Rutger Macklean

Rutger Macklean
Born	July 28, 1742 Ström mansion, Hjärtum parish, Bohuslän, Sweden
Died	January 14, 1816 (aged 73) Svaneholm Castle, Skurup parish, Sweden
Title	Friherre
Parent(s)	Rutger Macklean
Relatives	David Makeléer, grandfather[1]

Rutger Macklean (28 July 1742 - 14 January 1816) also Rutger Macklier II, was a driving figure in the reorganisation of agricultural lands in Sweden that made possible large-scale farming with its economy of scale.^[2][3][4]

Biography

The family name was originally spelled "Mackleir". In 1783, one year after Rutger Mackleir inherited Svaneholm Castle in Skåne from his uncle Gustaf Julius Coyet (1717-1782), the name was changed to "Mackeleir" and so remained until Mackeleir and his brother were ennobled, when it became "Macklier" again. During the Anglo-Saxon pre-romantic era it was changed again, to "Macklean".^[3] Sources conflict as to whether the Mackleirs were descended from Hector Og Maclean of Scotland or were from Holland.^[3][5][6]

Macklean was born on 28 July 1742 at Ström mansion, Hjärtum parish, Bohuslän to Baron Rutger Macklier (1688–1748) and Vilhelmina Eleonora Coyet.^[5][7] He had a brother, Baron David Maclean.^[8] At the age of 40, in 1782, Rutger was an army Captain in the forces of the Swedish Empire. In that year he inherited Svaneholm Castle and its estate of 8500 acres from his mother’s family. In accordance with feudal procedures of tenant land-right inheritance the manor had been divided, in the course of its existence, into hundreds of narrow strip allotments. Some 40 tenant farmers live in four villages on the manor. Each tenant had the right to farm 60 to 70 strips of land, but only two thirds of a tenant's strips were usually close enough to his village that he had time to farm them; his farther strips went unused.^[2]

Macklean had his land surveyed and redivided into 75 farms. A new cottage and barn were built on each plot, roads were built to connect the plots, and a tenant who wanted to stay had to agree to move from his village to one of the newly surveyed plots. Within ten years Svaneholm had become a model of agricultural efficiency; the tenant farmers who stayed found they could raise more crops on half as much land. Macklean's land redistribution procedures were introduced into law in Scania in 1802, and land reform legislation for the country as a whole followed.^[9] In 1811 a mob threatened his life, and he died in 1816.^[10]

Ancestors

Baron Rutger Macklean's ancestors in three generations

Baron Rutger Macklean,	Father: Baron Rutger Macklier	Paternal Grandfather: David Makeléer	Paternal Great-Grandfather: John Hans Makeléer
			Paternal Great-grandmother: Anna Gubbertz
		Paternal Grandmother: Eleonora Elisabet von Ascheberg	Paternal Great-Grandfather: Rutger von Ascheberg
			Paternal Great-Grandmother:
	Mother: Vilhelmina Eleonora Coyet	Maternal Grandfather: possibly Gustaf Adolf Coyet I	Maternal Great-Grandfather:
			Maternal Great-Grandmother:
		Maternal Grandmother: possibly Bernhardine Morass	Maternal Great-grandfather:
			Maternal Great-Grandmother:

References

1. James Noël MacKenzie MacLean (1971). The Macleans of Sweden. The Ampersand. ISBN 0-900161-00-0.
2. Scott, Franklin D. (1988). Sweden: the nation's history. Southern Illinois University Press. pp. 289–291. ISBN 0-8093-1513-0.
3. "Rutger Macklean". Svaneholm. Retrieved 2009-04-15. Rutgers family name was Mackleir until 1783, one year after he had taken over Svaneholm Castle from his uncle Gustaf Adolf Coyet. His grandmother was a daughter of Rutger von Ascheberg, one of king Carl XI's kinsmen, who owned the Ström mansion. His father Rutger Macklier was one of King Karl XII's warriors from Holofzin, Poltava and Tobolsk. ...
4. "Rutger Macklean". Nationalencyklopedin (in Swedish). Retrieved 2009-12-24. Macklean [makli:´n] (före 1783 Macklier), Rutger, 1742–1816, friherre, politiker och jordbruksreformator. Macklean kritiserade Gustav III och förvisades till sitt skånska gods Svaneholm. Här samlades från 1783 varje bondgårds ägor i en enhet, enskifte. Macklean upphävde dagsverksskyldigheten samt införde moderna redskap och varierande växtföljd. Han lade grunden för beslut om enskifte 1803–07 och laga skifte 1827.
5. Svenska män och kvinnor (in Swedish). 1942. Föräldrar: översten friherre Rutger Makeléer och Vilhelmina Eleonora Coyet. The name Macklean, which is quite un-Swedish, was taken by Rutger and his brother Gustav when they were appointed lords in 1783. The Swedish branch of the family immigrated around 1600. The reason [they] changed their name to Macklean was probably that their father - falsely - got the information that the family was a branch of the Scottish noble family Maclean.
6. Both appear to be correct, his father descends from the Macleans of Scotland and his mother from the Coyets of Holland.
7. Kenneth Olwig and Michael Jones (2008). Nordic Landscapes. University of Minnesota Press. ISBN 0-8166-3915-9. When he returned to Sweden, he married at the age of over 50 the 20-year-old Vilhelmina Eleonora Coyet, Rutger Macklean's mother.
8. Bruce A. McAndrew. Scotland's historic heraldry. ISBN 1-84383-261-5. ... continued the line of baronets, his male descendants expiring in 1775, when the baronetcy passed to Baron Rutger ...
9. "Rutger Maclean". Electric Scotland. Retrieved 2009-02-28. When Maclean took over his estate he found the peasants in his four villages so weighed down by their obligatory "daywork" for the landowner’s manor, that they were unable to look after their own land, which was also split up into numerous allotments, often as many as 60-70. But as a landowner Rutger Macklean was a benevolent despot. He called a surveyor, had the land measured up, and reorganised the many small allotments into one or two large ones. He also split up the villages and made the peasants live in new houses by the new ground they were given. The "day-work" system was abolished, and the putting of old pasture land into cultivation encouraged. Within the space of some ten years Svaneholm was transformed into a famous model farm. The radical reforms introduced by Rutger Maclean provided a pattern for the single allotment system introduced by law in Scania in 1802, and was later followed in legislation for the country as a whole. ...
10. Horace Marryat (1862). One year in Sweden: including a visit to the Isle of Götland. Forty-third in lineal descent from Inghis tuir le Amhir, younger son of an Irish king, came Gilleon, who lived a hundred years before Christ. From him in unbroken genealogy is traced John Maclean (son of the Laird of Dowat), who came to Sweden in 1639 [sic], and, settling in Goteborg, greatly aided in the building of that town. Having rendered some service to the house of Stuart, he was created an English baronet by King Charles II in 1050, during his exile, and ennobled by Queen Christina under the name of Makeleer, with a grant of arms differing from those borne by his ancestors, neither of which were used by his descendants. ...