1523-1632 CE
From 1523 to 1632 CE, the Swedes broke free from Danish union and built the Lion of the North — Gustav Vasa forging a nation from rebellion and Reformation, his grandsons seizing Baltic coastlines from Muscovy and Poland, until Gustavus Adolphus crossed into Germany to save Protestantism and died at Lützen in the moment of victory. Swedish armies would remain in Germany for sixteen more years, kingmakers in a war that was no longer theirs.