Dragomir the Bohemian came to Denmark in 1205, bore the King a son, Valdemar, and died two years later, probably in childbirth. From the first she was the people’s darling; her Slav name was changed to Dagmar (Dag-mø = day-maid or light-bringer) “by reason,” says a contemporary chronicler, “of her great beauty.”
The Ballads of her Bridal and Death were probably composed by the next generation, and have little pretension to historical accuracy. Bishop Valdemar, for instance, was not the Queen’s uncle, but the King’s first cousin—son of Knud Magnusson, whose sister was Valdemar’s mother. In consequence of an attempt to usurp the throne, as the German Emperor’s vassal, he was thrown into prison at Søberg, where he lay for fourteen years. His release in 1205 was due to the Pope’s intervention, aided, as a monkish chronicle puts it, “by the loving representations of Bishop Andreas and others”—but the people, perhaps with some reason, pictured Dagmar as the peacemaker.
A second Ballad of her bridal describes her wooing by Sir Strange as the King’s proxy:
“I saw a sail fare o’er the Sound,
—So many a pennon of gold—
There sailed he, Sir Strange, with Dagmar the Queen.”
Little is known of Valdemar’s second Queen, Berengaria, except that she too was beautiful. But, since she came of a contentious and covetous family, the popular view of her character may be accurate enough. The “binding the harbours with iron bands” means the closing of them with chains, so that tribute might be exacted from incoming vessels. The Ballad’s account of her death—a relishing piece of poetical justice—has no foundation in fact.
III
QUEEN DAGMAR’S BRIDAL, 1205
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