‘Liden Gunver’

The Little Mermaid statue inspired by the Hans Christian Andersen tale is well known in the streets of Copenhagen, but it is not the city’s only merfolk-related monument.

Wander around the gardens of Rosenborg Castle and you may stumble across a somber bronze statue of a girl called Liden Gunver or “Little Gunver.” It is the title of a song written by Johannes Ewald and Johann Hartmann for their 1780 musical The Fishermen.

In the play, the titular fishermen sing about the tragic fate of poor little Gunver, a girl who fell in love with a deceitful merman and was lured into the depths of the sea. In 1899, it was commemorated with a statue by well-known sculptor Theobald Stein. In 1909, a bronze cast was made and installed in the castle garden, where it still stands today.