Ulrike Eleonora of Denmark

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Ulrike Eleonora (1656 - 1693), was the daughter of King Frederick III of Denmark and his wife Sophia Amelia of Brunswick-Lüneburg. On May 6, 1680, she married to King Charles XI of Sweden. She had seven children, of whom only three survived her, a son Charles, and two daughters, Hedvig Sofia and Ulrika Eleonora.

Queen Ulrike Eleonora is in Sweden often called "the elder" to separate her from her daughter, the future queen regent. She was promised to Charles XI very young. During the Scanian War between Denmark and Sweden 1675-1679 she was encouraged to break the engagement, and was even considered as a possible wife by the German-Roman Emperor, but she refused to break the engagement. She gained a reputation for exhibiting kindness to Swedish prisoners during the war.

[edit] Life as queen

Ulrike Eleonora was described as beautiful and kind and was received with entusiasm in Stockholm, and according to legend, her husband was never unfaitful to her, which was unusual for a king during this era; when he died, he told his mother he had not been happy since his wife died. However, he was also said to have been by nature cold and unable to show her the love he felt for her, and above all, he was forever under the strong influence of his mother, Hedwig Eleonora of Holstein-Gottorp, who never surrended the position of queen to her daughter-in-law. When the foreign ambassadors paid their respect, they always came to Hedwig Eleonora first, and then to Ulrike Eleonora.

Neglected by her husband and under the shadow of her mother-in-law in the court, she is reputed to have been mostly unhappy; her happiest days was when her brother-in-law and sister the duke and duchess of Holstein-Gottorp came to visit, and the days when she and her husband and children visited the simple manor her husband used a relaxation place; here she enjoyed a simple life away from the court, who was in fact her stepmothers, and developed an interest in painting.

In 1690, her husband named her as possible regent if he should die under his sons minority, but her health declined by the many childbirths and she died three years later. She was completely in the shadow of her husbands mother, and is remembered in Swedish history mostly for this sad fact.