CANUTE THE GREAT.—HARDA-CANUTE.—MAGNUS.—ROMANTIC ADVENTURES OF HARALD HARDRADE.—SWEYN II.—HARALD III.—CANUTE IV.—OLAF II.—ERIC III.—NICHOLAS.—ERIC IV.—ERIC V.—CANUTE V. AND SWEYN III.—VALDEMAR I.—HIS ABLE REIGN.—ARCHBISHOPS ESKIL AND ABSALOM.—CANUTE VI.—VALDEMAR II.—DECLINE OF THE DANISH POWER, AND THE CAUSES WHICH LED TO IT.—ERIC VI.—ABEL.—CHRISTOPHER I.—ERIC VII.—ERIC VIII.—CHRISTOPHER. II.—INTERREGNUM.—VALDEMAR III.—MEMORABLE TRANSACTIONS WITH NORWAY AND SWEDEN.—OLAF III.—UNION OF DENMARK AND NORWAY.
On the death of Sweyn, his son Canute was proclaimed by the Danes. But this was the signal for the revolt of the Anglo-Saxons against the Danish yoke, and for the restoration of Ethelred. That rash and vicious prince was accordingly invited from the court of his brother-in-law, Richard duke of Normandy, on the condition of his governing better in future. What excited his hope, and that of his people, was the abrupt departure of Canute for Denmark. Harald, brother of the latter, who was invested with the administration, was aiming at the sovereignty of that kingdom; and prudence demanded that he should not suffer the loss of his hereditary realm, when he must evidently have again to fight for England. Released by the death of Harald from all apprehension in that quarter, he returned, with all the forces he could raise, to the English coast. Lord of Denmark, of a considerable portion of Norway[131], of several English counties, and of a fine army in that kingdom, he thought himself equal to any enterprise. What most favoured his views on England was the detestation in which Ethelred was held. His labour would have been easy, except for the valour of Edmund Ironside, who, but for the treason which ruled his father’s councils, and for that father’s utter worthlessness, would have resisted with success. Leaving to the historians of England the task of detailing the battles and negotiations which followed, we shall only observe that on Ethelred’s death (1016), Edmund was acknowledged by London and some counties; and that both parties being tired of the destructive warfare, agreed to a compromise—the counties north of the Thames being ceded to the Dane, those south of the Thames to the Saxon; and that on Edmund’s assassination (probably at Canute’s instigation) the Danish monarch was acknowledged by the whole kingdom. The two children of Edmund, indeed, remained; and, if report be true, the conqueror endeavoured to remove them by violence. But the Swedish prince to whom they were confided, refused to be made the instrument of his purposes, and sent them for greater safety to the court of the Hungarian king. In this relation there is evidently much romance. We have no proof that the Swedish prince of this period was the friend, or even the ally, of Canute. Probably the children were sent by their own friends to a place of security.
|1016 to 1028.|
The English administration of Canute must be sought in the histories of that kingdom. In Denmark he endeavoured to give to Christianity a predominancy which it had not yet attained. On his accession, full half of the Danes were pagans. To reclaim them, churches were built, and Anglo-Saxon missionaries appointed. This latter measure was hateful to them; and it was not agreeable to his Christian subjects, who wished the dignities of the church for themselves. Both were dissatisfied with his almost continued absence in England. Availing himself of this universal feeling, Ulfo the jarl, as we have before related[132], placed Harda-Canute, an infant son of the king, on the Danish throne. We have related, too, the issue of this rash step—the resignation of the boy, and the murder of Ulfo by the royal order. From this time there was continued tranquillity in both Denmark and England. Canute, indeed, was too powerful and too vindictive to be resisted with impunity. The acquisition of a third kingdom, which he conquered in 1028[133], surrounded his throne with a splendour that no Saxon or Danish prince had before possessed.
|1029 to 1035.|
That Canute was sullied by many crimes is evident, even, from his most partial historians. He put to death many, without the forms of law, either because he would punish their past, or avert their future, hostility. After his accession to the English throne he acted with great cruelty to many Anglo-Saxon nobles, and with perfidy to more. Yet he had great qualities. He must have been a good ruler, or he would not have dismissed his Danish followers, with the exception of about 3000. That he placed Danes and English on a footing of equality; that he administered justice with strict impartiality; that he improved the laws no less than the administration; that his yoke was felt to be tolerable by the English and the Norwegians, no less than by his hereditary subjects, are historical truths. “In fact, he was one of the best princes that ever swayed the English sceptre. If in his earlier days he was ferocious, after his establishment on the English throne he was humanised by Christianity. Of his zeal for religion, no less than for the temporal welfare of his people, we have evidence enough in his acts. There was an air of barbaric grandeur about the monarch, not to be found in any other sovereign of the times.”[134] Lord of three great kingdoms as he was, we must look for his true elevation to his own mind; and (a rare phenomenon) his moral qualities improved as he advanced in years. Few are the instances, whether in history or in common life, of men so completely reclaimed from evil to good. Much of this reformation has been ascribed by Roman catholic historians to his pilgrimage to Rome. They would be more logical if they called this pilgrimage the effect of the reformation. The state of his mind, his motives, his principles, are well described in the remarkable letter which he wrote from the eternal city, and which exhibits his character in a truer light than the comments of any historian.[135]
This monarch was liberal to his followers, as well as to the church. How, considering the splendid retinue which generally accompanied him, the magnificent presents which he made, the churches and monasteries which he founded and endowed, he could still be surnamed the Rich, is not easy to be conceived. His prudence was doubtless great; but his moderation is the virtue on which his biographers dwell with most satisfaction. There may be, and there probably is, no truth in the well-known anecdote of his rebuking his flatterers on the sea-coast. But another, which displays him in a light equally striking, is less known. Many years before his pilgrimage he drew up a code of laws, and was one of the first to violate them by killing, in a fit of anger, aggravated perhaps by intoxication, one of his servants. His good sense told him that this violation was a bad example for his ferocious nobles; and he resolved that his punishment should be signal. Convoking his judges, he appeared before them in the garb of a prisoner, accused himself of homicide, and awaited their decision. The penalty, according to the Germanic jurisprudence, which governed the greater part of Europe, was forty silver marks for one in the condition of the victim.[136] But the slavish administrators of the law deemed that in publicly confessing his crime, he had made sufficient recompence. Seeing their fear of him, he condemned himself to pay 360 silver marks, or nine times the amount of the legal compensation. Of this large fine half went to the kindred of the victim, half to the crown; but the king would not touch his portion, which was distributed to the poor.
In his last testament, and near three years before his death, this monarch divided his states between his sons. To Harda-Canute, whom he had invested with the government of Denmark, he left England also, because that prince was his offspring by Emma, the widow of Ethelred II. To Sweyn, who, since the death of St. Olaf (1030–1035), governed Norway, he bequeathed that kingdom. Whether any provision was made for Harald Harefoot, the eldest of his sons, is not very clear; but Harald taking advantage of his brother’s residence in Denmark, usurped the English crown. He could not expect, and he probably did not wish, that all three should rest on the same brow. Partition was the mania of the age.
HARDA-CANUTE.
1035–1042.
|1035 to 1040.|
By his father’s death, Harda-Canute, the heir of Denmark, was equally so of England; and he was preparing to pass over into that kingdom when intelligence reached him of Harald’s usurpation. But that usurpation was not sudden, or complete; and had he hastened with a few thousand followers to claim the crown, he would have triumphed. But he had little energy of character; and while he remained irresolute, the period favourable for his hopes passed away. Fortunately Harald’s reign was short; and in 1040 he was called by the English themselves to ascend the throne. On his arrival he committed an act of impotent vengeance against the memory of his brother, whose bones he caused to be disinterred, and cast into the Thames. They were, however, reburied.
|1040 to 1042.|
In his government of England, Harda-Canute seems to have committed only one reprehensible act, and for that he had provocation. A tax being levied for the support of the Danish soldiery, was condemned by the English, and at Worcester resisted, by the murder of the two collectors. To vindicate his authority, he resorted to severe measures. The ringleaders were executed, the city pillaged and partly burnt. In other respects he was not unpopular. His kindness to the family of Ethelred did him great honour. To Emma he confided a share in the administration; and to prince Edward, the youngest son of Ethelred, afterwards named the Confessor, whom he recalled from Normandy, he gave a splendid establishment. As he died without issue (the result probably of his intemperance), with him ended the Danish dynasty in England.
|1035 to 1042.|
Of Harda-Canute’s government in Denmark we have few records. He was negligent and intemperate; and his father’s memory, more than his own qualities, secured him on the throne. His transactions with Norway deserve especial consideration. On the death of Canute the Great, as we have just related, the sceptre of that kingdom devolved on Sweyn, who had for some years held the government. But his administration was disliked; he and his mother were equally unpopular; and his father had scarcely been dead a year, when both were expelled from the country by the ascendancy of Magnus the Good, bastard son of St. Olaf.[137] Sweyn took refuge with his nearest brother in Denmark, and died the same year (1036). If the Danish king was feeble, he was not without ambition. He knew that he should succeed to the English throne; and as, after that event, he should be the sole heir of Canute’s extensive empire, he urged his claim to the crown of Norway. Finding Magnus too powerful for him, he met that prince, and concluded a treaty singular in its nature, and in its results important. If either king died without issue, the other was to inherit his dominions. This convention was guaranteed by the chief nobles and prelates of the two countries. Harda-Canute, as we have just related, did die without issue, and the throne of Denmark accordingly fell to
MAGNUS.
1042–1047.
|1042 to 1044.|
On the arrival of this prince in Denmark, he was received with open arms. He was the son of a saint, with whose miracles the North resounded; and his own virtues (much less questionable than his father’s) justified the expectation of a happy reign. To few princes, indeed, can history accord more virtues than to Magnus; yet he was not deficient in the active duties of his station. The Jomsberg pirates who had revolted, and whose ferocity was the dread of the North, he speedily reduced, and their capital he laid in ashes. This was a service both to the Danes and the Norwegians for which they could not be too grateful. But the former, influenced by fickleness or by attachment to their old line of kings, or by mortification at receiving a sovereign from a country which they had twice conquered, soon cast their eyes on Sweyn, son of Jarl Ulfo and of Estrida, sister of Canute the Great. After his father’s murder[138], this prince sought refuge at the court of the Swedish king. As he approached man’s estate, he grew weary of inactivity, and having something to hope from the generosity of Magnus, he repaired to that monarch in Norway. He did not ask for any portion of Canute’s vast possessions: he wanted employment merely under so generous a monarch; and his request was immediately granted. His talents, his lofty mien, his deportment, and, above all, his skilful flattery, won the confidence of the Norwegian, who made him first minister, and next his lieutenant in Denmark. There was much imprudence in confiding to one so ambitious and so nearly connected with the throne a trust of this nature; but judging of other men’s hearts by his own, Magnus thought that such a trust would for ever bind Sweyn to his interests, and be agreeable to the Danes. On the relics of St. Olaf the young prince swore fidelity to the monarch, and was well received by the people. To deepen this favourable sentiment was his constant care; and by his affability, his attention to his duties, and his liberalities, he completely succeeded. When secure of their affection, he openly revolted. Magnus assembled an armament, proceeded to Denmark, defeated and expelled the usurper, who again sought refuge at the Swedish court.
|1044 to 1045.|
No sooner was this enemy vanquished, than another appeared in the pagan bands, who occupied all the eastern shores of the Baltic, that are now comprised in the Russian monarchy. These men, scarcely less ferocious than their allies the Jomsberg pirates, invaded Sleswic, wasting every thing with fire and sword. Magnus flew to oppose them, and, after a severe struggle, triumphed. During his absence, Sweyn returned from Sweden, reduced Scania, and passing into Zealand and Funen was again acknowledged by the people. Victory, in two or three successive actions, still declared for the monarch. Yet the cause of Sweyn was not destroyed. In the assistance of the Swedish king, in the adventurers on all the maritime coasts of the Baltic, and still more, in the attachment of the Danes, he had resources which even the power of Magnus was not wholly able to destroy.
|1045.| A third enemy now appeared in Harald, surnamed Hardrade, or the Stern, the son of Sigurd, and the half-brother of St. Olaf. If there be any truth in the ancient sagas, his adventures were most extraordinary. He was present at the last fatal scene of Olaf’s life; and from Norway he fled to the court of the Russian duke Jaroslaf, whose service he entered. With Elisif (Elizabeth), daughter of Jaroslaf, he became deeply enamoured; but his suit being unsuccessful[139], he repaired to Constantinople, and was admitted amongst the Varangians, or Scythian guards of the emperors. By his valour, and his birth, he obtained at length the command of that formidable, though small body, and by his exploits invested his name with much lustre. Heading an expedition against the pirates of the African coast, he was the victor in several battles, and the owner of immense booty, a portion of which he sent to his friends in Russia. He was afterwards employed in Sicily, in Italy, and in a journey to the Holy Land. In all this, there is no great improbability; but what follows is too romantic to be credited. As the reward of his services, Harald had demanded the hand of a princess of the imperial family, and had been refused. “Those Væringjar,” says Snorro, “who were in Miklagard, and received rewards for their services during the war, have said since their return home to the North, that they were told in Greece by wise and grave men of that country, that queen Zoe herself wished for Harald as her husband, and that this in truth was the cause of her resentment, and of his wishing to leave Miklagard, though other reports were spread among the people. For these reasons the king Constantinus Monomachus, who ruled the empire jointly with queen Zoe, ordered Harald to be cast into prison. On his way thither, St. Olaf appeared to him, and promised him protection; and on that same street, a chapel has been since erected, which is standing at this day. Here was Harald imprisoned with Halldór and Ulfr his men. The following night there came a noble lady, with two attendants, who let down a cord into the dungeon, and drew up the prisoners. This lady had been before healed by St. Olaf, the king, who revealed to her that she should relieve his brother from captivity. This being done, Harald immediately went to the Væringjar, who all rose up at his approach, and received him with joy. They seized their arms, and went to the chamber where the king slept, and put out his eyes. The same night, Harald went, with his companions, to the chamber in which Maria slept, and carried her away by force. They afterwards proceeded to the place where the gallies of the Væringjar are kept, and, seizing two vessels, rowed into the Bosphorus (Sævidar-sund). When they came to the iron chains which are drawn across the sound, Harald ordered all his men who were not employed in rowing, to crowd to the stern with their baggage, and when the gallies struck upon the chains, to rush forward to the prow, so as to impel the gallies over the chains. The galley in which Harald embarked was carried quite over on to the other side, but the other vessel struck upon the chains, and was lost. Some of her crew perished in the water, but others were saved. In this manner, Harald escaped from Miklagard, and entered the Black Sea, where he set the virgin on shore, with some attendants, to accompany her back to Miklagard, requesting her to tell her cousin, queen Zoe, how little her power could have availed to prevent his carrying off the virgin, if he had been so minded.” The anxiety of Harald was occasioned by the intelligence that his nephew Magnus had ascended the thrones of Norway and Denmark. Proceeding through Russia, he married the daughter of Jaroslaf; and with her returned to Norway through Sweden.[140]
|1045, 1046.|
On reaching Sweden, where the fame of his riches had preceded him, he entered into a league with Sweyn. The objects of this league are not very clearly defined; but we may infer that one of them was to place Harald on the Norwegian, Sweyn on the Danish throne. The wealth of Harald hired numerous adventurers; and by the two princes the coasts of Denmark were ravaged. Again Magnus prepared an armament to oppose them; but his surer recourse was policy. To detach the celebrated Varangian chief from the cause of the Dane, he offered him half of the Norwegian kingdom (and also no doubt the eventual succession), on the condition of Harald’s allowing in like manner a division of his treasure. The latter eagerly accepted the proposal; he forsook Sweyn, repaired to Norway, divided the treasure, the amount of which is described as wonderfully large, and was admitted to a share in the administration. Contrary to the usual experience of rulers so placed in regard to each other, they lived in harmony to the death of Magnus in the following year. By this defection, or rather by this conversion of an ally into an enemy, Sweyn was compelled to retire. But he had his partisans in Denmark, and Magnus, at his death, had the generosity to declare him his successor in that kingdom. To Harald was left the Norwegian throne. Thus the two adventurers became kings, in little more than a year after the arrival of Harald in the North.
The surname of Harald the Good, sufficiently establishes his character. He was indeed an admirable king and a virtuous man. Much praise is awarded to a code of laws which he compiled; but they no longer exist in their original form.
|1047.|
As with Harda-Canute had ended the ancient male line of Denmark—a line that traced itself to Odin—Sweyn II. may be called the founder of a new dynasty. That dynasty occupied the throne to the extinction of its male line in Valdemar IV., when it was succeeded by the reigning house of Oldenburg.
|1048 to 1070.|
Scarcely was Sweyn invested with the dignity, when he found an enemy as powerful as Magnus, and less generous, in Harald Hardrade, who claimed the Danish crown. The assertion of this claim led to many years of warfare, ruinous to both kingdoms, but especially to Denmark, the coasts of which were often ravaged. In general the advantage rested with the Norwegian monarch, who, in 1064, obtained a great victory over the Danish fleet at the mouth of the Nissa. With great difficulty Sweyn escaped into Zealand, and began to collect a new armament. Fortunately the mind of Harald was now disposed to peace. Sixteen years of hostilities had brought him little advantage; the fortune of war was dubious; and the Danes, like their king, were averse from a foreign yoke. The two monarchs met, and entered into a treaty, which left affairs just as they had been at the death of Magnus. These were not the only hostilities in which they were engaged. Both undertook predatory expeditions to the English coast; but they could obtain no advantage over the vigilant and intrepid monarch (William I.), who now swayed the sceptre of that kingdom.[145] Sweyn too had the mortification to see his own coasts ravaged (those of Holstein) by the Vandalic pirates, who had renounced Christianity, and who laid both Sleswic and Hamburg in ashes. Before he could reach them they retired. Subsequently he was persuaded to march against the Saxons, then at war with the emperor; but his troops having no inclination to exasperate a people with whom they had long been on terms of amity, he desisted from the undertaking.
|1066 to 1070.|
Sweyn showed much favour to the church. He built many places of worship, which he endowed with liberality; and he founded four new bishoprics: of these two were in Scania, viz. Lund and Dalby, which were subsequently united; and two in Jutland, viz., Wiburg and Borglum. Yet this liberality did not preserve him from quarrelling with it. His chief vice was incontinence. Numerous were his mistresses, and numerous his offspring: thirteen sons are mentioned, of whom five succeeded him[146]; but the number of his daughters was much inferior; two only appear by history. For this vice he could not hope to escape the censure of holy mother, and he married. He did not, however, marry with that mother’s consent; but chose for his queen a Swedish princess within the prohibited degrees of kindred. When Adalbert, archbishop of Bremen, heard of the union, he angrily condemned it, and by his messengers threatened the king with excommunication if he did not separate from the princess. The king resisted, and even threatened to lay Bremen (the legate’s residence) in ashes; but the power of the church was too great even for him to resist, and in the end he dismissed his wife, who had the misfortune to be his cousin. There is no reason to infer, with a recent historian of Denmark[147], that he dismissed her to recal his mistresses; for he was now arrived at an age when the empire of the passions could not be omnipotent. But he was probably taught to believe that a real was less sinful than an imaginary crime—fornication than marriage within the fourth degree.[148]
|1070.|
In another transaction we must admire, as much as we may here condemn, the conduct of the church. Sweyn was a man of strong passions, and of irritable temperament. In a festival which he gave to his chief nobles in the city of Roskild, some of the guests, heated by wine, indulged themselves in imprudent, though perhaps true, remarks on his conduct. The following morning, some officious tale-bearers acquainted him with the circumstance; and in the rage of the moment he ordered them to be put to death, though they were then at mass in the cathedral—that very cathedral which had been the scene of his own father’s murder.[149] When, on the day following this tragical event, he proceeded to the church, he was met by the bishop, who, elevating the crosier, commanded him to retire, and not to pollute by his presence the house of God—that house which he had already desecrated by blood. His attendants drew their swords, but he forbade them to exercise any degree of violence towards a man who in the discharge of his duty defied even kings. Retiring mournfully to his palace, he assumed the garb of penance, wept and prayed, and lamented his crime during three days. He then presented himself, in the same mean apparel, before the gates of the cathedral. The bishop was in the midst of the service; the Kyrie Eleison had been chaunted, and the Gloria about to commence, when he was informed that the royal penitent was outside the gates. Leaving the altar, he repaired to the spot, raised the suppliant monarch, and greeted him with the kiss of peace. Bringing him into the church, he heard his confession, removed the excommunication, and allowed him to join in the service. Soon afterwards, in the same cathedral, the king made a public confession of his crime, asked pardon alike of God and man, was allowed to resume his royal apparel, and solemnly absolved. But he had yet to make satisfaction to the kindred of the deceased in conformity with the law; and to mitigate the canonical penance, he presented one of his domains to the church. The name of this prelate (no unworthy rival of St. Ambrose) should be embalmed in history. He was an Anglo-Saxon ecclesiastic, William, whom the archbishop of Bremen had nominated to that dignity, and who had previously been the secretary of Canute the Great. During the long period that he had governed the diocese of Roskild, he had won the esteem of all men alike by his talents and his virtues. For the latter he had the reputation of a saint (and he deserved the distinction better than nine-tenths of the semi-deities whose names disgrace the calendar), and for the former, that of a wizard. It is no disparagement to the honour of this apostolic churchman, that he had previously been the intimate friend of the monarch; nor any to that of Sweyn, that after this event he honoured this bishop more than he had done before.
|1070 to 1076.|
From this time to his death, Sweyn practised with much zeal the observances of the Roman catholic church. By his excessive liberalities he injured his revenues; and by his austerities, perhaps, his health. A faithful portrait is given of him and of his people by one who knew them well, Adam of Bremen. This ecclesiastic, hearing so much in favour of the royal Dane, proceeded to his court, and, like all other strangers, was graciously received. “Sweyn,” says the canon, “is not only liberal towards foreigners, but well versed in literature; and he directs with much ability the missions which he has established in Sweden, Norway, and the isles; from his own mouth have I received most of the facts contained in this history.” In his reign the pagans of Bornholm were first converted to Christianity, by bishop Egin. The image of Frigga, which they had been so long accustomed to venerate, they demolished with contempt. Another proof of their sincerity appeared from their offer of their most valuable effects to the bishop. This, unlike most churchmen of the age, he refused to accept; and advised them to expend it in two noble ways—in the foundation of churches, and the redemption of Christian captives. “The king,” proceeds Adam, “has no vice but incontinence.” The canon speaks of Denmark as consisting almost wholly of islands. “Of them Zealand is the largest and richest, and its inhabitants are the most warlike. Ledra had been, but Roskild was then, the capital. Next to Zealand in importance was Fionia, which was very fertile, but its coasts were exposed to the ravages of the pirates. The capital, Odinsey, was a large city. To cross from one island was perilous, not only from the stormy sea that rolled between them, but from the pirates. Jutland had a barren soil except on the banks of the rivers, the only parts cultivated: the rest of the country consisted of forests, marshes, and wastes, and was hardly passable. The chief towns lay near the narrow bays on the coast. Scania, always geographically, now politically included in Sweden, is represented as fertile, as very populous, and full of churches. No where, indeed, had Denmark much lack of these structures; Fionia, Adam assures us, had 100; Zealand, 150. “Scania is almost an island, and separated from Gothland by large forests and rugged mountains. Here is the city of Lund, where the robbers of the deep laid their treasures. These robbers paid tribute to the Danish king, on the condition of being allowed to exercise their vocation against the barbarians.” Among the Danes, Adam perceives many other things contrary to justice: he sees little indeed to praise beyond the custom of selling into slavery such women as dishonoured themselves. So proud were the men, that they preferred death to stripes; and they marched to the place of execution, not only with an undaunted, but with a triumphant air. Tears and groans they held to be unmanly; and they mourned neither for their wives, nor for their dearest connections.
|1076.|
As Sweyn left no legitimate offspring, the only claim that could be made was from his numerous bastards. Harald was the eldest; but then as he was of a quiet, gentle nature, he was not very agreeable to a fierce people. On the other hand, Canute, the next brother, had distinguished himself greatly in the wars against the pagans of Livonia. There was, accordingly, a dispute when the states assembled, most declaring for Harald, but all Scania for Canute; and a civil war must have been the result; but for the bribes of two chiefs, who prevailed on the electors of that province to confirm the choice of Harald. After this decision, Canute refused to remain in Denmark, and passed the rest of his brother’s life in his old occupation.
|1076 to 1080.|
The short reign of Harald affords no materials for history. Silent, reserved, timid, averse to the shedding of blood, even for judicial delinquencies, he was little esteemed. Yet few periods were more happy than that which witnessed his administration. He made new laws, which have been praised and condemned. According to Saxo, whose means of information cannot be disputed, he abolished the judicial combat, and substituted purgation by oath—a change which led to frequent perjury. But if the testimony of Elnoth be admissible, he enacted other laws which were long valued by the people—so valued, that they made every new monarch swear to observe them.
|1080 to 1085.|
This prince, who had unsuccessfully contended for the crown with his brother Harald, and who was now unanimously elected, was very unlike his predecessor. Fond of martial glory, he prosecuted the war in Livonia, until he had brought it to an advantageous issue. His next project was one of greater magnitude—to subdue England, which the Danes had learned to regard as a revolted province. It is, however, inconceivable how so wild a project could enter the brain of the king, even though the Norwegians engaged to join in its execution, and though he received aid from his father-in-law, Robert, count of Flanders. Perhaps he only aspired to the recovery of Northumbria. But though a large armament was collected, it never sailed, owing to the intrigues of the English monarch, or the revolt of the pagan Vandals, or probably to both causes combined. To pacify the revolted pagans, he sent money and promises, and detained the fleet on the Jutland coast until the result was known. In the mean time, his warriors, ignorant what caused his delay, began to mutiny: when he had punished some, others vainly conspired against his life; while the rest quietly dispersed, and he was compelled to dismiss the Norwegians with gifts. The armament, therefore, led to nothing but disappointment and exasperation.
|1080 to 1086.|
Internally the administration of this king was distinguished by great vigour and great love of justice. Under the mild sway of his predecessor, and indeed for the greater part of a century, the local governors were so many tyrants, regardless alike of law, of religion, of decency. Of them he made many severe examples; he punished capitally offences which had become almost inveterate; he applied the law of talion to all convicted of striking or mutilating others; he completely reformed the administration, deposing corrupt judges, and replacing them by others of greater integrity, and we may add of greater sternness. Pecuniary fines—the basis of Germanic jurisprudence—were exerted with a rigour never before experienced. In all these measures the king was abundantly justified; but they gave not the less offence to men hardened by long impunity. Open mutiny or smothered discontent, loud menaces, or secret conspiracies, marked the greater part of his short reign. Even the rigour with which he suppressed piracy made him enemies; if it was agreeable to the great body of his people, it was hateful to the licentious nobles who had so long profited by it.
|1080 to 1086.|
The conduct of St. Canute in regard to the church was no less unpopular. He exempted ecclesiastics from all dependence on the secular tribunals; he placed bishops on the same level with dukes and princes; he brought the clergy into his council, and endeavoured to give them a voice in the assembly of the states. In this policy we see little to condemn. It may be true, in the abstract, that churchmen should be restricted to their peculiar province, the care of souls; but practically they have never been so; and in giving them influence in public affairs,—in converting the bishops into temporal barons, and the higher clergy into local judges,—Canute acted merely in conformity with the spirit of the times. And indeed he seems to have had good reason for that policy. Churchmen were better informed, more regular in their lives, than laymen: he therefore believed that they would make better administrators of the law; and in that belief he increased their powers at the expense of the feudal nobles. He could not foresee that by thus rendering them independent of the crown and of the people, he was preparing a scourge for his successors.
|1080 to 1086.|
Though these measures raised him many enemies, his prodigality to several churches, and still more, his attempt to make tithes an obligatory impost, rendered three fourths of his people disaffected to his sway. Yet here, too, he is not to be censured by impartial posterity. He, doubtless, saw that if the church must subsist at all, it must not depend solely on so precarious a source as voluntary contributions. He saw that tithes were sanctioned by God’s word, and obligatory in the rest of Christendom; and he thought the impost less oppressive than any other that could be devised. But he did not proceed to his object with sufficient caution; he was too precipitate: he exasperated where he should have conciliated; and he was impatient of the least contradiction to his will. In fact, he was a despot; in most instances a well-meaning one; but his acts were more evident than his motives; and while he had no credit for these, he was hated for those. In another respect he was impolitic. Zealand he conferred, as a fief, on his brother Eric, with the title of Jarl; Sleswic, on his brother Olaf, with the title of Duke; and by so doing set a precedent for the dismemberment of his kingdom.
|1086.|
When so many causes of dislike existed, the end of Canute could scarcely be one of peace. He could not carry the tithe question in the states-general; but by his own authority he levied a capitation tax, partly as a punishment for the resistance which had been shown to his will, and partly for the use of the clergy. The rigour of the collectors was no less offensive than the tax itself. The inhabitants of Vend-syssel broke out into open revolt, and went in search of the king, who, with his wife, his children, and two brothers, sought refuge in the church of St. Alban in Odinsey. There he was soon invested; the sacred building was forced; his attendants put to the sword, and Benedict, one of his brothers, laid lifeless on the floor. Seeing that his own death was inevitable, the king knelt before the altar, and in that posture, according to one account, received the fatal stroke. Another says that he was killed by a lance through the window. Both agree that he died with resignation.
By the church, Canute was immediately placed in the glorious fellowship of saints and martyrs. His claim to this distinction is rather dubious: if he had been a private individual, or less liberal to the clergy, if he had exhibited greater moral virtues, and founded fewer churches and monasteries, assuredly he would have never been deified,—for canonization may be well called so. His widow returned to her father’s court, accompanied by one only of her sons, Charles. It is not a little singular that the same destiny was reserved for this son as for the father. Becoming count of Flanders, he was slain by his subjects in a church, and, like his father, “inter divos relatus.”
|1037.|
The people of Jutland, proud of having killed one king, would elect another, and in conformity with the will of Sweyn II., which set aside the children in favour of the brothers, they passed over the infant sons of St. Canute, and chose Olaf, duke of Sleswic, the third son of Sweyn. Olaf was at that time a kind of prisoner at the court of count Robert of Flanders, whither he had been sent by his despotic brother, on the suspicion of complicity in the mutiny of the fleet. But of that complaint there is no evidence. A heavy ransom is said to have been exacted by the count, before he was permitted to join his new subjects.[150]
During the reign of this prince, Denmark had one blessing,—that of peace. But it had also one curse,—that of famine, which the clergy declared to be a divine infliction for the murder of the sainted martyr, Canute. The people, we are told, died by thousands and tens of thousands, for lack of the mere necessaries of life; and to this cause, if Saxo be correct, is to be attributed the tranquillity of the country. Horses and even dogs were the ordinary nourishment of the people. In a country where agriculture was despised, a barren season could not fail to produce famine; our only surprise is that the visitation was not more frequent. Prince Olaf bore all the blame; it was his fault, not want of foresight in his subjects, that occasioned the evil. His personal character does not seem to have been amiable. He is represented as avaricious, despotic, unfeeling; as regardless of the laws and their administration; hence tyranny in the great, and licentiousness in the people. According to one account, he was found dead in his bed, after an entertainment which he had given or intended to have given to his nobles and clergy: according to another, he died of a natural disease, regretted by nobody. If the prayer which Saxo puts into his mouth were really his, he does not merit the severity with which he has been treated. Afflicted at the continuance of the famine, he said:—“O Lord, I can no longer endure the weight of thine hand! If thou art wroth with my people, spare them, and let me alone suffer!”
|1095, 1096.|
Eric was the fourth son of Sweyn II., and from the jarldom of Jutland was raised by the states to the throne of that kingdom. As the next harvest was one of abundance, the people were again contented, and he obtained credit for the abundance with the same injustice as his brother had been condemned for the famine. More active than his predecessor, he administered the laws with vigour; and he destroyed Jomsberg, the stronghold of the pirates, who had again reared their heads during the preceding reign. To keep them in continued subjection, he erected fortresses in their country, and garrisoned them well.
|1097 to 1103.|
The most remarkable event of this monarch’s reign is the erection of Lund into an archbishoprick. Hitherto, Denmark had depended entirely on the archbishop of Bremen, whose jurisdiction extended over the whole North. The king disputed with the haughty prelate Liemar, who then occupied the see, and by whom he was excommunicated. Instead of submitting, Eric appealed to Rome, and even visited that city to plead his cause in person. He gained it and returned triumphant to his own kingdom. Subsequently (in 1103), on his way to the Holy Land, he again visited the Eternal City, and prevailed on the pope to invest Lund with the metropolitan privileges. The pope could refuse nothing to the brother of a saint, who almost equalled that brother in devotion to the church: besides, the immense authority held by the archbishops of Bremen had rendered them dangerous when they had taken, as they had usually done, the part of the German emperors against the Roman see. By the bull issued on this occasion, Adgar, a descendant of the famous Palnatoko, became primate of Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and the islands dependent on those kingdoms.
|1103.|
The cause of Eric’s pilgrimage, from which he was destined never to return, is not well known; but it was probably to expiate an homicidal act which he had perpetrated in a fit of anger or of drunkenness. The idle fable of Saxo, that while under the influence of music he killed four of his attendants (or soldiers of his guard), is characteristic enough of that writer, but has obtained no credit in this country since the authors of the Universal History adopted it. Whatever the cause, he resolved to visit the Holy Land, and that too in opposition to the prayers and tears of his people, by whom he was cherished. Passing through Rome, where, as we have just related, he obtained the erection of Lund into a metropolitan see, he repaired to Constantinople. By Alexis Comnenus he was received with much distinction; though for some time he was narrowly watched, lest, with all his piety, he should place himself at the head of the Varangian guard, and become troublesome to his host. His manners soon dispelled this diffidence, and he was splendidly entertained. Being supplied not only with provisions and vessels, but with a liberal store of gold, he sailed for Palestine; but, landing in the isle of Cyprus, he fell a victim to a pestilential disease.
|1103.|
Eric III. was one of the best princes that ever swayed the Danish sceptre. “With his people,” says an ancient writer, “he lived like a father with his children; and no one left his presence dissatisfied.” Hence his surname of the Good. He never undertook any important matter without consulting his states. His chief fault was incontinence. If, as we are assured, he refrained from the bed of his queen, it was only to indulge himself the more freely with his concubines, of whom he had a considerable number. Saxo assures us that, so far from being offended with her royal lord for this frailty, she admitted the favoured ladies into her own suite, and assisted to adorn them for his gratification. Yet Eric was not far from canonization; and but for this frailty he would probably have obtained the honour. His liberality to the church, his pilgrimage, his settlement of the Cistercians in his dominions, and his foundation at Lucca of a cloister for the accommodation of Danish palmers, procured him the epithet of saint from more than one writer of the times.