City foundation

At the site of Malmö’s location, there was already a small peasant and church town from the mid-1100s on the present Triangle. The actual town of Malmö is believed to have been founded in the 1250s as a fortified berth of Archbishop Jacob Erlandsen, who resided in Lund about 20 kilometers northeast of here. The original name of the settlement was Malmhaug, which means the ore mound, and the town was located on church lands away from the early peasant town.

The Danish metropolis

Over time, the strategically well-located city developed, and in the 1400s, Malmö had developed into one of Denmark’s most important and largest cities. About 5,000 people lived here, and the Hanseatic League regularly traded in the city’s markets. It was not least Øresund’s rich herring fishing that was the city’s major source of income.

It was also in the 1400s that Malmö got his city coat of arms. It happened in 1437, when Erik of Pomerania awarded it in the form of two letters. The Griff still minted the city’s weapons, and it came from the king’s own coat of arms from Pomerania.

Shortly before, in 1434, a citadel had been established south of Malmö itself; it is the current Malmøhus. Malmöhus was supplemented by a number of other defense works that made it the most fortified in present-day Sweden.

16th century settlement

In the 16th century Protestantism came to Malmö early. The Reformation broke through in the years 1527-1529, making the city one of the first in Scandinavia to become acquainted with Martin Luther’s theses. It was Claus Mortensen who began to preach Luther’s words, and Malmö thus became the start of the Reformation in Lund’s diocese.

The Civil War-like County’s feud raged in Denmark after King Frederick Is died in 1533. Malmö was in line with Copenhagen on Christian II’s side against the deployment of Christian III; the city feared, among other things, the swelling of the nobility and the re-introduction of Catholicism. After the time of the feud in the years 1534 to 1536, Malmö accepted Christian III and achieved his goals by being able to choose his own priests within the Protestant faith and to abstain from noble rule.

The loss of Malmö and Skåne in the

1600s became the great time of the upheaval in Malmö. In the summer of 1644, Sweden besieged the city, which repeated itself the following year; both times without major consequences. However, they came with the Peace in Roskilde in 1658, when Denmark had to relinquish the parts of Skåne, Halland and Blekinge, and with them also Malmö. Later in the same century, Denmark tried to recapture not least Skåne, but the month-long siege of the Skåne capital in 1677 ended without success, and Malmö remained Swedish.

1700s and industrialization

At the beginning of the 1700s there were about 2,300 inhabitants in Malmö, but this figure dropped to around 1,500 in the first decades of the century. This was due to both the plague epidemics and the loss of wars that King Charles XII dealt with himself and the country. The 18th century, however, ended with increasing importance and thereby a greater relocation, as a modern port was built here.

Industrialization came to Malmö in the 19th century, as was the case in many other places in Europe. One of the major industries was shipbuilding. In 1840, the Kockums yard was opened and it became one of the largest yards in the world. The railway soon underpinned Malmö’s position, opening to Lund in 1856. The following years, Södra Stambanan was opened, and via 483 kilometers and the city of Katrineholm it connected with the capital Stockholm.

Several industries moved to the city, growing rapidly through the century. By 1870, Malmö had grown to become Sweden’s third largest city; only Stockholm and Gothenburg were now larger, and by the end of the 19th century about 60,000 lived in the southern Swedish city.

Baltic Exhibition and the 20th century

In the decades around 1900, much was built in Malmö, and many larger properties were opened up. Office and residential buildings, churches, a larger railway station and a new central post office are just a few examples from this time.

The Baltic Exhibition was held in the summer of 1914, and it was the largest event in Malmö’s history. Sweden, Denmark, Germany and Russia participated, and the gates were open from May 15 to October 4. 850,000 guests visited the site. The exhibition was an industrial fair, but there was also a part with agriculture and one with art, and there were also music and sports competitions. There were rides and restaurants in the crowd.

Many industries also shot up these years in the city, which by about 1900 had passed Norrköping in population and thus became Sweden’s third largest city. Throughout the 1900s, the Kockums yard was the most well-known workplace in the city, and the company’s large crane was a symbol of the working town.

The interwar period was also a period of growth despite depression and financially tight conditions. Malmo’s airport, Bulltofta, was one of the construction works during these years. After World War II, growth continued, and many new suburbs were constructed and erected. Several major events also came to the city, which was among other things one of the Swedish host cities at the 1958 World Cup.

Recent decades

At the end of the 20th century Malmö first negatively impacted. There was a recession in the country in the 1970s, which led to many business closures and rising unemployment. The former industrial spearhead in the city, the Kockums yard, also had to close over the years, and the downward spiral of declining population continued until the mid-1990s, when a major revitalization of the city was initiated. In the midst of the worst crisis in the early 1990s, however, a popular party came to town in the form of a host role for some matches at the 1992 European Football Championships.

In 1998, a new university was opened on Kockum’s former shipyard, and two years later the Øresund Bridge could be opened south of the city. With it, the road to Denmark’s capital and Scandinavia’s largest city, Copenhagen, was established, and since then the cities along with the upland have developed as the Øresund region. The former port areas of Malmö have been greatly expanded in recent years, and in 2005 the characteristic building Turning Torso was inaugurated as the city’s modern landmark and a symbol of the progressive and modern Malmö that characterizes the city today.