Kronborg

Why it is renowned

Kronborg is known worldwide as Elsinore, the setting of Shakespeare's Hamlet. UNESCO inscribed it on the World Heritage List in 2000 as an outstanding example of the Renaissance castle.¹² Hamlet was first staged there in 1816, and Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud, Christopher Plummer, Derek Jacobi, David Tennant and Jude Law have since played the prince at the castle.² It is part of the National Museum of Denmark and still stages Hamlet in the summer.³

The story

Eric of Pomerania built a fortress, Krogen, on the spot in the 1420s to collect the Sound dues from ships entering and leaving the Baltic.² Frederick II had it rebuilt as a Renaissance castle between 1574 and 1585 by the Flemish architects Hans Hendrik van Paesschen and Anthonis van Obbergen, and named it Kronborg.² After a fire in 1629 Christian IV rebuilt it; the Swedes took it in 1658. From 1785 it served as army barracks; the army left in 1923, and after restoration the castle opened to the public.²

What to know it by

• Hamlet at Kronborg²1816Shakespeare's play, staged at the castle since 1816
• The casemates³Underground passages where Holger the Dane sits
• The castle church²Chapel within the walls