Saxo Grammaticus completes Gesta Danorum

1208

The Danish cleric finished his sixteen-book history of the Danes, written in ornate Latin prose that would have flattered Cicero. Among its tales was the story of Amleth, a prince who feigned madness to avenge his father's murder. Four centuries later, Shakespeare would find it and call it Hamlet. The chronicle remains Denmark's foundational national narrative and a treasure of medieval Nordic legend.