We had planned to stay in Jylland one day more, but the weather turned bad, so all my plans of showing Marco and the kids the nice beaches along the westcoast is postponed for at least another year.
Instead we took a slow tour down though Jylland.
We visited the Church in Viborg (Viborg Domkirke).
Viborg Cathedral, Our Lady Cathedral (
Danish:
Viborg Domkirke eller Vor Frue Domkirke) is the site of one of
Denmark's most important historic churches located in the town of
Viborg in northern
Jutland. The modern building is a 19th century construction based on
Lund Cathedral in southern
Sweden which bears no resemblance to the medieval cathedral that stood on the site since 1130.
Before Viking times, the town of Viborg was one of the four major centers for religion and politics in ancient Denmark. As early as 800 there was a Viking settlement at Viborg which lies in north central Jutland with connections to the Lim Fjord, an important water "highway" through Jutland until modern times.
Viborg was the location of one of the three great regional assembly places in Denmark. (
Danish:
landsting) The first recorded proclamation of a King of Denmark was at Viborg for King
Hardecanute in 1027. The monk,
Aelnoth, apparently attended the Viborg assembly before 1120 and wrote "There (at Viborg) assembled rapidly great crowds from all over Jutland, some for trade in the market, others go there to talk. Thereby laws are established, and it is determined whether (old) laws are still in force and at the same time made effective. Whatever is agreed upon by the unified voice of the crowd cannot without punishment be set aside anywhere in Jutland."
Viborg is the final resting place of King
Erik Klipping (1289–1286). Erik's nickname was once thought to refer to a habit of blinking, but that has been discounted. It is thought that Klipping refers to the devalued money issued in his name. In other words, Erik Cut Rate. In 1282 Erik was at Vordingborg where he was forced to agree to the "Magna Charta of Denmark" (
Danish:
handfæstning) which was the first time the power of Danish king's was limited by a document. Erik was involved in a feud with his cousins and some of Denmark's powerful noble families, notably Counts Marsk Stig and Jacob of Halland. Tradition has it that after a long day's hunting, the king fell asleep in a barn in the village of Finderup, near Viborg. During the night he was stabbed and slashed 56 times. Nine of the king's enemies were outlawed as a result of the murder. It was later believed that Archbishop
Jens Grand was implicated in the plot to murder the king. He was imprisoned in terrible conditions and later escaped. Studies of the king's remains indicate that he was "mangled"; the body was not just stabbed but hacked to death (
Danish:
maltraktet). He was buried in front of the altar where his grave stone can still be seen.
Alessandro enjoys the garden next to the church.
Not far away from Viborg are their our two most famous runic stones called "Jelleingestenene. They mark the birth of Denmark.
The Jellingestenene runic stones are located on the South side of the Jelling Church in the town of Jelling in Eastern Jutland. The runic stones, the two mounds and the first church were all raised and built in the 10 th century AD. Jelling and the historical monuments have been symbols of the founding of Denmark and the Danish monarchy. The viking king, King Gorm The Old, was the first king in an unbroken line to today's monarch, Queen Margrethe II, making the Danish Royal family the World's oldest.
The church itself is the latest since the first, wooden, church was built by King Harald Blue-tooth. Three wooden churches were built, and three wooden churches burned to the round, prompting a change of the main building material to stone. The grave of King Gorm The Old is inside the church, beneath a sterling silver "Z" in the black granite floor.
In 1994, UNESCO included the Jelling Runic Stones, the mounds and the Jelling Church as part of the World Heritage List, declaring them of exceptional and universal value to the World.
The large Jellingesten, known as King Harald's Stone, is King Harald Blue-tooth's statement to the World that he united Denmark and Norway into a single kingdom, and he claims to have converted the Danes to Christianity, which may to some degree have been a declaration of commitment rather than a statement of fact.
The text written in runes is: Harald, King, ordered this inscription for Gorm his father, and for Thyra his mother. The Harald who won for himself Denmark. Further text on the two other two sides of the stone is: all and Norway / and converted the Danes to Christianity.
Marco is climbing one of the "Gravehöje" (Danish version of the Pyramids) there is next to the Jellinge Church.
The two large mounds at Jelling are called the North Mound and the South Mound. In the North Mound, which is the earliest, a burial chamber was built in 958-59 AD. The core of the North Mound consists of a much older mound from the Bronze Age, which was enlarged in the Viking Age – either to make the construction work easier or perhaps because the ancient mound had a special significance? All of the contents of the North Mound’s burial chamber, as well as remains of the dead, were removed in a robbery during the Viking period. The South Mound is the largest of the two, measuring 10 m in height and 70 m in diameter, and was constructed around 970. It did not contain any burials. Hidden underneath the mounds lie the remains of the oldest monument at Jelling: a huge, ship-shaped stone monument or ‘ship-setting’. With a length of c. 360 m it is the largest known example in Scandinavia.
Bedstefar and Marco enjoyed reading the names and small remarks on the stones in the graveyeard.
Here you see the birthday boy unwrapping the only gift he got for his birthday.
Marco is studying for his examinations so I left him at home for most of the day so he could study.
Iris slept 1/2 hour in the train and Ale the last 5 minutes. That turned out to be wayyyy to little for him and the rest of the day he turned into an energy bomb with bad temper. 
I tried to get some photos of Mike and Lene in Love, with Marcos new lens.
