Sweden

Sweden is a kingdom on the Scandinavian Peninsula, between Norway and Finland, facing Denmark across the sea to the south. Stockholm is the capital, and Swedish became the official language by law on 1 July 2009, beside five recognized minority languages, among them Finnish and Sámi. At 449,964 km² (173,732 sq mi) it is the largest country in Northern Europe, and forests cover about 65% of the land.

Birka, a trading town of the Viking Age, stood near today's Stockholm from around 750 until about 975. A single Swedish state took shape in the late 10th century, and in 1397 Sweden joined Denmark and Norway in the Kalmar Union. Nobles made Gustav Vasa king on 6 June 1523, now the national day, and he took the country into the Protestant Reformation. Victories in the Thirty Years' War under Gustavus Adolphus made Sweden a great power around the Baltic until the Great Northern War. Finland was lost to Russia in 1809, and the campaign that forced Norway into a union in 1814 was the last war Sweden fought; that union lasted until 1905.

Under the Instrument of Government of 1974 the monarch has only ceremonial duties, and the 349-member Riksdag holds legislative power. Sweden stayed neutral through the Cold War, joined the European Union in 1995, voted against the euro in 2003 and joined NATO in 2024 after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The currency is the krona, issued by the Riksbank, founded in 1668.

Timber, hydropower and iron ore support an export economy built on engineering, with firms such as Volvo, Ericsson, Electrolux, Scania, IKEA and H&M. Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite, founded the prizes named after him. Selma Lagerlöf won the Nobel Prize in Literature, Astrid Lindgren wrote Pippi Longstocking, and Ingmar Bergman and Greta Garbo made their names in film. Midsummer and Saint Lucia's Day on 13 December are holidays of its own, and the Tre Kronor ice hockey team won Olympic gold in 1994 and 2006.