Perhaps a reminder of the days when Danes were several tribes who settled in Jutland and the islands with a common language and culture.

In addition to the pantheon in Old Norse religion (Æsir), the world was filled with less glorious beings who had more of an impact on a regular basis.

The fields, forests, moors and the sea were inhabited by various spirits, sprites, demons, and monsters that lurked in the shadows.

Daily life incorporated rituals to encourage luck, health, and wealth and avert evil, envy, and accidents.

Beech groves of magnificent height and age would be akin to outdoor cathedrals where silence reigned when the help of the gods was invoked.

High hills in a country with no real mountains would be another natural place that would draw people to worship.

While people other parts of northern Europe worshiped stone or wooden images in sacred enclosures, nothing like that has been recorded in Denmark.

As far as is recorded, the first Christian missionary to set foot in Denmark, probably only penetrating the south, perhaps Hedeby in Schleswig, was St. Willibrord (658-739), a Saxon monk from Northumbria with strong connections to the imperial court of the Carolingian kings.

The collapse of his mission to Friesland in 695 left him without anyone else to convert, so he turned north and went to the pagan Danes.

All we know is that he failed to convert anyone, but succeeded in bringing back some young men whom he hoped to teach and train to become the next generation of missionaries to the north.

Virtually nothing is known of Denmark for the next 120 years when the first successful missionaries brought Christian ideas and beliefs to the Danes.

[1] Missionaries from the combined Archdiocese of Hamburg Bremen in Germany were specifically tasked with bringing Christianity to the people of the North.

In 1080 King Canute IV gave several farms to the diocese to fund the bishopric and chapter.

The cathedral was built of Danish granite and sandstone in Romanesque style with half-rounded arches supporting a flat timber ceiling.

The church consisted of a long nave, two side aisles, and short, stubby transepts, and a choir with a rounded apse.

Almost immediately miracles were reported and people flocked to Viborg to pray at Kjeld's grave.

Due to the efforts of Bishop Niels I, Kjeld was pronounced a saint by Pope Clement III in 1188.

In unusual fashion his reliquary was hung from the vaulting of the chapel built for him on the north side of the church.

Erik was involved in a feud with his cousins and some of Denmark's powerful noble families, notably Counts Marsk Stig and Jacob of Halland.

Tradition has it that after a long day's hunting, the king fell asleep in a barn in the village of Finderup, near Viborg.

Studies of the king's remains indicate that he was "mangled"; the body was not just stabbed but hacked to death (Danish: maltraktet).

Bishop Friis was unable to cope with the rising demands for changes in the liturgy and the host of issues that separated Protestants and Catholics all over Europe at the time.

27 June 1726 the city and the church suffered devastating fire damage leaving the bare walls and vaulting standing.

The towers were capped with short "coffee pots" according to locals who remembered the high spires before the fire.

The building was closely patterned after the ancient Romanesque cathedral at Lund in southern Sweden.

The sandstone pulpit was carved for the new cathedral by the sculptor Rosenfalk modeled after the work of H Bissen.