is thought to have been for King Magnus Henriksson (not
Magnus Nielsen as the stone shows), though his actual burial probably took place elsewhere within the cloister compound, now in ruins. Magnus was a claimant to the throne of Sweden, which was much-contested at the time. In 1156, according to
Saxo Grammaticus, he bribed a trusted servant of King
Sverker the Elder to assassinate him. A few years later, according to a legendary source, he allied with a certain chief in the country, possibly Sverker's son
Karl. He then ambushed and killed King
Erik Jedvardsson (later to be known as Erik the Saint) when he left the church at Östra Aros near
Uppsala on 18 May 1160. After this feat Magnus reigned as king over most of Sweden, but apparently not
Östergötland, which was ruled by Karl Sverkersson since c. 1158. He is, however, mentioned in the list of kings of the
Västgöta Law, implying that he was recognized in Västergötland. Magnus appointed his brother Ragnvald as jarl and provided refuge to his uterine brother Orm when their brother King
Inge the Hunchback was killed in Norway. Otherwise not much is known about his reign, except that he and his brother Ragnvald donated land to
Vreta Abbey. The near-contemporary Saxo Grammaticus, on the other hand, writes that "he fell in a battle that he fought against Sverker's son Karl, whom he also intended to deprive of his crown, after he had first deprived him of his father." Saxo regarded the violent death of Magnus as the divine revenge for the shameful assassination of Sverker. His full brothers Knut and Buris served as jarls in the court of
Valdemar I of Denmark. His uterine brother
Nikolas Arnesson was Bishop of
Oslo, and an opponent of
Sverre of Norway, the son-in-law of Erik the Saint. Queen Bridget later remarried with the powerful jarl
Birger Brosa (d. 1202) and became the ancestress of a branch of the
House of Bjälbo, and the grandmother of King
Johan Sverkersson. ==References==