Kristianopel

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Kristianopel

Coat of arms

Country

Sweden

Municipality

Karlskrona Municipality

Founded

Kristianopel is a village (pop. 81) in Karlskrona Municipality in the southeastern Swedish province of Blekinge.

[edit] History of the town

Kristianopel is located in the easternmost part of Blekinge, which was the easternmost part of Denmark in beginning of the 17th century. The town of Avaskär, located just a few hundred metres north of present-day Kristianopel, was too difficult to defend from Swedish attacks. The Danish king Christian IV had a fortress built south of it in 1603 and named it after his newborn son - Christian, or Kristian, with Danish spelling. The suffix '-opel' was given to give the town a cosmopolitan ring similar to Constantinople. Construction of the town was completed in 1606 and held approximately 700 inhabitants.

During the Kalmar War prince Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden took the town with a small force on June 25, 1611 and destroyed the supplies the Danes had stored there. The town was burned down and the church was demolished. A new Church of the Holy Trinity was rebuilt between 1618 and 1624.

The city privileges of Avaskär and neighboring Lyckå were transferred to Kristianopel in 1622, and the town was fortified in 1637.

Kristianopel's significance as a frontier fortress vanished when Blekinge became Swedish as a consequence of the treaty of Roskilde in 1658 and in 1676 the fortress' equipment was transferred to Karlshamn. September 25 that same year the abanadoned fortress was taken by Danish lieutenant colonel Lützow, who began shoring up the partially demolished fortifications and made Kristianopel a strongpoint for the Snapphane guerilla. Lützow was forced to yield Kristianopel on February 22, 1677, whereupon the fortress was razed to the ground and the burghers commanded to move to other towns. The town was declared dangerous to the security of Sweden, and in 1678 an order decreed that no building be left standing in Kristianopel. The remaining inhabitants were resettled in Ronneby, Växjö, and Karlshamn.