Kirsten Munk - Separation

Separation

As the king's health declined in 1625, so did his temperament and his marriage.

In 1627, Kirsten fell in love with a German cavalry captain in her husband's service, the Rhinegrave Otto Ludwig of Salm-Kyrburg (1597–1634). The couple are alleged to have had encounters at Funen, Kronborg, and Copenhagen. Eventually, word came to the king of his wife's affair. Supposedly, after seeing two maids sleeping outside her locked door, he got a footman to engrave the date on a stone and did not have sex with Kirsten again. Her last daughter was conceived 10 months after this and he refused to accept her as legitimate, instead calling her "Miss Leftover". In the end, he formally charged Kirsten with adultery, witchcraft, and consorting with a magician in Hamburg.

His mother-in-law sought to mitigate the king's indignation–several of her granddaughters were then engaged to marry Denmark's leading nobles–by encouraging him to engage in an affair with her daughter's lady-in-waiting, Vibeke Kruse. Although the king did father children with Kruse who later became political rivals of Kirsten Munck's children and in-laws, he continued with the divorce and exiled her to Jutland in 1629.

Kirsten herself refused to admit her adultery. After an interrogation, she was kept at Stjernholm in Horsens and then placed under house arrest in Boller in 1637. This confinement continued until 1647, allegedly owing to Vibeke Kruse's encouragement to the king to remain strict. However, Kirsten was never brought to trial despite repeated threats to that effect from the king and her good relationship with her children and in-laws led to their intercession with the king and the removal of her confinement.