Danes cheer their queen’s 40th jubilee

Published on Sunday 15 January 2012 00:00

TENS of thousands of flag-waving Danes braved near-freezing temperatures yesterday to cheer Denmark’s popular figurehead queen as she celebrated 40 years on the throne.

Escorted by mounted Hussars, Queen Margrethe travelled in an 1840 horse-drawn carriage through Copenhagen to a reception at the City Hall, attended by King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden, Norway’s King Harald and Queen Sonja, the family of the deposed monarch, Constantine, of Greece and Icelandic president Olafur Ragnar Grimsson.

Later, Margrethe and her husband, Prince Henrik, waved from a balcony as thousands of people on the City Hall Square sang a jubilee song and cheered.

The 71-year-old head of Europe’s oldest monarchy began the day by laying a wreath at the tomb of her father, King Frederik IX.

Margrethe, whose powers are largely ceremonial, became queen on 14 January 1972, after Frederik died, aged 72.

The next day, a 31-year-old, fragile-looking woman, dressed in black, stared at tens of thousands of people from a parliament balcony. At her side was former prime minister Jens-Otto Krag who proclaimed to the crowd: “King Frederik IX is dead. Long live Her Majesty Queen Margrethe II.”

Through the past 40 years, Danes have held an affinity with the Danish royals who have remained largely scandal-free. Known affectionately as “Daisy,” the queen is widely popular, with a recent poll showing that nearly eight out of 10 Danes are in favour of their monarchy.

That makes the Scandinavian country’s royal court “the most popular in Europe”, according to Lars Hovbakke Soerensen, a historian at the University of Copenhagen who has studied the role of the monarchy in modern society. Queen Margrethe has been able to “modernise an ageing monarchy and adapt it to the evolving society”, he explained.

Her popularity has soared since the 1980s when she began establishing herself as a talented artist. A multilingual intellectual, she has also taken part in several elaborate translation projects, including the 1981 Danish version of Simone de Beauvoir’s All Men are Mortal, which she translated under a pseudonym in co-operation with her husband.

Though some believe she should retire and hand over duties to her son, 42-year-old Crown Prince Frederik, Margrethe has stated she thinks that staying on is all part of the job description in a hereditary monarchy.

“It is a commitment that I actually feel very comfortable with,” she told a news conference.