Rosenborg

HISTORY OF ROSENBORG CASTLE

133

III

This first castle was still a very modest dwelling for the

king and queen, and consequently Christian the Fourth soon

began to th ink of making extensions. In fact, in 1610 he had

fo u n d a t io n s la id fo r a r e s id e n t ia l pa lace o f such con 

s id e ra b le d im en s ion s that, together w ith the small „summer

house“ that was already standing, it would have been at least

as big in ground area as F re d e r ik s b o rg . The subsequent

war w ith Sweden (1611—1612), and the unexpected death of

the queen (1612) prevented the carrying out of his plans; and

after the successful conclusion of peace w ith Sweden (Ja

nuary 1613), the king simply le n g th e n e d th e sm a lle r , b u t

now w e llfo u n d e d b u ild in g s ym m e tr ic a lly abou t a new

m id d le a x is , so th a t the new cas tle re c e iv e d tw o

p r o je c t io n s on the east s ide and a new „ ro u n d “ (oc

tagona l? ) s ta ir - to w e r a t the m id d le of the w es t façade.

For the present, then, the house was one of two stories,

and its only spire was on the stair-tower, as was the case

w ith the first Rosenborg, A t this stage (1613—1614) the

castle resembled Ib s t r u p , the country* residence on which

Christian the Fourth had been working so zealously in the

foregoing years after 1609. When the spire on the stairtower

was completed — and therefore no longer appears in the

accounts — the king held a „magnificent feast" (the 22nd

of July 1615). By that time, however, he had already (since

February of that year) ordered two spires to be raised on

the projections to the east; and before these had been built

up his ideas about the castle grew to such an extent that

he determined to build an e n t ir e ly new s to ry on to i t