Sten Sture the Elder was a Swedish statesman and regent of Sweden from 1470 to 1497 and again from 1501 to 1503. As the leader of the victorious Swedish separatist forces against the royal unionist forces during the Battle of Brunkeberg in 1471, he weakened the Kalmar Union considerably and became the effective ruler of Sweden as Lord Regent for most of his remaining life.

The Kalmar Union was a personal union in Scandinavia, agreed at Kalmar in Sweden as designed by widowed Queen Margaret of Norway and Sweden. From 1397 to 1523, it joined under a single monarch the three kingdoms of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, together with Norway's overseas colonies.