1660 state of emergency in Denmark

A state of emergency was declared by the King of Denmark, Frederick III of Denmark in 1660. Its purpose was to put pressure on the nobility of the first estate, which were reluctant to a proposal from the second and third estates to replace the elective monarchy with hereditary monarchy.

Background

Prior to the state of emergency, Denmark had an elective monarchy. The king was elected upon the death of the previous king by a council of noblemen known as the Riksråd, which also functioned as a counterbalance to the king's power while they were in office.

Frederik III was elected king in 1648, following the death of his older brother, Christian IV of Denmark. However, the political situation surrounding his election was tense, and following a breif period of interregnum he had to offer several concessions to the riksråd in return for their vote. Part of this process was a concession fixing the number of nobles on the council to 23, where previously the number had been chosen by the king. These concessions meant that Frederik had limited use of his powers early on in his reign, up until the late 1650s where using some clever political manouvering the young king was able to oust two of his primary rivals from the council: Hannibal Sehested (governor) in 1651 over mismanagement of funds as the govenor of norway, and Corfitz Ulfeldt in 1657 over treasonous conduct in helping sweden during the Dano-Swedish War (1657–58). This paved the way for him to begin to solidify his power.

First war with Sweden

Celebration in Frederiksborg Castle to the Treaty of Roskilde. Painting (1658) by Erik Dahlbergh.

On 6 June 1654, Charles X Gustav became the king of Sweden. This was a source of concern to Frederick, who considered that the new Swedish king's temprament would lead to much agression. An opportunity came when in July 1655, the Swedish king started a campaign against poland, the Polish War. This was a source of relief to Frederick, who was concerned about a direct attack on Denmark. He saw this as a distinct opportunity, and with his power in the Riksråd secured, he was able to convince them on 23 February 1657 to grant significant subsidies for a mass military mobilisation for a strike on Sweden while their army was overseas in Poland. On 23 April 1657, he got permission from the council to attack Swedish holdings in germany, and war was formally declared on 5 June 1657. However, this proved to be a mis-step for the Danish king - the Swedish army quickly abandoned their polish campaign and invaded jutland, and then marched quickly across the frozen sea to unexpectedly conquer the rest of Denmark in the March Across the Belts.

This was a crushing defeat for Frederick, who was forced to sign over almost a third of the territory he controlled in the Treaty of Roskilde. One of the provisions of the treaty was to renounce any anti-swedish alliances, and a second condition was that Denmark must provide troops to fight in Sweden's wars, effectively making Denmark a Vassal of Sweden. Frederick, seeing the precarity of his position, resolved to make amends with his former enemy, inviting Charles X Gustav to his palace as an honoured guest, throwing banquets in his honour. The two kings were observed to speak amicably, and signs pointed towards friendship in the near future.

The Assault on Copenhagen in 1659 by Frederik Christian Lund, 1887, Det Nationalhistorike Museum, Frederiksborg.

Second war with Sweden

However, peace did not last long. The Swedish king was not content with his territorial gains, and made a surprise landing in Zealand on 17 July 1658. Nobody had forseen the possibility of such a surprise attack, and the defences of the Danish capital, Copenhagen, were not well prepared or garrisoned at all. The situation seemed dire, but impressively the Danish king made a name for himself by dismissing advice given to him by the council to flee the city, famously insisiting that he would "dø i sin rede", or "die in my nest". The king personally led the defence of the city. The Danes had only three weeks of warning of the invasion, and the unprepared and dilapadated line of defence had at first only 2,000 troops garrisoned. However, the city was led well and by September all the breaches in the wall had been repaired, cannons had been hoisted into positons around the walls, and the defending troops had swelled to over 7,000.

The Swedish king had originally planned to directly assualt the cpaital, but upon seeing the improved defences, began a protracted seige. The seige was broken just over a year after it had begun when the dutch fleet came to copenhagen's aid, defeating the swedish naval fleet at the Battle of the Sound and cutting off the beseiging swedish army from supply. The dutch then assisted in liberating the rest of the Danish isles, and shortly afterwards the Treaty of Copenhagen (1660) was signed on 27th of May 1660.

The king's well known and valiant defence as well as refusing to abandon his people caused him to become immensely popular with the people, setting the stage for his consolidation of power.

Declaration of Emergency

Paying homage to the hereditary king in front of the Castle of Copenhagen. Painted by Wolfgang Heimbach, 1666

In September 1660 a Declaration of Emergency was proclaimed. This called the estates together to meet to discuss problems in the realm. At the meeting obstensibly the estates were to discuss the financial problems caused by the wars. At this meeting, Frederick played the estates against each other, and managed to leverage his popularity with the people in order to gain support for the proposal to switch to hereditary monarchy. In addition to this, he was also able to convince the council to annul his earlier Haandfæstning, leaving him without any explicit limits to his power until 14 November 1665, where a new document, the Kongeloven, was forged. This document was the first assertion of Divine right of kings in europe in a written constitution, stating that the king "skal være hereffter og aff alle undersaatterne holdes og agtes for det ypperste og høyeste hoffved her paa Jorden offver alle Menniskelige Lowe, og der ingen anden hoffved og dommere kiender offver sig enten i Geistlige eller Verdslige Sager uden Gud alleene." - the king "shall from this day forth be revered and considered the most perfect and supreme person on the Earth by all his subjects, standing above all human laws and having no judge above his person, neither in spiritual nor temporal matters, except God alone." This in effect gave the king the right to overrule and abolish any other position of power unilaterally, which he then used to abolish the Riksråd council, leaving the king without any limitations to his power.