The Swedish allotment system was a system used in Sweden for keeping a
trained army at all times. The oldest variant of the system came into
use in around 1640, and in 1682 an updated system was introduced. Both
systems relied on estates and farms that provided housing, salary and
some military equipment for a soldier or horseman. In exchange, all
other men in households providing soldiers escaped conscription, and
households providing a horseman gained a large tax reduction. The
system provided a well-trained, fast-mobilized and relatively cheap
army that had large success on the battlefields of Europe during the
17th century, but the system also took its toll on the population. The
allotment system was not replaced until the early 1900s, when the
Swedish Armed Forces started using a conscription system.
Read the rest of this article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_allotment_system
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1192:
Third Crusade: Conrad of Montferrat, the elected King of Jerusalem,
was assassinated by the Hashshashin.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conrad_of_Montferrat)
1789:
Fletcher Christian led a mutiny aboard HMAV Bounty against Commander
William Bligh.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutiny_on_the_Bounty)
1952:
Occupied Japan: Japan was once again an independent state, when the
Treaty of San Francisco entered into force.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupied_Japan)
1996:
A spree shooter in the Port Arthur Massacre killed 35 people, and
seriously injured 37 in Tasmania, Australia.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_Arthur_massacre)
2001:
Dennis Tito became the world's first fee-paying space tourist, riding
the Soyuz TM-32 spacecraft to the International Space Station.
(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_tourism)
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Wikiquote of the day:
"War: first, one hopes to win; then one expects the enemy to lose;
then, one is satisfied that he too is suffering; in the end, one is
surprised that everyone has lost." -- Karl Kraus
(
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Karl_Kraus)