Johan (son of Sverker I)

Johan Sverkersson (in Old Icelandic sources called Jón jarl Sørkvisson), who died between 1150 and 1153, was the eldest son of King Sverker the Elder of Sweden and his queen Ulfhild Håkansdotter.

[1] Preserved lists of donations to the Catholic Church indicate that he married a lady called Ragnhild, probably a relative of Guttorm who was jarl under the reign of Karl Sverkersson (1161-1167).

[2] According to a medieval genealogy Johan must have been the father of the two subsequent contenders for the Swedish throne, Kol and Burislev, and another man named Ubbe the Strong.

According to a seventeenth-century source, Johan might have had another son, called Alf, who died young and, like Burislev, was interred in Vreta Abbey.

According to Saxo Grammaticus, the Danish pretender Canute V, Richeza's son in a previous marriage, fled to the court of Sverker in 1150.

Sverker received his stepson friendly at first, but Canute was soon forced to sell land that he owned in Sweden in order to maintain himself.

[1] While this served as a pretext, the hostility of Sweyn was mainly due to Sverker's support of his rival Canute V.[8] Some time later, in about 1152 or 1153, Prince Johan appeared at a Thing where he was killed by an enraged peasantry.