We have no wish to pursue farther the list of Danish kings, who, according to Saxo, reigned prior to our Saviour’s birth. Some of them, probably, never reigned at all. Others, certainly, reigned _after_ that event. Others, again, ruled at the same time, over different provinces of the kingdom. The reigns of many whom Saxo places before the Christian era are identical with those which the best Danish writers regard as posterior; and the actions attributed to both are substantially the same. All writers admit that Denmark had no monarch before Skiold, the son of Odin; indeed, it had none for some generations afterwards: for there is room to believe that even his authority was more of a sacerdotal than of a temporal character. In virtue of this character he might, and probably did, claim a twofold sovereignty over the peninsula and islands; but that sovereignty was never virtually exercised—it was one merely nominal. Several of the islands had their separate governors, whom Saxo calls kings; and Jutland, as we have seen in the sketch of Hamlet’s life, had them also. The men whom personal qualities elevated above the rest, became chiefs; and when one chief had others subject to him, he assumed the regal title. There were kings of various kinds. We read of petty kings (sma-konungur, or fylke-konungur); of sea kings, island kings, and cape kings. The name of the last may require an explanation. They were neither more nor less than the pirate chiefs, who lived in caverns or in huts near the promontories, ready, at any moment, to sally forth and seize the unsuspecting mariner. Thus there were kings enough scattered over the seas, the forests, the mountains, the maritime coasts of the north. Probably all those in the Danish islands might yield a nominal homage, at least, to the one that reigned in Scania in Zealand. But no dependence whatever can be placed on the list of Danish kings prior to what we now call the historic times; that is, to about the eighth century of our era. It is astonishing to see how little judgment has been exercised by the historians of this country in regard to the old northern kings. Thus, the authors of the “Universal History,” not satisfied with giving the names of the sovereigns from Dan to Frode III., have been so far misled by the Latin historians of Denmark, as to fix the precise year before Christ when each began his reign.[59]