Holger Danske

The last thing that Jael and I saw in Kronborg Castle was the Casemates.  For some reason, I had anticipated that the casemates would be on the top of the walls.  They were not.  They were very far underground.  Very far.  They smelled a little like the basement at Little Grandma's old house--wet, kind of musty, and like the walls were about to cave in.  During times of threat, soldiers would live down in the casemates for months at a time, waiting to defend the castle.  It would not have been fun.

They sold flashlights in the gift store but Jael and I didn't buy one.  They had vending machines of only flashlights in the basement, right before you went down into the casemates.  Jael and I saved our money.  And then we spent the rest of our time stumbling around in the dark, trying to light our way with the LED display on the back of my camera.  It was really, really, really dark.  It was also a long way around, through lots of windy corridors, with lots of little side caverns and little corners and things.  It was kind of creepy.  The biggest problem of all, though, is that you couldn't really get a good picture to express how dark it was. When you used a flash, the white washed walls reflected light really well and it seemed pretty bright.  It was hard to really get the atmosphere.  There were lots of little corners as well, into which you could walk, with the walls closing in around you.  Jael went into one of them.  I stayed behind and helpfully took pictures and blinding her.  The pictures are all off-center because I couldn't actually see Jael until the flash went off.  In the picture of Jael's back, you can see that, when squeezing into the corner, she got white powder all over her pants and jacket, which marks stuck with her all the rest of the day.

I did find some pictures other folks took of the casemates which might give you a better idea of what they looked like.  You can click here or here for photo albums.  If you click here, you can see a blog entry who's author also failed to buy a flashlight.

When I was looking for pictures, I came across this video.  It is an episode of "Ghost Hunters International".  I do not know the legality of its position on YouTube but the episode is all about Kronborg Castle.  I did not watch the whole thing so I don't know how appropriate it is (although I assume that it is fine) but at 5:30,  they go down into the casemates and look around.  After that, they do a lot of "Wait!"  "What was that?"  "I think I saw something!"  and it's goofy but you do get to see the casemates, and other parts of the castle pretty well to start with.  The video is here.


The biggest and most famous thing about the casemates, though, is the statue of Holger Danske which is down there.  (You can find the official Kronborg Castle information page about the statute here.)  Holger Danske is a mythical/legendary king of the Danes from the 8th or 9th century.  According to the story, Holger Danske sleeps under Kronborg Castle, waiting until the Danes are in dire need of help to wake again.  The story is, apparently, not unique to the Danes and it is quite similar to the story of Father Time in C. S. Lewis's The Silver Chair.









The Holger Danske (or Holger the Dane) story seems to have become a large part of the Danish identity.  The Danish Resistance movement during WWII (Denmark was occupied by Germany in 1940 and remained under occupation throughout the war) was called "Holger Danske".  There is even an opera about him, called Holger Danske, which was written in 1789.  I couldn't find performances of the opera anywhere but, if you go here, you can find the opera on CD at Amazon--there you can buy it or listen to little samples of the opera.  He also had a whole TV show about his life.  It is claymation so it is kind of like watching a really weird, pagan-ey "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer".  The TV show is called "The Ballad of Holger Danske".  The name may be a reference to "The Song of Roland" because, according to Danish myth, Holger the Dane actually defeated Charlemagne in a one-on-one fight before graciously sparing his life and then helping him to fight against the Turks.

There are other musical endeavors.  For instance, Holger the Dane shows up in Danish rap music (click here.  It's actually not that bad (although, I suppose, it could have very bad language and I would never know)).  I bet not every national hero can say that.  And, there is a more traditional sounding song called "I alle de riger og lande" in which Holger Danske sings about how he is not afraid to let the world know that he is Danish and that anyone who doesn't hold their Danish heritage proudly is no true Dane (I gather).  I have included the words to the song below, as well as the Google Translate translation of them which doesn't make tons of sense, but you probably get the idea.

Danish words to “I alle de riger og lande”

Google Translate version of the lyrics

I alle de riger og lande, hvorhen jeg i verden fo'r, jeg fægted med åben pande for, hvad jeg for alvor tror. En ørn var mit hjelmemærke, på brynjen stod korsets tegn, på skjold bar jeg løverne stærke i hjerternes milde hegn. Når mænd jeg kasted min handske, opslog jeg min ridderhjelm, de så, jeg var Holger Danske og ingen formummet skælm. Vil dansken i verden fægte, men dølger åsyn og navn, jeg ved, hans ånd er ej ægte, jeg tager ham ej i favn.

In all the kingdoms and countries whither I rushed world, I by open pan fægted for what I really think. An eagle was my helmet brand in armor standing sign of the cross the shield I wore lions strong in hearts mild fence. When the men I threw my glove, I pitched my knight helmet they saw I was Holger Danish and no disguised rogue. Will Dane in the world fencing, but hides face and name, I know his spirit is not real, I take him not to embrace.

However, by far my favorite piece of Holger Danske history is this 1909 Danish movie called "Holger Danske".  The film is pretty dark and kind of hard to see and has, of course, no sound.  You can skip ahead to 1:15, when the story really gets started (I gather that the first minute or so is Holger Danske sleeping, then dreaming about the lady-in-distress, and then waking to go save her).  Just make sure to keep watching through the second minute or so, so that you don't miss one of the absolute best death scenes ever.

 












This is Hans Christian Andersen's Holger Danske.  It was published in 1845.  It is now in the public domain and there were four or five versions of it available on Google Books.  However, most of them were in the middle of long books which required searching through, so I am just putting this here, in case it is of interest. It is one of the less creepy and sad fairy tales that Andersen produced.  You can see the Danish version here.