ABSTRACT
This chapter investigates the relations between collecting and colonialism in Queen Christina’s reign. Examining the roles of colonial objects in the queen’s collections, it is found they were material evidence of the geographical reach of Swedish royal power. The new Kunstkammer, started by the queen in the late 1640s, suggests a global interest: colonial and imperial ambitions which went hand in hand with a desire for rare objects and a thirst for knowledge of the world.
