ERIK PONTOPPIDAN (1698-1764), Danish author, was born at Aarhus on the 24th of August 1698.
Ansgar preached in Denmark from 826 to 861, but it was not till after the subsidence of the Viking raids that Adaldag, archbishop of Hamburg, could open a new and successful mission, which resulted in the erection of the bishoprics of Schleswig, Ribe and Aarhus (c. 948), though the real conversion of Denmark must be dated from the baptism of King Harold Bluetooth (960).
It is uniformly low, the highest elevation in the whole country, the Himmelbjerg near Aarhus in eastern Jutland, being little more than 500 ft.