Riksdag of the Estates

The meeting at Arboga in 1435 is usually considered to be the first Riksdag, but there is no indication that the fourth estate, the farmers, were represented there.

However, a number of entailed properties (fidekomisser) remain to be commuted (that is, turned into limited liability companies).

Comprising much of present-day Finland, these became a Grand Duchy under the Emperor, but the political institutions were kept practically intact.

This Diet of Finland followed the forms of the Swedish Riksdag, being the legislative body of the new autonomous region.

The diet was next assembled by tsar Alexander II in 1863, due to the need to modernize the laws.