 was 61,040 in 1856, 93,070; in 1880, 176,875; in 1900, 300,624; in 1933, 521,618.
Origin.—Before Stockholm arose, Bjorko, Sigtuna and Upp sala were places of great importance. Bjorkii ("the isle of birches"), by foreign authors called Birka, was a kind of capital where the king lived occasionally at least; history speaks of its relations with Dorestad in the Netherlands, and the extensive refuse heaps of the old city, as well as the numerous sepulchral monuments, show that the population must have been large. But though situated at a central point on Lake Malar, it was destroyed, apparently before the beginning of the 11th century (exactly when or by whom is uncertain) ; and it never recovered. Sigtuna, lying on the shore of a far-reaching northern arm of Lake Malar, also a royal residence and the seat of the first mint in Sweden, where English workmen were employed by King Olaf at the begin ning of the iith century, was destroyed in the 12th century. Stock holm was founded by Birger Jarl, it is said, in or about 2255, at a time when pirate fleets were less common than they had been, and the government was anxious to establish commercial relations with the towns which were now beginning to flourish on the southern coast of the Baltic. The city was originally founded as a fortress on the island of Stadholm. The castle was erected at the north eastern corner, and the city was surrounded with walls having for tified towers on the north and south. It came to be called Stock holm ("the isle of the log," Latin Holmia, German Holm); the true explanation of the name is not known. During the middle ages the city developed steadily, and grew to command all the foreign commerce of the midlands and north, but it was not until modern times that Stockholm became the capital of Sweden. The me diaeval kings visited year by year different parts of the king dom.
Situation.—Stockholm is famed for the beauty and physical characteristics of its situation. The coast is here thickly fringed
with islands (the skargdrd), through which a main channel, the Saltsjo, penetrates from the open sea, which is nearly 4o m. from the mainland. A short stream with a fall normally so slight as to be sometimes reversed by the tide, drains the great lake Malar into the Saltsjo. The scenery of both the lake and the skargdrd is similar, the numerous islands low, rocky, and generally wooded, the waterways between them narrow and quiet. The city stands at the junction of the lake and the sea, occupying both shores and the small islands intervening. From the presence of these islands a fanciful appellation for this city is derived—"the Venice of the North"; but actually only a small part is insular. There are five main divisions, Gamla staden, old town, ancient nucleus of the city, properly confined to Stadholmen (the city island) which divides the stream from Malar into two arms, Norrstrom and SOderstrom; Norrmalm on the north shore of the channel. and Sodermalm on the south.