Where He Goes for Food and Where He Lodges : Social Lives, Non-Academic Work and Living Arrangements of Students in Uppsala in the Late 1690s

Sammanfattning

This thesis examines the everyday activities of students at Uppsala University through court material for the years 1697–1699. By asking what students did, with whom and where, it seeks to provide answers as to the importance of students’ geographical origin, what roles students played other than that of the academic trainee and to what degree students were separated from the rest of the town. Answering these questions, in turn, provides insight into the identity of early modern Swedish students. The thesis consciously adopts a wide scope of activities to provide a more complete picture of early modern students. Students’ networks are found to have been largely devoid of townspeople, except in activities regarding marriage and sex or economic arrangements, indicating a strong but not total separation of students from the town. Geographical origin and nation memberships of students are found to have been important, but not decisive, in structuring students’ networks, and another important factor is found in the students’ familial connections. Through their activities, students are found to have taken on various roles aside from that of the academic trainee, some of which can be connected to a wider definition of a student identity, while others were entirely disconnected from their roles as students. As a whole, the thesis illustrates several ways in which students’ identities were based on attributes other than their student status, and suggests that their identities were less distinct than described in previous literature on Swedish early modern students.