History
For the most part, Denmark followed the style of other European nations, with government-employed executioners, called skarpretter (headsman) in Denmark. The headsman had the status of a Royal government employee.
The last public execution was conducted in 1882 on Lolland, when Anders Nielsen was executed. Jens Nielsen was the last man executed under the penal code. He was executed on 8 November 1892 in the courtyard of the State Prison of Horsens, convicted on three counts of attempted murder. He was beheaded with an axe. Both executions were conducted by Jens Carl Theodor Seistrup, the second-to-last executioner and the last actively to do executions for the Government of Denmark. The last headsman in office was Carl Peter Hermann Christensen who held the position from 27 August 1906 until 1 April 1926, but never performed any executions.
Starting during the first decennia of the 1800s, death penalties were increasingly commuted to life imprisonment by the Crown. After 1892, death sentences were handed down but not carried out. This also applied to the last death sentence which was handed down in a civil court on 13 June 1928.
Read more about this topic: Capital Punishment In Denmark
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“If you look at history you’ll find that no state has been so plagued by its rulers as when power has fallen into the hands of some dabbler in philosophy or literary addict.”
—Desiderius Erasmus (c. 1466–1536)
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—Henry James (1843–1916)
“... in a history of spiritual rupture, a social compact built on fantasy and collective secrets, poetry becomes more necessary than ever: it keeps the underground aquifers flowing; it is the liquid voice that can wear through stone.”
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