Page 637 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Europe

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DENMARK

Denmark is a peaceful and pleasant place. Its landscape is largely green, flat,
and rural – with a host of half-timbered villages reminiscent of a Hans Christian
Andersen fairy tale. It is an easy country to visit – not only do the majority of
Danes speak English, but they are friendly and extremely hospitable. Above all,
the pace of life is not as frenetic as in some European mainland countries.
Denmark consists of no fewer than Constant struggles for control of the North
405 islands and the Jutland peninsula, Sea with England and western Europe,
which extends north from Germany. for the Skagerrak – the straits between
Located as it is between Scandinavia Denmark and Norway – with Norway
proper and mainland Europe, Denmark and Sweden, and for the Baltic Sea with
not surprisingly shares characteristics Germany, Poland, and Russia, ensued.
with both. It has the least dramatic But thanks to their fast ships and fearless
countryside of the Scandinavian countries, warriors, by 1033 the Danes controlled
yet there are also a number of important much of England and Normandy, as well
Viking sites dotted throughout the land. as most trading routes in the Baltic.
Zealand, the largest island, is the focal The next three hundred years were
point for Denmark’s 5.5 million inhabitants, characterized by Denmark’s attempts to
a quarter of whom live in Copenhagen. maintain its power in the Baltic with the
Funen and Bornholm are much more help of the German Hanseatic League.
tranquil islands, popular for holiday retreats. During the reign of Valdemar IV (1340–
The Jutland peninsula has the most varied 1375), Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Greenland,
scenery, with marshland and desolate and the Faroe Isles came under Danish rule.
moors alternating with agricultural land. Valdemar’s daughter Margrethe presided
over this first Scandinavian federation,
History known as the Kalmar Union.
Although nomadic hunters inhabited The next period of Danish prosperity
Jutland some 25,000 years ago, the first occurred in the 16th century, when
mention of the Danes as a distinct people Denmark profited from the Sound dues,
is in the chronicles of Bishop Gregor of a levy charged to ships traversing the
Tours from 590. Their strategic position Øresund, the narrow channel between
in the north made them a central power Denmark and Sweden. Christian IV
in the Viking expansion that followed. (reigned 1588–1648), the “builder king,”

Evening illuminations in Tivoli Gardens, Copenhagen
Aerial view of Copenhagen, with the Rådhus in the background

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