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280
KRONBORG.
Chap. XVIII.
subjects “ not one penny.” This was more easy of
execution to Frederic, first crowned Protestant sovereign of
Denmark, than it would have proved to later monarchs.
He had made a good haul of suppressed monasteries,
church lands, plate, and treasure—was flush of money,
and did not mind spending it. The existing castle was
then commenced in the year 1577, and completed in
the course of nine years. Bishop Kingo and Tycho
Brahe both sung its praises, and the talents of Rubens
were called into play—somewhat later I imagine—for
the decoration of the chapel. The castle is strongly
fortified with double-bastion, moat, and rampart, after
the manner of preceding ages.
Kronborg possesses one great advantage over the
other Danish buildings of the sixteenth century: it is
built of fine sandstone, the only specimen in the kingdom.
Though quadrangular and four-towered, it is relieved
from all appearance of formality by the quaint onion
pagoda-like minarets by which its towers are surmounted.
The lofty clock turret,* too, rising from its centre, higher
than those which flank the corners, adds to the dignity of
the building. Few castles in the space of three hundred
years have suffered so little from modern additions and
* In the year 1538 the citizens of Lund received orders to pull down
the stone churches in disuse since the Reformation, and forward the
materials to Copenhagen to be employed for the building of the new
castle; and again, in 1552, a second supply was sent. Even Laura
Maria, the big bell purchased with the legacy of Bishop Absalon, was
not spared ; she got cracked on the journey, was melted down and
recast into two little ones, which still hang in the clock-tower of
Kronborg. Laura Maria was looked upon almost $s a saint, and Valdemai’
Atterdag, who believed in nothing, when on his death-bed is said to have
roared out in a paroxysm of pain, “ Help me, Sorø! help me, Esrom!
help me, Laura Maria, you big bell of Lund !”
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