Karin Hansdotter

Katarina "Karin" Hansdotter (1539–1596) was the royal mistress of King John III of Sweden during his time as Prince and Duke of Finland in 1555–1562. Biography Karin Hansdotter was the daughter of the Lutheran priest Hans Klasson Kökkemäster, a former monk of the Dominican Order, and his wife Ingeborg Åkesdotter, a former nun and the illegitimate daughter of count Åke Hansson Tott. Her father left monastic life after the Swedish Reformation and became a Lutheran priest in Stockholm, but lost his office because of adultery. Royal mistress Karin Hansdotter was given a position in the household of the queen dowager Catherine Stenbock, where she met Prince John. In 1555, Prince John was given his own household, and Karin left her position with the queen dowager and became the official kept mistress of John with the approval of her guardian. In 1556, accompanied John when he left Sweden for Åbo Castle in his Duchy of Finland, where she lived with him as his hostess and the center of his court. She was referred to as "Our Gracious Lady" and given her own household with her own maids and also brought her relatives and friends to her household. She followed him as far as to Arboga on his journey to England in 1559, and lived with him in Stockholm in 1560-61. The couple had four children. In 1562, the relationship between Karin and John was terminated awaiting his marriage to Catherine Jagellonica of Poland. In October 1562, Karin was awarded several estates in Finland, notably Wääksy Manor in Kangasala, and married to the nobleman Klas Andersson Westgöte (d. 1565), a trusted courtier of John. She was granted a great dowry by John and retired to the manor of her new spouse, Vik in Birkala. It is noted that she left her eldest children with John, but the two youngest followed her to Vik, as well as her own mother, who apparently lived with her.