Stockholm & the Mälaren Valley

The Mälaren basin was the core of the Svear, the people who gave Sweden its name. At Gamla Uppsala, great burial mounds from the 6th century mark a royal and pagan cult centre described by the chronicler Adam of Bremen, and on the island of Björkö in the lake the trading town of Birka flourished in the 8th to 10th centuries, visited by the missionary Ansgar around 830. Sigtuna, founded around 980, struck Sweden's first coins, and the province of Uppland holds more runestones than anywhere else in the world.

Uppsala became the seat of Sweden's archbishop in 1164, and its university, founded in 1477, is the oldest in the Nordic countries. Stockholm grew from a fortress on the islands where Mälaren meets the sea, traditionally dated to Birger Jarl around 1252, and rose on the trade in iron and copper from Bergslagen, the mining country north of Västerås. In 1317 King Birger invited his brothers to Nyköping Castle and starved them to death in its dungeon; in 1520 the Danish king Christian II executed scores of nobles in Stockholm's main square, the "Stockholm Bloodbath" that set off Gustav Vasa's revolt.

As the capital of a 17th-century great power, Stockholm acquired palaces, Drottningholm among them, and noblemen built country houses such as Skokloster along the lake. Industry arrived with the 19th century — ASEA, later ABB, at Västerås, steel and arms at Eskilstuna — and after 1945 the capital grew into a city of well over two million, ringed by planned suburbs.

This is the region that sets the national tone: standard Swedish is based on the speech of the Mälaren area, and Stockholm's accent is the one heard on national radio, though the capital's slang and the multilingual street Swedish of its suburbs change fast. Stockholmers are teased elsewhere in Sweden for being hurried and status-conscious, and the rivalry with Gothenburg shows up in everything from jokes to football, where AIK, Djurgården and Hammarby share the city's loyalties.

The archipelago shapes the capital's idea of summer. Families keep wooden cottages on the islands, go out by boat on Friday afternoons, and hold Midsummer there around a maypole. Uppsala keeps a university culture of student "nations", choirs and white caps, and on 30 April its Walpurgis festivities bring bonfires, rafting races on the Fyris river and crowds of students in the city's parks. Most of the Nobel Prizes are awarded in Stockholm each 10 December, and the Lucia processions of 13 December light the city's churches.

Royal tradition is most visible here too: the changing of the guard at the Royal Palace, the royal family's home at Drottningholm, and the Riddarholmen Church, where most Swedish monarchs since the 17th century are buried.

About 2.4 million people live in Stockholm County alone, roughly a quarter of all Swedes, and the four counties together hold well over three million. Stockholm municipality has about 1 million residents; Uppsala's municipality has around 250,000, Västerås about 160,000, and Eskilstuna and Södertälje around 100,000 each, with Nyköping, Strängnäs and Enköping smaller.

The economy is the most diversified in Sweden: government, finance and headquarters in Stockholm, a large tech and start-up scene that produced Spotify and Klarna, pharmaceuticals at Södertälje and Uppsala, heavy trucks at Södertälje's Scania, and electrical engineering at Västerås. Commuting is part of life, with trains pulling Uppsala, Västerås and Eskilstuna into the capital's job market.

Days start early and end early; lunch is taken around half past eleven or noon, and fika breaks punctuate office hours. In July workplaces empty as people head to summer houses. The housing shortage — long queues for rental flats and high prices for owned ones — is the chronic local issue, alongside gang violence in some suburbs and the strain of growth on commuter rail.

The capital's classic dishes are the old bourgeois ones of husmanskost made elegant: stekt strömming, fried fillets of Baltic herring with mashed potatoes and lingonberries; wallenbergare, a rich minced-veal patty with peas and potato purée; and toast Skagen, shrimp in dill mayonnaise on fried bread. Östermalm's covered food hall, the Östermalms saluhall, sells herring, game, cheese and shellfish, and the archipelago contributes smoked and pickled fish.

Stockholm is also Sweden's restaurant capital, with a string of Michelin-starred kitchens and a café culture where kanelbullar and kardemummabullar, cardamom buns, are eaten at every fika. The semla, a cardamom bun filled with almond paste and whipped cream, fills bakery windows before Lent, and prinsesstårta, a green marzipan-covered sponge cake with cream and raspberry jam, is the classic celebration cake.

Beyond the city, the Mälaren farmland supplies grain, vegetables and apples; Västerås has a long reputation for its cucumbers; and the lake and archipelago give pike-perch (gös), perch and whitefish. Drinks run from the crisp lagers of Swedish breweries to aquavit sung over at Midsummer and Christmas.

Stockholm spreads over islands: Gamla Stan, with the Royal Palace, the cathedral and narrow lanes around Stortorget; Riddarholmen and its royal burial church; Djurgården, home to the Vasa Museum, Skansen and the ABBA museum; the City Hall, where the Nobel banquet is held; and the Fotografiska and Moderna Museet galleries. The metro's painted cave stations are an attraction in their own right, and Drottningholm Palace, with its baroque park and court theatre, is a boat ride west on Lake Mälaren.

The Stockholm archipelago begins at the city's edge. Vaxholm, with its fortress, is reached by boat from the city; further out lie Grinda, Sandhamn with its sailing club, and the outer islands of Utö and Landsort, where the rocks thin to bare skerries.

North of the capital, Sigtuna has its medieval church ruins and runestones, and Uppsala its cathedral, castle, university, Linnaeus Garden and the royal mounds of Gamla Uppsala. Skokloster Castle and Birka, the Viking town on Björkö that is a UNESCO World Heritage Site with nearby Hovgården, lie on the lake. To the west, Västerås has its cathedral and the mound of Anundshög, with the Engelsberg ironworks, another World Heritage Site, in the forests beyond. In Södermanland, Gripsholm Castle stands above the lake at Mariefred, Strängnäs has its cathedral, and Nyköping has the castle of the 1317 banquet and a harbour on the Baltic.