Day 2, Rosenborg Castle

The pictures of my second day in Copenhagen are rather heavy on my first stop, Rosenborg Castle, so I decided to give it its own entry.

In my last post I mentioned that there are several castles in the city, and the one I described last time is the current royal residence, dating from the eighteenth century.

This one coming up is the oldest remaining one in Copenhagen, Rosenborg Castle, and it was built sometime during the Renaissance.  There was VERY little information in English and my other language skills failed me so I don't have a lot to tell about it.

Anyway, although I had done a lot of research on the public transportation system in the city (which, by the way, seems very good) I ended up walking everywhere just to enjoy the city.  Friday was absolutely gorgeous in Copenhagen, which took me by surprise - I was expecting a lot of cold, damp, broody weather but Friday was like any other non-rainy spring day in Paris.  Hooray!

On the way I just had to take a picture of this little street because it reminded me so much of my Brooklyn neighborhood:

I wandered through the "Latin Quarter," an older part of the city where the University of Copenhagen still is.  I always feel at home in these areas because university students are the same everywhere - hauling around large backpacks, standing around in groups to chat, riding bikes recklessly, setting up their laptops in cheap cafes.  This area was even filled with narrow, cobblestone-y streets like the Paris Latin Quarter.

The castle and its gardens are just north of the university, and the grounds are quite pretty.  Or at least, I imagine they would be when things are blooming; for now they're a bit dreary but with potential.

When this building came into view I thought surely it was some kind of other thing associated with the castle but not it...it seemed so, I don't know, small?  Not small exactly because it's really big, but when I think of Renaissance palace I don't think of this.  Evidence I've been in France too long, I guess, because I suppose I was expecting a chateau.

In any case, that was the palace.

A lot of the rooms are more or less as the kings and queens left them - lots of kings named Frederick and Christian, but I know next to nothing about Danish royalty (apart from Hamlet of course!). 

But I had a lot of trouble figuring out what was what exactly.  Like this, I could see that it was Christian something's bloodstained bedclothes but why were they bloody?  Why are they on display?  Wikipedia is not helpful in this case.

Old toilet rooms are always kind of funny to see.  You imagine the kings and queens back then had every possible comfort, but this is still where they had to go.

When I said last time that Denmark's monarchy seemed to have avoided the super overly ornate French-style decorating, I guess I spoke too soon.

I decided I want this silver set for my everyday toilette.  Birthday present, anyone?

There were two kinds of ceilings here - this, the older kind, which is more unusual in Western Europe, with the square panels - and the typical one with a central fresco and molding around that.

There were all these tiny little side rooms that would say they're the bronze cabinet, or glass, mirror, porcelain or whatever, and they were all filled to the brim with treasures that I suppose the royal family accumulated over the years.  The pictures only show portions of one wall, usually, but imagine there is a whole closet with shelves filled like this, to the ceiling.

Bronze:

Glass:

Porcelain:

Eventually I came to the throne room, which I have to say is probably the most impressive one I've seen.

Hey look, there's me in the mirror!

The king and queen's throne.  The king's, left, is made of narwhal tusk!

And obviously any competent king knows his throne should be guarded by solid silver lions:

In the basement part of this castle is the royal treasury.  In olden times the treasury consisted of all the precious jewels and other objects owned by the king's family, passed through the generations.  Often it was kept in a strong room in the main residence, but I know that, for example, in 11th and 12th century England it was hauled along with the queen wherever she was going and protected somewhere near her bedroom.  If the crown was desperately in need of money they could sell off pieces from the treasury.

Today obviously the treasury is part of Denmark's national heritage so it's not going anywhere.  I suppose the only pieces that are ever brought out sometimes are the crowns for ceremonies of state, but even then - the Danish monarchs don't even have coronation ceremonies so I'm not sure what types of events would require the queen to wear her crown.  Anyway, everything here is probably priceless.

This is the ceremonial sword:

A goblet I liked for obvious reasons:

The official crown - there were two other (more casual?) crowns but this one is the one designated for those mysterious non-coronation crownworthy activities:

This picture is bad, but these are all hair ornaments. WANT.

And the various items from when they used to have coronations - the orb, scepter, sword, etc.

By this point I was sort of worn out by royalty, so though I did visit the final castle on Friday I only went into the ruins underneath.  That and some other stuff next post.