Swedish Ingria in the context of "Ingrian Finns"

Nyenschantz (Swedish: Nyenskans, lit. 'new sconce'; Russian: Ниеншанц, romanized: Niyenshants; Finnish: Nevanlinna) was a Swedish fortress at the confluence of the Neva River and Okhta River, the site of present-day Saint Petersburg, Russia. Nyenschantz was built in 1611 to establish Swedish rule in Ingria, which had been annexed from the Tsardom of Russia during the Time of Troubles. The town of Nyen, which formed around Nyenschantz, became a wealthy trading center and a capital of Swedish Ingria during the 17th century. In 1702, Nyenschantz and Nyen were conquered by Russia during the Great Northern War, and the new Russian capital of Saint Petersburg was established here by Peter the Great the following year.

The Treaty of Nystad, or the Treaty of Uusikaupunki, was the last peace treaty of the Great Northern War of 1700–1721. It was concluded between the Tsardom of Russia and the Swedish Empire on 10 September [O.S. 30 August] 1721 in the then Swedish town of Nystad (Uusikaupunki, in the south-west of present-day Finland). Sweden had settled with the other parties in Stockholm (1719 and 1720) and in Frederiksborg (1720).

During the war Peter I of Russia had occupied all Swedish possessions on the eastern Baltic coast: Swedish Ingria (where he began to build the soon-to-be Russian capital of St. Petersburg in 1703), Swedish Estonia and Swedish Livonia (which had capitulated in 1710), and Finland.

Charles XII, sometimes Carl XII (Swedish: Karl XII) or Carolus Rex (17 June 1682 – 30 November 1718 O.S.), was King of Sweden from 1697 to 1718. He belonged to the House of Palatinate-Zweibrücken, a branch line of the House of Wittelsbach. Charles was the only surviving son of Charles XI and Ulrika Eleonora the Elder. He assumed power, after a seven-month caretaker government, at the age of fifteen.

In 1700, a triple alliance of Denmark–Norway, Saxony–Poland–Lithuania and Russia launched a threefold attack on the Swedish protectorate of Holstein-Gottorp and provinces of Livonia and Ingria, aiming to take advantage of the Swedish Empire being unaligned and ruled by a young and inexperienced king, thus initiating the Great Northern War. Leading the Swedish army against the alliance, Charles won multiple victories despite being significantly outnumbered. A major victory over a much larger Russian army in 1700, at the Battle of Narva, compelled Peter the Great to sue for peace, an offer that Charles subsequently rejected. By 1706, Charles, now 24 years old, had forced all of his foes into submission. That year, Swedish forces under general Carl Gustav Rehnskiöld won a decisive victory over a combined army of Saxony and Russia at the Battle of Fraustadt. Russia was now the sole remaining hostile power.

The uniformity policy was the concept of implementing Swedish law to the dominions of Sweden during the latter's time as an empire. It is symbolized by the slogan unus rex, una lex et grex unus ("one king, one law, one people") possibly coined by Johan Skytte, governor-general in Swedish Estonia, Ingria and Livonia. However, the phrase is also found in the debates on the possible union of Scotland and England in 1607, when Sir Edwyn Sandys noted King James VI & I's view that for a perfect union there should be unus rex, unus grex, una lex.

Most notably, the uniformity policy aimed at abolishing serfdom then common in Estonia, Livonia and the Swedish dominions in the Holy Roman Empire (Ingermanland naturally had a free peasantry). It was implemented in Livonia against the will of the local Baltic German nobles, which led many of them, under the leadership of Johann Patkul, to side with Peter the Great and the Russian Empire during the Great Northern War. The Estonian and Pomeranian peasants remained serfs: Estonia had voluntarily submitted to Sweden and thus had been given leeway in keeping the traditional local law code, while Swedish Pomerania had retained its traditional law code when, on behalf of the then ruling Swedish high nobility, the Peace of Westphalia granted it to the King of Sweden while remaining part of the Holy Roman Empire, and not in a formal cession which would have resulted in the implementation of Swedish law. Swedish law was thus only introduced to Swedish Pomerania after the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, and then by a coup d'etat organized by King Gustav IV Adolf.