Eric IV of Denmark - Rule

Rule

His rule was marked by bitter conflicts and civil wars against his brothers. Especially he fought his brother, Duke Abel of Schleswig who seems to have wanted an independent position and who was supported by the counts of Holstein. Eric also fought the Scanian peasants, who rebelled because of his hard taxes, among other things, on ploughs. The number of ploughs a man owned was used as a measure of his wealth (more ploughs, more farmland). This gave the king the epithet "plough-penny", Danish, Plovpenning).

Eric had only been king for about a year when he first came into conflict with his brother, Duke Abel of Schleswig, in 1242. The conflict lasted for two years before the brothers agreed on a truce in 1244 and made plans for a joint crusade to Estonia.

At the same time Eric faced trouble from the religious orders who insisted that they were immune from taxes that Eric might assess. Eric wanted the church lands taxed as any other land holder would be. The pope sent a nuncio to negotiate between the king and the bishops at Odense in 1245. Excommunication was threatened for anyone, great or small who trespassed upon the ancient rights and privileges of the church. It was a clear warning to Eric that the church would not tolerate his continued insistence at assessing church property for tax purposes.

Enfuriated, King Eric directed his rage at Bishop Niels Stigsen of Roskilde who fled Denmark the same year. Eric confiscated the bishopric's properties in Zealand, including the emerging city of Copenhagen, as compensation for his troubles with Abel. In spite of intervention from Pope Innocent IV who advocated the reinstatement of the bishop and the return of the properties to the diocese, the dispute could not be resolved. Niels Stigsen died in 1249 in the Clairvaux Abbey and the properties were not restored to the diocese before after the death of King Eric in 1250.

In the meantime, the conflict between King Eric and his brothers had broken out again in 1246. The conflict started when Eric invaded Holstein in an attempt to restore his father's control of the county. Duke Abel of Schleswig, himself married to a daughter of Adolf IV, Count of Holstein and former guardian of his brothers-in-law, the two young counts of Holstein John I and Gerhard I, forced King Eric to abandon his conquest. The following year, Abel and the Holsteiners stormed into Jutland and Funen, burning and pillaging as far north as Randers and Odense. Abel was supported by the hanseatic city of Lübeck, as well as by his brothers Christopher, Lord of Lolland and Falster and Canute, Duke of Blekinge.

Eric retaliated immediately, reconquering the city of Ribe and occupying Abel’s patrimonial city of Svendborg the same year. In 1247, he captured the castle of Arreskov on Funen, as well as taking Christopher and Canute prisoners.

A truce was arranged by Eric's sister Sophie of Brandenburg which left Eric in firm control of all of Denmark.

In 1249 the peasants in Scania rose in rebellion against the plow tax. The king restored order with help from Zealand, but the church, Duke Abel, and the German counts in southern Jutland were pushed into an erstwhile alliance against the king.