Copenhagen - Christiansborg Palace Slot

From the National Museum in Copenhagen, cross the Frederiksholm Kanal to the island of Slotsholm on which stands Christiansborg Palace, seat of the Danish Government and Parliament (Folketing). This building also houses the Foreign Ministry, the Supreme Court and the Queen's Audience Chambers. Parliament and the Royal Rooms can be visited on guided tours.

The palace occupies the site on which Bishop Absalon built the earliest fortifications of the city in 1167. Ruins of the bishop's castle, which was destroyed in the 14th C., as well as of the medieval fortress which passed to the crown under Erich von Pommern, were discovered when the present palace was being built and can now be seen by visitors.

The foundation stone of the first palace to be erected on the site of the original castle was laid by Christian VI in 1733, but the building was not completely finished and was subsequently destroyed by fire in 1794. Of that huge palace of four wings only the Riding School survives. A new palace was built in the first 20 years of the 19th C. to designs by the Classical master architect C. F. Hansen, but was used only rarely as a royal residence. In 1849 it became the home of the new Parliament. In 1884 this palace, too, was burned down. Among the sections which survived was the palace church, the dome of which was decorated with angels by Bertel Thorvaldsen. The "third" Palace of Christiansborg was erected between 1907 and 1928 to the design of Thorvald Jorgensen. The facade of the four-winged palace is of dressed Bornholm granite and its tower is 90m/295ft high.