The Age of Liberty began and ended with a revolution. Neither movement was tumultuous or violent, and no Swedish blood was shed on either occasion. Nevertheless, each was a true revolution, for each effected a radical alteration in the political system. Historians have always been ready to perceive the revolutionary character of the coupof 19 August 1772, whereby Gustav III brought the Age of Liberty to a sudden end; but outside Sweden they have been less inclined to appreciate the true nature of the events of 1719–20. Yet those events resulted in shifts of power and constitutional changes so dramatic, so far-reaching, and so firmly maintained, that only another revolution could undo them.

For nearly forty years before 1718 Sweden had been an Absolutism: an Absolutism popular, and to some extent parliamentary, under Charles XI; unrestrained, ruthless, and at last odious, under his son. By 1718 the sufferings which a period of two decades of continuous war had brought with it had irretrievably alienated the Swedish people. Admiration of the king's heroic qualities and his personal virtues did indeed survive, and would never be extinguished, but the Absolutism, as a political system, was not merely discredited; it was hated. On that point, at least, there was unanimity. Whatever was to be done, and whoever was to do it, Sweden must be safeguarded against a repetition of that experience: this was basic to all the constitutional discussions that took place in the months after the king's death.