Duke Valdemar

Who he is

Name

Valdemar Valdemarsen (the later King Valdemar II)

Title

duke of South Jutland (Latin dux; the duchy of Schleswig), brother and presumptive heir of King Canute VI

Since

named duke as a boy after his father's death in 1182 (en.wikipedia; da.wikipedia puts the formal naming in 1188); governed the duchy himself from 1187 (DBL, Knud 6.) or 1188 (da.wikipedia), when he was about 18

Born

1170, at Ribe (May or June; en.wikipedia gives 28 June): 29 years old on 1 January 1200

Family

Younger son of King Valdemar I (died 12 May 1182) and Queen Sophia (died 1198). Brother of King Canute VI, who is a widower (Queen Gertrude died 1 July 1197, DBL) and childless. Sisters: Ingeborg, the repudiated queen of France; Helena and Rikissa, both unmarried on 1 January 1200 (Helena marries William of Lüneburg in 1202, Rikissa Erik Knutsson of Sweden in 1210). Valdemar is unmarried. en.wikipedia reports a betrothal to a Saxon princess named Rikissa before his marriage to Dagmar of Bohemia (1205); its date is not pinned. His natural son Niels (later count of Halland, died 1218) has no known birth year, so whether he is born by 1 January 1200 is not pinned; his son Knud (by Helena, Esbern Snare's widow) is born about 1205 (DBL).

Confidence

high

en.wikipedia Valdemar II and Canute VI; Dansk Biografisk Leksikon (Valdemar 2. Sejr; Knud 6.); da.wikipedia Valdemar 2. Sejr; ADB and NDB Adolf III

Overlord

King Canute VI, his brother; the duchy is held of the Danish crown, not of the Empire (the Eider is the Empire's frontier)

What it holds

• the government of South Jutland between the Eider and the Levensau in the south and the Kongeå in the north: the three South Jutland syssels (Barvid, Ellum and Isted syssels), where the kings had set governors since the late 1000s (de.wikipedia), with their herreder
• the town of Schleswig on the Schlei, his seat (Rhineland map record Schleswig), with the North Sea to Baltic portage by Hollingstedt; the castle by the town (the later Gottorf) belonged to the bishops of Schleswig until Duke Erik I acquired it in 1268 (de.wikipedia), and with the bishop in prison, who keeps it on 1 January 1200 is not pinned
• the Danevirke with Valdemar I's brick wall and its single gate (Kalegat) where the Army Road (Hærvejen) crosses
• the Danish march between the Eider, the Levensau and the Schlei: the Danish Wold, the old frontier forest (Isarnho), and Schwansen; and Stapelholm between the Treene and the Eider
• the assembly (landsting) of South Jutland at Urnehoved, where Canute VI was acclaimed in 1182 after his acclamation at Viborg (lex.dk)
• the Danish castle at the head of Eckernförde Bay, built in the late 1100s (named Ykernæburgh in 1231), and the district of Fræzlæt that was run from it by about 1210 (de.wikipedia): the Danish strongpoint facing Holstein across the Danish Wold
• the island of Als with the castles of Sønderborg and Nordborg (who holds the castles, king or duke, is not pinned; Nordborg was the bishop's prison until 1198)
• the levy (leding) of the South Jutland herreder for the land war on the Eider
• the custody, for the crown, of Bishop Valdemar, whom he seized (the bishop is now held at Søborg on Zealand: dkz)

How it was acquired

Named duke after Valdemar I's death in 1182; the bishop of Schleswig governed for him until 1187-88. The duchy was an appanage for the king's younger kin: Knud Lavard held it as jarl from about 1115, and Valdemar I's natural son Christopher held South Jutland before his death in 1173 (not re-checked).

Allies and rivals

Allies: his brother the king; Archbishop Absalon of Lund, the king's chief counsellor (Church map); the Hvide kindred at court (the chancellor Anders Sunesen); the crown's Slav vassals in Mecklenburg, Schwerin and Rügen, who ring Holstein from the east (Rhineland and Eastern Germany maps); Otto IV, the late queen's brother. Rivals: Count Adolf III of Holstein and his allies Archbishop Hartwig II of Bremen, Margrave Otto II of Brandenburg and Duke Bernhard of Saxony; the friends of the captive Bishop Valdemar (in Bremen's chapter and, in 1192-93, at King Sverre's court in Norway). The Dithmarschers, who backed the bishop in 1192, are hostile to Adolf and will go over to the Danes in 1200-01.

How things stand that morning

On the morning of 1 January 1200 Valdemar governs all South Jutland north of the Eider and the Levensau. The Eider crossing at Rendsburg, castle and island, is held by Count Adolf III, who rebuilt the castle against the Danes; the north bank and the Danevirke are Danish. The war is live: Valdemar's attack on Rendsburg and the king's march to the Eider were the campaigns of 1199, and no fighting is recorded for the winter of 1199-1200.

Bishop Valdemar is the crown's prisoner at Søborg. The king's Frisians of the Uthlande on the west coast (King's Frisians) answer to the king, not to the duke.

Wealth

The king's rights in South Jutland as the jarls held them: the royal estates and farms of the duchy, the fines of justice, the levy, and the dues and tolls of Schleswig, the Schlei and the Hollingstedt portage, the old link between the North Sea and the Baltic. Which royal estates in South Jutland the duke held, and which the king kept, is not pinned for 1200 (the king's land book of 1231 is the first survey). No figures.

Military

The South Jutland levy on land and at sea; the Danevirke, completed under Valdemar I with a brick wall along the main rampart (lex.dk), whose gate on the Army Road was still in use in the early 1200s; the castles on Als (Sønderborg, built in the later 1100s; Nordborg, about 1150). Record: seized Bishop Valdemar in 1192-93; attacked Rendsburg in 1199. He wins at Stellau in 1201 and takes Hamburg by night surprise on Christmas Eve 1201 (da.wikipedia): later course, not yet.

No figures.

Threats

• Count Adolf III across the Eider, holding Rendsburg and the crossing of the Army Road
• a Holstein-Bremen coalition with Brandenburg and Saxony behind it, as in 1198-99
• Bishop Valdemar's cause: the elect of Bremen, a king's son, whose captivity is a grievance at Rome and among the Bremen clergy
• no designation as heir: if Canute died suddenly, the crown would have to be won at the assemblies

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

1. 1200 (month not pinned)Count Adolf III, pressed by the Danes, hands the castle on the Eider island (the Reinoldsburg, Rendsburg) to King Canute (ADB: 'compelled' in 1200). With the crossing in Danish hands, the king brings the Dithmarschers under him.Depends on: continued Danish pressure on the Eider and no relief from Bremen or the Staufen princes Stopped by: a renewed joint stand of Adolf and Archbishop Hartwig, or a Danish defeat in the field
2. 25 May 1200 (some sources 25 May 1201)At the king's order the crown's Slav vassals (Henry Borwin of Mecklenburg, Nicholas of Rostock, the counts of Schwerin, probably Jaromar of Rügen) march with Duke Valdemar into the county of Ratzeburg and beat Count Adolf of Dassel, Adolf III's ally, at Waschow; Nicholas of Rostock is killed and Ratzeburg falls under Danish overlordship (de.wikipedia Schlacht bei Waschow). The cause given is the repeated raids of Dassel and his allies into Danish ground in Schleswig and Mecklenburg.Depends on: the king's order and the duke's being free to leave the Eider Stopped by: Adolf III and Duke Bernhard of Saxony bringing help to Dassel in time, or the duke being tied down on the Eider

Later, on the likely course

1. 1201 (after this year)Adolf's raid on the Dithmarschers reopens the war; Valdemar routs him at Stellau near Kellinghusen, then besieges and takes him in Hamburg (Christmas Eve 1201). Lübeck does homage in 1202. Canute dies on 12 November 1202 and Valdemar is crowned at Lund on Christmas Day 1202 without having been designated beforehand (DBL).Depends on: the Rendsburg cession of 1200 and Danish success Stopped by: Danish defeat, or the duke's death

Places of note

• Schleswig: the duke's town and the see of the captive bishop (Rhineland map record Schleswig)
• The Danevirke and Valdemar's Wall: the border rampart across the neck of Jutland, faced with Valdemar I's brick wall; its gate (Kalegat) on the Army Road still in use
• Eckernförde castle: Danish castle at the head of the bay, late 1100s; the place is first named (Ekerenvorde) in 1197
• Hollingstedt: the landing place on the Treene for the North Sea end of the portage to Schleswig
• Aabenraa: where the duke seized Bishop Valdemar in 1192 (or 1193)
• Urnehoved: the landsting of South Jutland, in the Urne forest between Bolderslev and Uge south-west of Aabenraa (exact site disputed); Canute VI was acclaimed here in 1182 after Viborg (lex.dk)
• Sønderborg castle: castle on Als built in the later 1100s, with a young settlement beside it
• Nordborg castle: castle on Als of about 1150; Bishop Valdemar's prison until 1198

Where the sources disagree

• The brief describes Canute VI as married to Gertrude; she died on 1 July 1197 (DBL, Knud 6.; en.wikipedia), so on 1 January 1200 the king is a childless widower.
• Date of the bishop's capture: en.wikipedia (Canute VI) and DBL put it in 1192 at Aabenraa; en.wikipedia (Valdemar II) has him escape to Norway and be taken in 1193; de.wikipedia (Hartwig II) gives captivity from 1193. The campaign notes say 'since 1192-93', which covers both.
• Place of captivity: en.wikipedia (Valdemar II) has Nordborg on Als 1193-1198, then Søborg; en.wikipedia (Canute VI) says Søborg throughout. On 1 January 1200 both put him at Søborg (dkz's area).
• Rendsburg: en.wikipedia (Valdemar II) says Valdemar 'captured' Adolf's new fortress; the ADB says Adolf was compelled to hand it over in 1200. The Rhineland map follows the ADB (Adolf holds it on 1 January, handover during 1200); this record agrees.
• The Rhineland map (Denmark) says the duke became duke 'at 12'; da.wikipedia puts the formal naming in 1188, DBL says he took over the government in 1187. Either way he rules in person by 1200.
• The Rhineland map's town record (Schleswig) gives Schleswig 'the ducal castle'; de.wikipedia (Herzogtum Schleswig) says Duke Erik I acquired the castle at Schleswig from the bishops in 1268, so in 1200 it was presumably the bishop's (the bishop being the duke's prisoner). Where the duke lodged in the town is not pinned.
• de.wikipedia (Schlacht bei Waschow) puts the duke with the vassals' army in the Ratzeburg campaign of May 1200 (or 1201) and gives as its cause the repeated raids of Count Adolf of Dassel and his allies into Danish ground in Schleswig. These raids are not dated, so they do not prove raiding north of the Eider in the winter of 1199-1200; no belt is drawn here beyond the Rhineland map's Eider march.

Evidence: The duke's career is well known in outline (Arnold of Lübeck, the Danish annals, DBL), but no charter of his household or officers for the 1190s was found in the sources used, and the duke's revenues are known only in general from later evidence. The Rendsburg events rest on Arnold of Lübeck as reported by the ADB.

On the map: The duchy's edges follow the later border of Schleswig (the Kongeå line to Hejlsminde in the north, the Eider and Levensau in the south), which is old but was only fixed in writing later. The west coast before the great floods of 1362 and 1634 was quite different: the line between the duke's geest hardes and the king's Frisian marsh hardes is drawn on modern land.

Primary sources for Denmark

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• The Danish annals of Lund, Ryd and other houses (12th and 13th centuries; Lund continued to 1307, Ryd to 1288). Short dated entries from Lund, the archbishop's seat, and from Ryd in Schleswig. Read online
• Annals of Stade, by Albert of Stade, Albert of Stade (about 1240 to 1256). A world chronicle written at Stade in the 1240s from older Stade and Bremen annals. Read online
• Chronicle of the Slavs, by Arnold of Lübeck, Arnold of Lübeck (about 1209 to 1210). Arnold continues Helmold and writes from Lübeck, close to Danish, Welf and Baltic affairs. Read online
• Chronicle of the Slavs, by Helmold of Bosau, Helmold of Bosau (about 1167 to 1172). Background only. Read online
• The Icelandic annals to 1578 (compiled from the late 13th century onward from older notes). Year-by-year notices that fix Icelandic chronology. Read online
• The Livonian Chronicle of Henry, Henry of Livonia (1225 to 1227). The chief source for the Baltic mission. Read online
• Deeds of the Danes, Saxo Grammaticus (about 1185 to 1208). Saxo was writing at Lund in 1200 under Absalon, who died in March 1201, and his last books are an insider's history of Valdemar I and Knud VI to 1185: the Wendish wars, the taking of Rügen, the submission of Pomerania in 1185, the Danish fleet, Absalon's power and the Danish quarrel with the Empire. Read online
• Short history of the kings of Denmark; The Law of the Retainers, Sven Aggesen (about 1185 to 1188). A short Latin history of the Danish kings to Knud VI's Pomeranian victory of 1185, with the Lex castrensis, Sven's version of the law of the royal household. Read online

11 more in the sources library for Scandinavia.