DENEMEARC, TANMAURK ALA, AND CONFINIA

NORDMANNORUM: THE ANNALES REGNI FRANCORUM

AND THE ORIGINS OF DENMARK

Paul Gazzoli

A
lthough runic texts are often obscure and can give rise to highly different
interpretations, the word that has excited the most discussion in the two
Jelling stones (DR 41–42) is neither difficult to read nor unknown from
later usage. It is in fact the word that became the name of an entire country:
tanmaurk, Denmark. What is it about these stones that has made this word so
controversial?
The texts on the stones themselves are short. The earlier stone, that of King
Gorm (d. 958) states that ‘King Gorm made this monument in memory of Thorvi
(Thyre), his wife, Denmark’s adornment (tanmarkaR but)’ (Moltke 1985, 206),
while the larger and more ornate stone of Harald Bluetooth (d. 986) states that
‘King Harald commanded this monument to be made in memory of Gorm, his
father, and in memory of Thorvi (Thyre), his mother — that Harald who won the
whole of Denmark (tanmaurk ala) for himself, and Norway and made the Danes
Christian’ (Moltke 1985, 207). These stones, especially Harald’s, are our most im-
portant evidence for how the Danish kings viewed themselves and their realm in
the mid-tenth century; thus how one interprets them can be of great consequence.
Different understandings of the origin of the name Denmark, in particular, have
led to opposing views on the nature of the Danish kingdom in the days of Gorm
and Harald.

Paul Gazzoli (pmg38@cam.ac.uk) received his PhD from the Department of Anglo-Saxon,
Norse, and Celtic at the University of Cambridge in 2010.
Abstract: This article re-examines the arguments for the origins and meaning of the word
‘Denmark’ and the historical context in which it arose. It rejects the idea that ‘Denmark’ originally
referred to the eastern part of the later kingdom in sources such as Ohthere’s Voyage and the Jelling
stones, and looks instead to ninth-century Frankish annals for evidence of the name. It argues that
‘Denmark’ originally referred to an area on the Danish-Saxon border, and by drawing on work on
‘ethnogenesis’ attempts to explain how this name came to apply to the entire area of the later
kingdom.
Keywords: Denmark, ninth century, ethnogenesis, Frankish annals

Viking and Medieval Scandinavia 7 (2011) 29–43. 10.1484/J.VMS.1.102614

30 Paul Gazzoli

Any attempt to resolve the problem must take into account the other evidence
for the name Denmark. It occurs in two other stones, in Skivum in northern
Jylland (DR 133) and Karlevi on south-central Öland in Sweden (DR 411). As
with the Jelling stones, these are both memorials, the former to a man whose name
is lost from the inscription but who is called ‘the best and first of all the “land-men”
in Denmark’ (Moltke 1985, 297), while the latter eulogizes one Sibbe the Good in
dróttkvætt, proclaiming that ‘no strife-strong chariot-god of wondrous wide ground
of the sea-king (i.e. no god of the ship, no captain) will rule more uprightly land in
Denmark’ (Moltke 1985, 320). As for early foreign sources, we have a charter of
Otto I (MGH D O I, no. 294, p. 411) which refers to ‘marca uel regno danorum’
(the march/region or kingdom of the Danes), a mention of Denimarca in Regino
of Prüm’s Chronicon (Regino, 122, s.a. 884), and two Old English travellers’
accounts preserved in the Old English Orosius, of Ohthere (ON Óttarr), a trader
from Hålogaland, and the Englishman Wulfstan.1 These travellers identified the
entire coastline to the east southwards from Kaupang in Viken as Denemearc, in
contrast first to open sea, and then Gotland and Sillende (respectively northern and
southern Jylland) on the other side (Bately 1980, 16).
Lund (1991) and Sawyer (1988) have read this as revealing a political division,
which they mapped onto the Orosius’s earlier description of separate tribes of
North Danes and South Danes, separated by the Ostsæ (Bately 1980, 13), and
argued that the Jelling stones showed a South Danish dynasty establishing a claim
on North Danish territory (Denmark). Recent work on the early Danish kingdom,
notably Garipzanov’s investigation into the identity of the ninth-century gens
Danorum (2008) and Sindbæk’s archaeological study of regional divisions within
Denmark (2008), has raised new points which make it an opportune time to
reopen this question.2 I believe that the interpretation of the OE Orosius as reveal-
ing ‘Denmark’ as a separate region from the kingdom of the ‘Danes’ is flawed, and
in this article I will put forward a new interpretation that will reveal both earlier
evidence of the name Denmark and a new understanding of the meaning of
Harald’s rune-stone.

1
One of the ‘Alfredian’ translations, whose earliest manuscript was written by a Winchester
scribe active between 892 and 924 on the A manuscript of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: Lund (1984,
13). For a recent overview, see Bately (2007); for a discussion of Wulfstan’s ethnicity, see Jesch
(2008, 29–31). All translations are mine unless otherwise noted.
2
Duczko has also re-examined the question, without however coming to any new conclusions
on the textual evidence (2008, 60–63).
DENEMEARC, TANMAURK ALA, AND CONFINIA NORDMANNORUM 31

In the interpretation advocated by Lund and Sawyer, the element mark (border,
march) indicated that ‘Denmark’ was an area into which the Danes were expand-
ing, thus the territory of the North Danes as contrasted with the South Danes in
the homelands of Jylland and Fyn; or alternatively, as the old homelands of the
Danes on the eastern shore of Kattegat from which they expanded westwards into
Jylland and Fyn, thus forming a border region from a Swedish or Gothic perspec-
tive (Lund 1991, 163–65). If we thus choose to interpret ‘Denmark’ as being the
eastern shore and islands, Harald’s claim to have won ‘all Denmark and Norway’
on the Jelling stone would thus be a claim to have conquered two regions on the
frontiers of traditional Danish power, rather than two kingdoms. The older Jelling
stone, erected by Harald’s father Gorm, states that it was raised in memory of his
wife Thyre, ‘Denmark’s adornment’ (tanmarkaR but). Given that Gorm’s descen-
dants married wives from outside their centres of power to strengthen their con-
nections to new areas — Harald and Sven married Slavic princesses, Cnut married
Emma — Harald’s stone was thus interpreted as setting a precedent for this prac-
tice by establishing a familial claim to a region which had historically lain outside
the dynasty’s control: tanmaurk (Sawyer 1988, 20–21, 220–21; Sawyer 2000,
158–66).
Contradicting this argument is the evidence of the Skivum and Karlevi stones,
which both commemorate men who lived or held land in Denmark. Both are
generally dated to the years either side of 1000 (DR, I, cols 171, 473; Moltke 1985,
297, 322). Unless these stones were raised on locations that were not part of their
familial lands — which would be highly unusual — they present us with a notion
of Denmark that stretched from Jylland eastwards to beyond the medieval
boundaries of the Danish kingdom by c. 1000. (Wulfstan’s travel-account records
that Öland belonged to the Swedes, as it did in the medieval period.) Even given
the difficulty of dating rune-stones precisely, this is far too short a time for the
definition of the term ‘Denmark’ to have changed completely, and consequently
Sawyer’s interpretation of the word on the Jelling stones is untenable. Regino of
Prüm, writing around the very beginning of the tenth century, did not state where
Denimarca was, but his report that a group of Nortmanni came from there and
entered the Rhine with the consent of Godefrid (Regino, 122, s.a. 884), the
Scandinavian (probably a member of the Danish royal family: Coupland 1998,
108) who held Frisia for the Franks, suggests that it was probably an area closer to
Frisia, such as Jylland. Otto I’s charter of 965 discusses the churches of Slesvig,
Aarhus, and Ribe (all in Jylland) in ‘marca uel regno danorum’ (the border-region
or kingdom of the Danes); and although this need not necessarily be a manifes-
tation of the name Denmark, it seems likely that it is.
32 Paul Gazzoli

This picture presented by the evidence cited above thus contrasts sharply with
the supposed distinction between ‘Denmark’ and the ‘Danes’ in Ohthere’s and
Wulfstan’s accounts. In her edition of the text, Janet Bately noted that nothing in
the text supported a distinction ‘between the land of the Danes and Denmark […]
similar duality of naming is found in Ohthere’s(?) [sic] use of both Norðmanna
land and Norðweg’ (Bately 1980, 196). In fact the only area which is said to belong
‘to the Danes’ rather than ‘to Denmark’ is Hedeby. The distinction is never made
explicit and has only been inferred from Ohthere’s placement of Denemearc on one
side and Jylland on the other. But on a close look at the passage, it is apparent that
Denemearc is not set opposite Jylland, but opposite the open sea:3
þa wæs him on þæt bæcbord Denamearc & on þaet steorbord widsæ þry dagas; & þa, twegen
dagas ær he to Hæþum come, him wæs on þæt steorbord Gotland & Sillende & iglenda fela.
(Bately 1980, 16)
[Then Denmark was to his port and open sea to his starboard for three days; and then, two
days before he came to Hedeby, to his starboard were Gotland and Sillende and many
islands.]
We are thus left with what is practically an argument ex silentio: on the grounds
that Gotland etc. are not explicitly called Denamearc, were they therefore not con-
sidered part of that realm?
Some solution might be found in the note that ‘on þæm landum eardodon
Engle, ær hi hider on land coman’ (Bately 1980, 16) (on these lands lived the
English, before they came to this land): this fact would have been more relevant to
an English audience than its contemporary status as part of Denmark.4 When the
text’s focus moves out into the plethora of islands between Fyn and Sweden, care
is taken to point out whether they belong to Denmark or to the Swedes (or in the

3
I am grateful to Richard Dance for making this point.
4
Cf. Bede, Historia ecclesiastica i.15 (Lapidge 2008–10, I, 68–70): ‘Porro de Anglis, hoc est de
illa patria quae Angulus dicitur, et ab eo tempore usque hodie manere desertus inter prouincias
Iutarum et Saxonum perhibetur’ (‘from the country of the Angles, that is, the land between the
kingdoms of the Jutes and the Saxons, which is called Angulus [and which] is said to have remained
deserted from that day to this’; trans. Colgrave and Mynors 1969, 51). This should not be seen as
contradictory to the statement of the Orosius, which seems to be referring not only to the homeland
of the Angles (rather than the Saxons and Jutes) but to that of the English, encompassing the
homelands of all three ancestral peoples (whom Bede also identifies as the settlers of Britain): hence
the plural, on þæm landum. Sillende, in Frankish sources Sinlendi, ‘extensive land’, seems to have
been a later name for Angeln after most of the Angles left to settle in Britain (Garipzanov 2008,
129; Laur 1985; Wagner 2002).
DENEMEARC, TANMAURK ALA, AND CONFINIA NORDMANNORUM 33

case of Bornholm, have their own king). This information could have been useful
to traders facing a confusing situation but would not be so necessary when discuss-
ing Jylland. The territorial divisions on the eastern shore (such as between Skåne
and Halland) are not mentioned as they are for northern and southern Jylland:
these areas had special significance to an English audience, and thus there was a
reason to point them out, in contrast to the wide swathe of coastal area and ‘many
islands’ which are simply called Denmark. Thus the runic evidence and the testi-
mony of the OE Orosius can be harmonized to give a picture of a ‘Denmark’ in the
late ninth century which extended from Jylland to the eastern shore of Kattegat
and Øresund.
Even if the term Denmark applied to most of the area of the later kingdom, this
does not mean that it was a political unity. In discussion of this text, it has often
been overlooked that, in the OE Orosius, territorial designations need not corre-
spond to peoples: for example, the description of Germania (which includes
Scandinavia) states that ‘binnan þæm sindon monega þeoda, ac hit mon hæt eall
Germania’ (Bately 1980, 12) (within it are many peoples, but it is all called Ger-
many). Rather, Sawyer and Lund have assumed from the distinction made, in the
Orosius’s description of northern Europe, between the South Danes and the North
Danes, separated by the Ostsæ, that this may be mapped onto the apparent distinc-
tion between ‘Denmark’ and the ‘Danes’, the former identified as the territory of
the North and the latter of the South Danes (Bately 1980, 13). This section, which
draws not on the original Orosius but on other classical traditions and probably
contemporary informants (Lund 1984, 8–9), does not however mention Denmark,
much less claim that it corresponds to one or the other territory. North Danes and
South Danes should thus be understood as two peoples inhabiting the same region,
known as Denmark. The archaeological record supports the idea of distinct regions
within the Danish area but cannot tell us which part, if indeed any, was known as
Denmark (Sindbæk 2008, 193–99).
The origins of the name ‘Denmark’, I suggest, are rather to be sought among the
Danes’ southern neighbours. Emperor Otto I’s charter of 965 (MGH D O I, no.
294, p. 411) refers to ‘marca uel regnum danorum’ (the border-region or kingdom
of the Danes): the Ottonian empire’s border-territories were organized into
marches (marcae) under military command (Althoff and Keller 1985, 82–83), and
this text has traditionally been interpreted to reflect a desire to include Denmark
among these regions (or even that such was already the case). Similarly, the char-
ter’s supposed imperial grant of immunity to the Danish bishoprics has also been
interpreted in this way — naturally immunity could only be granted by the Em-
peror to an area he had jurisdiction over (Bolin 1931, 197–201). Refskou however
34 Paul Gazzoli

has argued that this charter does not represent a grant of immunity, as all the neces-
sary formulae for this are lacking, but rather shows that Otto I recognized Harald’s
sovereignty over Denmark and its bishoprics (Refskou 1986, 193–94, 200–01).
The relationship between the Danish kingdom and the German empire was tense
in these years, and war was expected (Widukind iii.70), although there is in all
likelihood no substance to Adam of Bremen’s claim (AB, ii.3, 62–64) that Otto I
defeated Harald Bluetooth as this is not mentioned by the tenth-century chron-
iclers Widukind of Corvey and Thietmar of Merseburg. Both Harald’s conversion
and Otto’s consequent recognition of his sovereignty should be understood in the
context of this tense political climate. Otto was concerned with the situation on
his Slavic frontier, and Harald and his successors were closely allied to the Abo-
drites and Poles, making the Danes potential participants in an uprising (Refskou
1986, 189–92). Hostilities broke out on the death of Otto I in 973, which led to
a Danish defeat and the temporary loss of southern Jylland, including Hedeby; the
Danes recovered this territory in 983 in conjunction with the Slavic uprising
around the time of Otto II’s death (Gelting 2007, 81–82; Refskou 1986, 191). The
term marca does not necessarily mean an imperial march, but is also used in Otto’s
diplomas to refer to duchies or simply demarcated areas (Refskou 1986, 171–72).
The use of the term, therefore, need not imply the political subjugation of Den-
mark to the empire.
Whether or not this charter shows a use of the name Denmark, the origin of the
term would have to be earlier than the reign of Otto I, as it appears in the OE Oro-
sius. My argument here is that the earliest traces of the name can be detected in the
early ninth century. With the presence of the Franks across the border in recently
and bloodily subdued Saxony, the inhabitants of southern Jylland would certainly
have been conscious of being on a border — and moreover a border made highly
visible to both sides by the Danevirke — much as a confederation of ‘border-men’,
the Marcomanni, dwelt across the Germanic border of the Roman Empire.5
As the Latin danus in this period could be applied as a label to all Scandinavians
(see Garipzanov 2008 and below), much like ‘Northman’ in the Germanic vernac-
ulars (and in its Latinized forms nordmannus/nortmannus/normannus as well),
‘Denmark’ would be understood as ‘the border-region of the Danes or Northmen’;

5
The earliest phase of the Danevirke has been dated by dendrochronology to 737 (Sawyer
1988, 19); as ARF 808 (p. 126) records that Godofrid built a wall on his border, it seems he
restored or enlarged it: Roesdahl (1982, 141–46). On the Marcomanni, see Dietz (1999). That the
term ‘Denmark’ originally referred to this border is accepted by Skovgaard-Petersen (2003, 169),
Jørgensen (1981–83, I, 27, II, 29, III, 31), and Wessén (1969, 18).
DENEMEARC, TANMAURK ALA, AND CONFINIA NORDMANNORUM 35

this can be compared to the use of the term do3nsk tungu to refer to the Old Norse
language.6 This easy variation between terms such as dani and nordmanni is shown
in Regino of Prüm’s account of Nortmanni arriving from Denimarca (Regino, 122,
s.a. 884) and in native Scandinavian material in the form of a rune-stone on
Lolland (DR 217). This stone was raised by a woman in memory of her husband
Krokr, who was ‘the most resolute of the sutrsuia and suþrtana’ — the ‘Sunder-
Swedes’ and the South Danes — and the best among the nurminum (Northmen).7
Lund construed the stone as describing Krokr as a ‘powerful opponent’ of these
peoples, necessitated by the conjecture that nurminum is a reference to the ‘North
Danes’ (Lund 1991, 168). This interpretation rests on the assumption that there
were two separate kingdoms. However, the inscription’s poetic nature makes it
easy to see these terms as simple artistic variations (see DR, I, col. 267; Jesch 2001,
1–6). As Lund acknowledges, the only text other than the Orosius to mention
North and South Danes is Beowulf, where east-dene (East Danes), west-dene (West
Danes), gar-dene (Spear-Danes), and hring-dene (Ring-Danes) also appear for the
sake of alliteration (Lund 1991, 168; Klaeber 1950, 433–34); the different names
of peoples in this stone probably have the same poetic function. DR 217 dates from
the Jelling period and thus might evidence three ethnic terms in use on Lolland,
which in the account of Wulfstan’s journey (Bately 1980, 16) is reported to belong
to Denmark — supposedly the realm of the North Danes. This is evidence of a
number of ethnic terms being used as alternatives for one man at one time: they
were evidently not mutually exclusive, much as dani and nordmanni were in Latin
(cf. Geary 1983).
I suggest that the earliest form of the name ‘Denmark’ can be seen in the Annales
regni Francorum’s entry for 813, which mentions the sending of messengers ‘trans
Albim fluvium ad confinia Normannorum’ (across the river Elbe to the borders of
the Northmen), and that for 828, which uses ‘in confinibus Nordmannorum’
(within the borders of the Northmen) to refer to the Danish kingdom (ARF, 138,
175). The latter entry also speaks of Danish activity at the marca and in 825 (ARF,
168), we hear of the ‘marca eorum [i.e. Nordmannorum siue Danorum]’ (their
[the Danes’ or Northmen’s] march). The Annales also use other terms for borders

6
E.g. Sigvatr Þórðarson, Víkingarvísur 15 (Skj AI, 228, BI, 216).
7
Lund (1991, 167–68) translates sutrsuia as ‘particular Swedes’; Moltke calls them Særsveerne,
‘de svenske, der har udskilt sig fra de øvrige svenske’ (DR, I, col. 267; ‘the Swedes who separated
themselves from the rest of the Swedes’; Lund has rightly cast doubt on Moltke’s explanation of
this group as Swedish colonists in Danish territory). Translations adapted from DR and from the
Samnordisk Runtextdatabas.
36 Paul Gazzoli

to refer to the Danish kingdom: termini Danorum in 823 (ARF, 163) and fines
Nordmannorum in 827 (ARF, 173). These are all Latin words for a concept that
would have been expressed as Mark in Old High German and Old Saxon.8 The
persistence of the term marca for the Danish kingdom in Regino of Prüm and the
Ottonian charters suggests that it was the most common Latinization of Mark.
These terms were not used for the Danes alone, but were generally used in
discussions of many peoples in Frankish sources, including the Franks themselves.
Why then did the idea of a march or border continue to define the realm of the
Danes? A case can be made that the early ninth-century Danish kingdom, through
its dealings with its powerful Frankish neighbours, acquired a prestige which gave
the term an unprecedented longevity: later Danish rulers were keen to lay claim to
its legacy, and in the chaotic political situation of the later ninth century various
claimants spread the name throughout the area in which they acted.
The early Danish polity has often been seen as a ‘secondary state’, that is, a state
formed due to pressure and influence from a larger, more advanced neighbour, in this
case the Frankish Empire (Randsborg 1980, 7–10). This idea can be supplemented
with the work on ethnogenesis that has sprung up in analyses of the late antique
world, when barbarian ‘peoples’ came into existence along the borders of the Roman
Empire and developed into a political unity for common defence or offence. The
barbarians would take a name which may have been used in the past that linked the
identity of the new people with that of the ancient one, normally through the
lineage of the king or leader whose victories created its territory, a process which
has come to be known as ‘ethnogenesis’ (Geary 2002, 73–119). The Franks had a
static view of the peoples beyond their borders which was not in accord with the
fluid nature of ethnic identity among the northern peoples, whom they colloqui-
ally called Nordmanni and whom their authors further divided into Dani and
Sueones: as Ildar Garipzanov (2008, 115–19) has persuasively argued, these terms
were at least as much geographical preconception as a reflection of reality. In the
late eighth century, the terms Nordmanni and Dani were used interchangeably in
Frankish sources, but from 804 Dani referred to the specific political entity ruled
by King Godofrid while Nordmanni had a more generic territorial meaning, as the
people living to the north of the Franks (Garipzanov 2008, 121–22).

8
Indeed, by the tenth century at the latest we have evidence of confinium and marca explicitly
being acknowledged as synonyms (Niermeyer 1976, 243, s.v. confinium): in 907/08 a charter speaks
of a place ‘in confinio vel marca’ (Wampach 1929, 255: on the border, or marca), and a diploma
of Otto I from 944 (MGH D O I, no. 56, p. 139) mentions ‘partem confinii, id est marchę’ (part
of the border, that is of the marca).
DENEMEARC, TANMAURK ALA, AND CONFINIA NORDMANNORUM 37

Within the date range of the Annales regni Francorum’s use of the terms sug-
gested to be the origins of ‘Denmark’, that is, between 813 and 828, sometime in
the 820s, the first Scandinavian coins were minted at Hedeby, before production
ceased in the mid-ninth century, around the same time when Frankish chroniclers
ceased to use Dani as a specific political designation (Garipzanov 2008, 125,
135–36). The distribution of these coins is densest on Fyn and southern Jylland
and correlates negatively with that of Carolingian coins, which are relatively un-
common in southern Jylland and Fyn, but common elsewhere in Scandinavia (with
Sjælland as a border-region between the two). Godofrid’s successors seem to have
reminted Carolingian coins to produce their own currency, thus emphasizing their
own authority within their territory (Garipzanov 2008, 140–41).
The ninth-century Danish kingdom seems to have had its core in southern
Jylland and Fyn (Randsborg 1980, 16). The presence of an Osfrid de Sconaowe
among the Danish nobles who witnessed a peace treaty between King Hemming
(Godofrid’s nephew) and Charlemagne in 811 may suggest that Skåne was under
the sway of the Danish kings, but there was probably little direct control (ARF,
134). Similarly, when the same annals recorded Danish kings putting down an
uprising in Westarfolda (Vestfold in Norway), this has been taken as evidence that
Danish control extended as far as this area; but again, the situation there was
probably one of Danish overlordship (ARF, 138–39, s.a. 813; Garipzanov 2008,
134–35). Søren Sindbæk’s recent study of archaeological boundaries substantiates
the general picture of regionalism within Viking-Age Denmark, but he points out
that a wider kingdom would have existed primarily in the minds of the aristocracy
who ruled the regions and bound them together through their family connections
(Sindbæk 2008, 193–200). Thus even though Skåne and Vestfold (and other areas)
would have had their own aristocracy, the conception of a wider Danish identity
could have spread to the rulers of those regions through the ties of marriage and
friendship connecting the members of the aristocracy. In turn, the followers of the
aristocracy would have associated themselves with this prestigious identity, gradu-
ally transforming the myths and stories of the deeds of a small elite into the history
of a new people (Geary 2002, 108). This ‘trickle down’ of an identity from a noble
core has been called the ‘kernel of tradition’ in works on ethnogenesis.9

9
In German, Traditionskern (Wenskus 1961, 75–77). Geary defines the kernel of tradition
as the ‘shared common ancestry myths, cultural traditions […] legal system, and leaders’ (2002, 74)
which connected members of the community to ancient divine origins and stories of past heroes
and were carried principally by members of a royal dynasty and the aristocracy (and in a Denmark
that was riven with internal strife, much of the aristocracy would have had a connection to the (or
38 Paul Gazzoli

There is no perceptible continuity between Godofrid’s kingdom and the

Danish polity that emerged in the mid-tenth century; but nor is there much per-
ceptible discontinuity. Rather than attempting to construct a narrative of the
period from the information he was given by King Sven Estridsen, Adam of
Bremen merely states that it would be impossible to say how many Danish kings
there were in this period (AB, i.52, p. 53).10 By the early tenth century we again
have signs of a kingdom in southern Jylland ruled by one Chnuba, who was de-
feated by Emperor Heinrich I in 934 (Widukind i.40; Annales Corbienses s.a. 934).
He was followed by his son Siktrik who is commemorated in two runestones from
Hedeby (DR 2, 4).11 Adam cites Sven Estridsen as telling him that a certain Harde-
gon, son of Suein, then came from Nortmannia and expelled this dynasty (AB, i.52,
p. 53).12 Given the names Hardegon (Hardeknud) and Suein (Sven), this dynasty
can probably be identified with that of Gorm and Harald, which employed these
names in the tenth and eleventh centuries. Just what form the Danish kingdom,
or kingdoms, took in the later ninth and early tenth centuries is impossible to say,
but by the time of Ohthere and Wulfstan at least the name Denmark had become
established. This came about as nobles in various parts of what would later con-
stitute the kingdom of that name, through various kinds of alliances whose full

a) royal dynasty). This concept, along with the notion of ‘ethnogenesis’ it is part of, has both
evolved and been criticized a good deal since Wenskus’s day, most notably in the papers in Gillett
(2002). For a response to the criticisms, see Pohl’s contribution to the same volume, and Wolfram
(2008), especially pp. 792–97 on Traditionskern. Both of these responses stress that a Traditions-
kern should not be seen as exclusive of other traditions or factors, or immutable: it is in this spirit
I invoke it, without wishing to force the Danes into a prescriptive model of ethnogenesis.
10
Adam’s attitude can also be explained by his remark that it is sufficient to know that these
kings were all pagan; as this did not reflect positively on the missionary responsibilities of the see
of Hamburg-Bremen, Adam naturally had no interest in expanding on the period.
11
One of these has been interpreted as showing Swedish influence in the letter-forms, thus
confirming Adam’s story of the Swedish origin of the dynasty (AB, i.52, p. 53), but as Sawyer
(1988, 218) points out, this is very slim evidence, and in any event Swedish influence can hardly
be surprising in Hedeby, given its connections to Birka.
12
There is no point in trying to identify this with Norway or Normandy: all we can say is that
one dynasty displaced another. Adam seems to use Nortmannia to refer to the entire Scandinavian
peninsula; thus it could theoretically refer even to Skåne in this case. Sawyer (1988, 219) suggested
that the kings involved were Danes in exile in Sweden or Norway, rather than themselves originat-
ing there, but this question is of little meaning in a world of fluid ethnicities. As the victorious
dynasty’s centre of power lay at Jelling in north-central Jylland, Adam’s report of their arrival from
Nortmannia may be a garbled recollection of their conquest of Hedeby and southern Jylland from
the north.
DENEMEARC, TANMAURK ALA, AND CONFINIA NORDMANNORUM 39

complexities are lost to us, sought to establish their claim as the rightful heirs to the
legacy of the kingdom on the Frankish border that had contended with Charle-
magne. The claim of Harald’s stone was not a claim to a specific territory linked to
his mother’s legacy, but rather to the far more important, though less material
inheritance of Godofrid.
Thus in the early ninth century, when the Franks conquered Saxony and estab-
lished a border with the Scandinavian peoples, whom they called Dani or Nord-
manni, a kingdom on the borders arose around a dynasty which displayed its au-
thority through the pictorial invocation of Scandinavian motifs on coins reminted
from Carolingian ones. This kingdom comprised a core area of southern Jylland
and Fyn and may have held power through various intermediaries eastwards to
Skåne and northwards to Viken. The name Denmark, I conclude, was adopted
from Frankish usage and referred simply to the area near the borders of their
empire inhabited by Danes or Northmen, but by the later ninth century it was in
use by Scandinavians themselves. The ‘Danishness’ of this realm was a political
identity, which could subsume smaller groups (such as South Danes or Jutes).
Under Harald, we can see the traces of a new Danish ethnogenesis, happening
under external pressure like that of the early ninth century. The German empire
had been struggling with the Danes’ Slavic allies and with the Danes themselves
over the course of the tenth century. As Harald engaged with this threat, he de-
clared his people Christian and came to an arrangement with the empire, in turn
re-creating the Danes as a Christian people and a (would-be) European state. This
ethnogenesis is presented in Harald’s Jelling stone. The Danes are a people united
by Harald’s achievements of Christianization and conquest, and in the memory of
his forebears: the stone’s explicit purpose is the commemoration of Gorm and
Thyre, even though more space is devoted to Harald’s claims. The continuity of
the name ‘Denmark’ shows that the name which had arisen for a kingdom on the
border of the Carolingian Empire still carried prestige, and that rulers and their
followers wanted to be associated with it and claim its inheritance.
Attempting to define the geographical area of Harald’s ‘Denmark’ is difficult.
His kingdom certainly included all of Jylland and Fyn and extended eastwards into
Sjælland. The Trelleborg fortresses, all built on the same basic plan at the same
time, and the bridge at Ravning Enge date to his reign (dendrochronologically
dated to 981: Bonde and Christensen 1982, 145–47; Christiansen 1982, 108).
These structures are convincing evidence for a well-developed and strong royal
authority, active in Jylland, Fyn, Sjælland, and possibly Skåne; another one of these
forts has been found on Skåne’s south-western tip at Trelleborg. Although this was
built on the same plan at the same time, some important differences suggest that
40 Paul Gazzoli

Harald’s authority may not have been exercised directly here as it was in the west
(Sawyer 1994, 13; Gelting 2007, 82).13 By c. 1000 there is evidence, in the form of
the Karlevi stone, that Öland could be considered part of Denmark, even though
it is described by Wulfstan as belonging to the Swedes and would later be included
within the medieval kingdom of Sweden. This highlights the fluid and mutable
nature of ethnic identity in the period. Similarly, Harald’s kingdom did not include
Blekinge, a later territory of the medieval kingdom of Denmark, but for Harald
and his contemporaries it was no less ‘all Denmark’ for including the regions it did.
Harald was not laying claim to an area so much as an idea.

13
On the site in Skåne, see Jacobsson (1998, 17–21): the fort is ‘not quite circular’, and lacks
the timber buildings which stood inside the ramparts of the other forts.
DENEMEARC, TANMAURK ALA, AND CONFINIA NORDMANNORUM 41

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