63 DENMARK. 



plained with certainty ; but they are supposed to record some remark- 

 able events. 



History.. ..The most ancient inhabitants of Denmark, of whom 

 we have any account were the Cimbri, the Danish peninsula be- 

 ing called by the ancients Chersonesus Cimbrica, or the penin- 

 sula of the Cimbri. After the conquest of the country by the 

 Goths, we find the possessors of it formidable to their neighbours, by 

 their piracies and sanguinary depredations, in the fifth century, under 

 the name of Jutes or Vitse, and Angles ; and in the sixth, under that 

 of Danes. But the history of Denmark is fabulous and uncertain, till 

 the tenth century. Harold Blaatand, who succeeded his father Gormo 

 in 945, was the first Christian king of Denmark. He was followed 

 by his son Swein, who invaded and laid waste England; and dying in 

 1014, was succeeded by his son Canute the Great. 



Under Canute the Great, Denmark may be said to have been in 

 its zenith of g.ory, as far as extent of dominion can give sanction to 

 the expression. Few very interesting events in Denmark preceded 

 the year 1387, when Margaret, daughter of Waldemar III, who had 

 married Hakon king of Norway, but was then a widow, mounted 

 the throne ; and, partly by her address, and partly by hereditary right, 

 formed the union of Calmar, anno 1397, by which she was acknow- 

 ledged sovereign of Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. She held her 

 dignity with such firmness and courage, that she was justly styled 

 the Semiramis of the North. Her successors being destitute of her 

 great qualifications, the union of Calmar, by which the three king- 

 doms were in future to be under one sovereign, lost its effect ; but 

 Norway still continued annexed to Denmark. In the year 1448, the 

 crown of Denmark fell to Christian, count of Oldenburg, from whom 

 the present royal family of Denmark is descended. 



In 1513, Christian II, a tyrannical and sanguinary prince, ascended 

 the throne of Denmark, and married the sister of the emperor Charles 

 V. Being driven out of Sweden for his atrocious cruelties, the Danes 

 rebelled against him likewise ; and he fled, with his wife and children, 

 into the Netherlands. Frederic, duke of Holstein, was unanimously 

 called to the throne, on the deposition of his cruel nephew. He em- 

 braced the opinions of Luther ; and about the year 1536, the protes- 

 tant religion was established in Denmark by that wise and politic 

 prince Christian III. 



Christian IV, of Denmark, in 1629, was chosen for the head of the 

 protestant league formed against the house of Austria ; but, though 

 brave in his own person, he was in danger of losing his dominions; 

 when he was succeeded in that command by Gustavus Adolphus king 

 of Sweden. The Dutch having obliged Christian, who died in 1648, 

 to lower the duties of the Sound, his son FredericJII, consented to 

 accept of an annuity of 150,000 florins for the whole. The Dutch, 

 after this, persuaded him to declare war against Charles Gustavus 

 king of Sweden; which had almost cost him his crown. In 1657, 

 Charles stormed the fortress of Fredericstadt ; and in the succeeding 

 winter marched his army over the ice to the island of Funen, where 

 he surprised the Danish troops, took Odensee and Nyburg, and march- 

 ed over the Great Belt to besiege Copenhagen itself. Cromwell, 

 who then governed England under the title of Protector, interposed ; 

 and Frederic defended his capital with great magnanimity till the 

 peace of Roschild, by which Frederic ceded the provinces of Hochland, 

 Bleckingen, and Schonen, the island of Bornholm, and Bahus and 



