Snapphane

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The Snapphane Movement was a pro-Danish guerilla organization that fought against the Swedes in the Scanian War of the 17th century.

The name Snapphane, which was used as a pejorative term by the Swedes to describe the pro-Danish rebels, was originally a word for gangs of bandits that lived in the woods. When Scanian peasants started to organize into battle groups that fought the Swedes with guerilla methods, they became called Snapphane too.

The Swedes fought the Snapphane brutally, and if a Snapphane was captured, he was usually executed and the corpse was impaled and shown where the locals could see it and be intimidated to obedience. Another common method was to crush the prisoners limbs under a rolling wagon called "rådbråkning" (Breaking wheel).

See also snaphance.