Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Örebro

ÖREBRO, one of the most important cities in Sweden, the chief town of a province of its own name, lies on both sides of the Svartå about a mile above its entrance into Lake Hjelmar, and 160 miles by rail west of Stockholm. In great part rebuilt since the fire of 1854, it has quite a modern appearance. Besides the principal church, dating from the close of the 14th or beginning of the 15th century, but modernized in the 19th, the more conspicuous buildings are the castle, on an island in the middle of the stream, the new Gothic town-house, the theatre, and the hospital. In front of the town-house stands a statue by Qvarnström, erected in 1865, representing Engelbrecht, the nobleman who was elected administrator of the kingdom in 1435; and in front of the principal hotel is an obelisk in honour of the Swedish Reformers Olaus and Laurentius Petri. Örebro has railway connexion with the mining districts round about, and carries on a trade with Stockholm by means of the Hjelmar Canal. The population was 2147 in 1749, 4227 in 1840, 9056 in 1865, and 11,785 in 1880.

Örebro was in existence in the 11th century. Its castle, erected by Birger Jarl in the 13th century, plays an important part in the early annals of Sweden; and no fewer than twenty diets or important assemblies have been held either in castle or town. It is sufficient to mention the Örebro concilium of 1537, the diet of 1540 in which the crown was declared hereditary, and that of 1810 when Bernadotte was elected crown prince.