Biking around the Battle of Lund

Attraction Full-Day Bike Excursion
40 kilometres
ca. 5-6 hours
High-resolution map
GPX-fil (route guide) In September 1675, Denmark declared war on Sweden. This was the start of what has been known as the Scanian (skånska) war, which lasted until 1679. On December 4, 1676, the war escalated, and the battle known as the Battle of Lund took place in the fields north of Lund. Around 3,000 soldiers lost their lives in the battle. This battle still fascinates today, and many people want to see the places where it took place, trying to understand what happened. However, the roads to some of the places are closed to vehicular traffic, so you cannot go there by car, but you can visit them by cycle, following the directions in this visitor's guide. You will be able to visit 14 places where the Battle of Lund occurred in different ways. At the same time, you will cycle along nice, carefully chosen cycle paths, experience beautiful nature and part of the lovely Scanian agricultural landscape.

It is important to use a bike with good tires, so you don't get a puncture. As far as possible, we have chosen roads that are safe and nice to cycle on, but there is vehicular traffic on several of the roads. Therefore, be careful not to encounter an accident, and always use the bike path when available. On the travel information page, there is information about where you can rent a bike in Lund.

Kävlinge Golf restaurant
(information in Swedish)
• Web site
• Facebook After almost half the distance, you will pass Kävlinge golf course and there is a possibility to have coffee or lunch at Kävlinge Golf restaurant. See the restaurant's website for more information and opening hours. There is also a small kiosk, which is open every day during the summer months. There you can buy smaller dishes, like sandwiches, hot dogs, candy and ice cream. In addition, there are tables where you can sit and eat if you prefer to bring your own packed lunch. It takes about three hours to cycle to Kävlinge Golf course and then another three hours before you are back in Lund, so we recommend that you bring, coffee or fruit as a snack as well, and don't forget to bring water to drink.

In the map below, you can see where there are public toilets, and at those places you can also replenish water. It takes about two hours to get to the first toilet, but then there are toilets regularly along the bike ride.

One of the signs along the way, telling about the Battle of Lund.

In a few places along the road there are signs telling about the Battle of Lund, that you can read. However, there aren´t signs at all places that appear in this visitor's guide, and some signs are not placed at the right position. The information on the signs has not been updated based on new information, so sometimes, the information on the signs is no longer fully correct. However, since this visitor's guide is digital, it is updated regularly when new information about the Battle of Lund becomes available. Therefore, it is better to read what is written in this visitor's guide, and the places pointed out here, when the signs do not say the same thing or are found at other locations.

The map below shows the route of the biking tour, and the places described in this visitor's guide, as well as where toilets and places to stop for lunch can be found. You can open and save the high-resolution map image in your mobile phone and use it for clearer directions. At each place description, there is a link to Google Maps if you want to use that instead. It is good to be aware that the biking route does not follow the chronological order of how the battle took place.

This visitor's guide has been produced based on the Swedish book about the Battle of Lund, by Claes Wahlöö and Göran Larsson, and the film about the Battle of Lund as primary sources. It has also been updated with new information from the archaeologist Kennet Stark. Before telling about the different places, which you will pass when biking around the Battle of Lund, it is good to know something about the Scanian War, in which the Battle of Lund took part. But firstly, a few words about the myth of the bloody Battle of Lund.

The myth of the bloodiest battle in the history

The Battle of Lund fascinates many people still to this day. It has long been described as the bloodiest battle in history, with around 9,000 fallen soldiers. That would imply that almost half of the combatants fell on that day, and even higher death rates have occurred in some sources.

In connection with leading archaeological investigations at Stångby station village (8) in 2015 and 2017, archaeologist Kennet Stark reviewed the information about fallen soldiers in historical sources. He found that the information about the total number of dead probably had been misinterpreted. Most of the dead did not fall during the battle, they died the weeks before, of diseases, starvation, and hardship in the soldier camps.

The information in the historical sources about the number of dead seems to stem from the number of buried reported by the Swedish court chaplain Haqvin Spegel. He received the information from the farmers, who were ordered to bury the dead. The number Spegel reported was 8,357, mentioned as the number buried, not the number fallen during the battle. Over the course of history, the number reported by Spegel has been interpreted as how many soldiers that fall in the battle on 4 December 1676, and so the myth of the bloody Battle of Lund arose.

It is not possible to know exactly how many soldiers that fall during the battle itself, but it seems to be around 3,000. The other 5,000 to 6,000 died of diseases before the battle. Just over a thousand of the soldiers fallen in the battle were Swedes and about two thousand were Danes.

The Scanian War 1675–1679

Through a peace treaty between Sweden and Denmark, signed in Roskilde Cathedral in 1658, Lund and Scania became Swedish, after belonging to Denmark for almost 700 years. However, Denmark wanted to repossess the lost lands. When Sweden lost a minor battle against German troops at Fehrbellin, northwest of today Berlin in June 1675, the Danes saw their chance. In September 1675, Denmark declared war on Sweden, and that was the beginning of the war known as the Scanian War, which lasted until 1679.

As reinforcement, Sweden sent soldiers from all over the country to Scania. Some soldiers walked all the way from northern Sweden (Norrbotten). Others travelled from Stockholm on the royal ship The Crown. However, on June 1, 1676, the ship collided with an allied Danish and Dutch fleet, led by the Dutch Admiral General Cornelis Tromp, outside the southern tip of the island Öland and wrecked.

The uniforms the Swedish troops should have worn during the Battle of Lund was on the royal ship Kronan. At that time, uniforms were not uniform like today. Each regiment had its own uniform, and that was the same in the Danish army. To be able to distinguish friends from enemy, the Swedes used a straw branch in their hat band or on their arm. The Danes used a white ribbon in the same way.

A painting from around 1675 portraying Cornelis Tromp. On June 27, 1676, the Dutch sailors, led by Cornelis Tromp, carried out a diversionary maneuver in Ystad to lure the Swedish troops there. Two days later, on June 29, a large Danish invasion force with 14,500 soldiers landed in Råå south of Helsingborg. During the months to follow, the Dutch and Danish troops managed to retake almost all Scania, except for the Malmö Castle.

On August 17, 1676, lost the Danish troops a battle against Swedish troops at Fyllebro, south of Halmstad. The Danish army then went back to Scania to avoid further combat, instead they planned to go into winter quarters. But the Swedish troops followed, and in November 1676 both the Danish and Swedish armies arrived at the area north of Lund.

1) Skälshög

Direction to Skälshög

NOTE: The road passing Skälshög and until Svenstorp Castle is private. It is sometimes used for agricultural machinery, which makes it dangerous to cycle there. If agricultural machinery appears, you are obliged to stop and give way. In connection with harvesting, you should completely avoid cycling that road, and we recommend an alternative route to Svenstorp Castle. On November 10, 1676, the Danish army arrived at Skälshög, which was the name of the village. The Danes established winter quarters and planned to stay there until the spring of next year. Earlier in the day, they crossed the Kävlinge creek over a bridge at Kävlinge, and then they tore the bridge down to prevent the Swedish army from being able to continue following them.

Skälshög, the location they chose for their camp, is a high and dry place with a clear view of the area towards Kävlinge creek. The creek was an effective obstacle for the Swedish army. The camp was built on the crest of a height, in an almost three kilometer long line to the west. On this place, there is the eastern end of a beautiful avenue with Willow trees now. The Danish camp was located on the left (southern) side of that avenue and stretched down towards Stångby station village.

The Danish army consisted of about 13,000 soldiers when arriving at Skälshög. There were also many civilian functions, ranging from diplomats and foreign envoys to court staff, merchants, and itinerant restaurateurs. In addition, there were women and children accompanying, so probably a total of up to 20,000 people were situated in the camp. As comparison, at that time Lund had about 1,700 inhabitants, and the whole of Scania, there were about a hundred thousand inhabitants.

A portrait of the Danish king Christian V around the year 1675. The camp was built of about 1,000 to 1,500 simple ridge tents, erected in two rows in batting order along a three kilometer long line from Skälshög Mill (1) to Stångby. The front was directed towards Kävlinge creek, the left wing in the west and the right wing in the east. You will pass Stångby station village, with a stop where the western flank was located (8). In the middle there was a camp street that served as a staging area. Senior officers had larger and more comfortable tents, and especially the officers who built barracks so that they did not have to live in tents.

In addition, there were cannons and thousands of troop wagons with associated troop personnel. Most of the associated troop personnel, with field forges, carpenter wagons, ammunition wagons, weapons wagons, feed wagons, provisioning wagons, tent wagons, canteen wagons, thousands of extra horses, slaughter cattle, etc., were located behind the camp, as common practice.

There were also German, French and Dutch soldiers in the Danish camp, including 2,000 sailors from the Admiral General Cornelis Tromps ship. The sailors were stationed at (A) near Svenstorp Castle (2). The, at time 30-year-old, Danish king Christian V stayed at the Svenstorp Castle.

There were a couple of hundred people living in the area. Now the area was ought to supply the large Danish army on the south side of the Kävlinge creek, and with the Swedish army on the north side, which in total must have been over 30,000 people. In addition, there were about 10,000 horses each in the Swedish and Danish camps that needed water and feed.

There was a shortage of trees in the area, so the Danish army robed Skälshög (B), and Håstad villages, which were a short distance away, to get firewood and building materials for the camp. Food and firewood quickly ran out, and it became difficult for those who lived in the area to survive, and many were forced to flee. It has been claimed that the villages were demolished and that Håstad, but not Skälshög, was rebuilt after the war. However, both villages were still there at the time of the agricultural land reform, the Great Partition, that took place about a hundred years later. Skälshög village disappeared in connection with agricultural land reform, the one-shift (Enskifte), that was made in the early 1800s.

Constant rain made conditions in the camp difficult and led to diseases starting to rage. Several thousand people died in the camp during the weeks before the battle. Stomach infections such as dysentery, was what many died from. However, the conditions in the Swedish camp were even worse than in the Danish camp. In total, between 5,000 and 6,000 people died in the two camps in the weeks before the battle.

On the morning of December 4, 1676, when the Battle of Lund was ongoing, troops from the Danish left-wing, led by the Danish King Christian V, fled from the battlefield back to the camp here at Skälshög. They were persecuted by the Swedish right-wing troops, led by the Swedish king Karl XI. The Swedish troops arrived at the Danish camp, and the Danish troops could not resist the attack, so they continued to flee towards Krutmöllan (4) and over the Kävlinge creek. Here at the camp in Skälshög, the hungry Swedish soldiers carried out massacres of the people who remained in the camp before continuing to persecute the Danish troops.

2) Svenstorp Castle

Direction to Svenstorp Castle

The castle and its surroundings are private property so show consideration. It is not allowed to go up to the castle, but you are welcome to cycle on the way passing, and to stop and photograph the castle from the road. While the people in the Danish army had their camp in Skälshög (1), the 30-year-old Danish king Christian V and his closest staff stayed here at Svenstorp Castle. The king stayed in a room on the first floor in the protruding part, to the left of the entrance which is in the middle of the castle.

The second night after the Battle of Lund, the Swedish king Karl XI stayed in that same room. The room is therefore called the King's Room. Nowadays, there is a portrait of Christian V hanging on one side of the room, and one of Karl XI on the opposite wall.

The castle was built in 1596 by a woman named Beate Hvitfeldt. She was the widow of Knut Ebbesen Ulfeld. On the portal to the castle, it says "Beate Hvitfeldt, Knut Ulfeld's widow". At that time, it was considered extreme to write the woman's name before the man's name. Mette Krabbe, born Rosencrantz, bought the castle in 1669, and she was hosting the two kings in 1676. Except for a tower that no longer exists, the castle looks the same today as it did when it was built.

3) Lilla Harrie village

Vägvisning till Lilla Harrie

The first toilet along the bike tour is at Örtofta cemetery.
There is a sign telling to be a private area at the entrance to Örtofta Castle , but Lund tourist information Destination Lund have asked for permission to pass by and have been allowed to draw out the biking tour through the farm as our directions show. The Swedish army, chasing the Danish army, arrived at Lilla Harrie on the north side of the Kävlinge creek on November 11, 1676, the day after the Danish army arrived at Skälshög (1) on the south side of the creek. As long as the water floated in the Kävlinge creek, it was an effective obstacle, preventing the Swedes from approaching the Danish camp without great difficulty.

There is less information about the Swedish army camp than about the Danish, therefore, its range is not fully known and cannot be shown on a map. The Swedish camp was on the north side of the old road between Örtofta and Kävlinge. The road is still there passing Lilla Harrie church. The camp was set up in order of battle, with two rows along a line more than two kilometers long, and the front against the Kävlinge creek. The left wing was then located in the east and the right wing in the west. Many of the soldiers lived in a pit filled with straw, with a tent as a gable roof over the pit.

The Swedish king Karl XI portrayed during the Battle of Lund. The Swedish, then 21-year-old, king Karl XI accommodated himself and his staff in a farmhouse in Benstorp Benstorp village. However, there is nothing left of the former village and Benstorp is located on the other side of the heavily trafficked country road.

There were about 9,000 soldiers in the Swedish camp., and like the Danish camp, there were a lot of other people and equipment as well. In total there were upwards of 14,000 people in the camp.

The constant rain made the ground in the camp muddy and troublesome. The conditions were even worse in the Swedish camp than in the Danish camp. It is said that as many as 3,000 people may have died from stomach infections such as dysentery in the camp in the weeks before the battle. Some also died when Danish soldiers made reconnaissance attacks on the Swedish camp, just as Swedish soldiers sometimes went to the Danish camp and scouted there. King Karl XI sometimes took part in reconnaissance missions. There were also cases where the two armies fired artillery at each other's positions.

The beautiful Lilla Harrie Church is located on the south side of the old road between Örtofta and Kävlinge. The church was built in Romanesque style sometime in the latter part of the 1100s. However, the tower did not exist at that time, it was built sometime after the Battle of Lund. The church was used by the Swedish army when stationed in Lilla Harrie.

The church in Lilla Harrie, which was built in the 1100s. There is still a pulpit from 1599 in the church with the monogram of the Danish king Christian IV. It is a mystery why the Swedish army did not destroy it when they arrived. One theory why it remains is that the three farmers who donated money to buy the pulpit took it down and hid it when the Swedish army approached. There are also two silver candlesticks, of which at least one is decorated with Christian IV's monogram. Due to previous thefts in Swedish churches, Lilla Harrie church is unfortunately rarely open nowadays.

On November 12, the day after the Swedish army arrived at Lilla Harrie, Danish artillery rolled cannons to the opposite side of the Kävlinge creek and fired on the Swedes for a few hours. The heavy shooting did not cause any major damage but caused cracks in the south wall of Lilla Harrie church. The cracks are not visible but were discovered in connection with a renovation of the church.

The Swedish king Karl XI's ciphered letter with to the Swedish Commandant at Malmöhus Castle. The conditions in the Swedish army camp were miserable with constant rain and a lack of food and firewood. King Karl XI realized that eighter they soon must attack the Danish army or go back up into Småland county. But then, Malmö city would get into a difficult situation with even more military blockade of Danish troops if the Swedes left. What settle the matter why the Swedish army finally decide to attack the Danish camp was that it became colder at the end of November 1676. It started to snow and the Kävlinge creek froze, so it became possible to cross on the ice.

On December 2, the final decision to attack was made. King Karl XI wrote a ciphered letter to the Swedish Commandant in Malmö, Fabian von Fersen, in which he announced the decision. During the night, a horseman with the letter to the commandant in Malmö was sent through the Danish army lines. Today, the letter is achieved at the Regional Archives in Lund.

On December 3, the day before the Battle of Lund, the whole day was spent preparing for departure. It was the first Sunday of Advent and during the evening the court chaplain Haqvin Spegel held a service and distributed communion for king Karl XI and the senior officers in Lilla Harrie church. Later in the evening, king Karl XI wrote a letter to his mother Hedvig Eleonora in Stockholm in which he told what would happen the next day, he wrote that he "will win or die".

At 01:30 on the night of December 4, the Swedish army broke the camp, and at 02:00, the whole army had lined up in five troop trains in Lilla Harrie. King Karl XI rode around and tried to instill courage in the soldiers while they waited for the moon to set so it would be completely dark. The good visibility of the fields, where there was a thin layer of snow, could otherwise have revealed to Danish scouts what was happening. At 02:25, when it had become completely dark, the army began to march towards Rinnebäck, the place where king Karl XI's closest men had decided that they would cross the creek.

4) Krutmöllan (in English Gunpowder mill)

Direction to Krutmöllan

The Battle of Lund on December 4, 1676, began with a confrontation between the Swedish and Danish vanguards at the Kävlinge road (12), just north of what was the city boarder at the time. Then, the battle continued when the Swedish army's right wing with the Swedish king Karl XI and the Danish left wing with the king Christian V clashed.

A short distance after the power line that cross over the bike path is the place where the Danish army fled across the Kävlinge creek on the ice. After about an hour, the Danish left-wing troops began to give in, and at 10:00 a.m. they began to flee from the battlefield in northeast direction towards the Danish camp at Skälshög (1). King Karl XI and the Swedish right-wing followed the Danish troops. When back in the Danish camp, the Danish soldiers made a last attempt to defend themselves against the Swedish troops, but without success. The hungry Swedish soldiers began to loot in the camp and carry out massacres of the people who were left there.

The Danish soldiers continued to flee north and at 11:00 they arrived at Kävlinge creek, east of Krutmöllan. They tried to cross creek on the ice since it had been holding when the Swedish army crossed it earlier in the morning at Rinnebäck (5). The Danish King Christian V, his brother Prince George, Major General Anders Sandberg and several soldiers get across and were able to continue to flee through a ravine towards Landskrona. But there was a jam of riders and wagons which also wanted to cross before the Swedish troops caught up with them and the ice would break. The ravine can be seen in Erik Dahlberg's drawings of the Battle of Lund, and it is still there today, but can be difficult to detect from the cycle path during summer, when the trees obscure the view.

The ravine, through which the Danish King Christian V, his brother Prince Georg, Major General Anders Sandberg and several Danish soldiers fled through, after crossing the Kävlinge creek and then continued towards Landskrona

When the Swedish troops, led by king Karl XI and his closest men Rutger von Ascheberg and Erik Dahlberg, caught up with the Danish troops at Krutmöllan, it became very chaotic. Many of the Danish troops' wagons were abandoned standing on the south side of the creek and were conquered by the Swedish troops, who ravaged among the disbanded troops and shot at the soldiers who were on the ice.

The Swedish army had won the battle at Krutmöllan at 11:30. The Swedish king's horse, Thotten, was shot in the forehead and the king quickly mounted his reserve horse, Brilliant, which he had received as a gift from the French king Louis XIV. The Swedish army’s kettledrum horse (a horse that carries drums) was also shot. The next morning, December 5, the creek had frozen again. Then, it was a terrible and macabre sight with all arms and legs of soldiers and parts of horses sticking up through the black-blue new ice.

The name Krutmöllan (gunpowder mill) comes from the place where ingredients were mixed for gunpowder in the early 1660s. The production was done with power from the pent-up Kävlinge creek. Although, the mill exploded after only a couple of years, and after the explosion, the mill was used to grind flour instead.

5) Rinnebäck

Direction to Rinnebäck

Just before arriving in Rinnebäck, you can have lunch at Kävlinge golf restaurant or eat your own packed lunch at the tables at Kävlinge golf kiosk . In the kiosk they sell sandwiches, hot dogs and ice cream, among other things. After the Swedish army decided to attack the Danish camp, Karl XI's closest men Rutger von Ascheberg and Erik Dahlbergh checked the thickness and bearing capacity of the ice at several places during the evening of December 3, 1676. They noticed that the ice was about 10 cm thick and chose the place at Rinnebäck to cross the Kävlinge creek early in the morning of December 4, 1676.

The Swedish army marched from Lilla Harrie at 02:25, when the moon had set so it was completely dark. At 04:00 in the morning of December 4, 1676, they started to walk across the ice on the frozen Kävlinge creek. They had already prepared for the crossing by putting plank on the ice. The army went over in batting order, first the right wing crossed and continued up the slope on the other side. Then the infantry and dragoons came, who crossed on the ice, while the artillery with its guns was rolled over on the laid planks and finally came the hawser.

The ice creaked and cracked but not a single man went through the ice and by 05:30 everyone had crossed without the alarm had goes off in the Danish camp. There was still compact dark, and after getting order in the ranks, the columns continued south through the valley west of Västra Hoby. A vanguard moved a few hundred meters ahead. The troops marched with the right wing first, then the infantry, artillery, and last the left wing.

6) Västra Hoby (West Hoby village)

Direction to Västra Hoby

Västra Hoby kyrka från 1885. The night after the Danish army had fired cannon balls at the Swedish camp on November 12, the Swedish army responded to the artillery fire. They rolled cannons to Kävlinge creek and fired at Västra Hoby village with annealed cannonballs. Namely, there were Danish troops in the village. However, the farmers were hit the hardest and most of the village burned down, including the vicarage in Västra Hoby.

The road through the small village of Västra Hoby is very beautiful to cycle on a nice summer day. We do not know where the vicarage was located at that time. The current church in Västra Hoby was built in 1885 and replaced the previous medieval church.

7) Stångby kyrkby (Stångby Church village)

Direction to Stångby kyrkby

When everyone in the Swedish army had crossed the frozen Kävlinge creek at 05:30 in the morning on December 4, they continued south through the valley west of the village Västra Hoby. The Danish army had stationed guard forces in the terrain, who were supposed to raise the alarm if the Swedish army would try something. The Danish scouts were probably stationed up on the hill southeast of Västra Hoby. From that position, it should not have been difficult for them to discover the Swedish army. The drivers shouting, the horses neighing, whips banging, and the noise of the hawser and artillery carriages caused so much noise that Erik Dahlbergh wrote afterwards that it must have been heard almost a mile. But for some strange reason, no alarm or warning was raised from the Danish guard forces.

The Danish priest Sthen Jacobsen wrote in his chronicle of the Scanian war, that the Danish army hardly had gone to bed thirsty the night before. When Denmark after the battle summarized why things went the way they did, the Danish Major General Anders Sandberg was appointed scapegoat because he was responsible for the guard forces. He was alone held accountable for what happened but was acquitted because it could not be proven that he had failed in responsibility.

Stångby Church was built in the 1100s but was completely renovated in 1869–1870. It was not until 07:00 in the morning the alarm went off in the Danish camp at Skälshög (1). Shortly after, Major General Anders Sandberg was informed that the Swedish army was marching. By then, the front of the Swedish army had reached all the way to the main road between Kävlinge and Lund, west of Stångby Church. The entire Swedish army was lined up barely 4,000 meters from the western flank of the Danish camp, located were now Stångby station community is (8). There must have been some panic in the Danish camp, when they discovered what was going on. Someone had to ride in posthaste to Svenstorp Castle to inform the Danish king Christian V and the sailor battalions that were stationed there.

King Karl XI's plan was a surprise attack on the Danish camp before they discovered it. However, this would not have been possible, there were too many earth-embankments and stone walls in the terrain. Besides, when the alarm went off in the Danish camp, the plan had failed. The Swedish army stopped while King Karl XI held a short council of war with his closest commanders without getting off their horses. They decided to continue towards Lund, aiming at getting there before the Danish army, so they could have the city behind them as support and protection against circumvention movements from the Danish army. In addition, there was an advantage in being able to master the heights north of Lund. King Karl XI commissioned Lieutenant General Otto Wilhelm von Fersen to take command of the vanguard, while the King himself took command of the right wing. By then, the time was 7:45 a.m. and dawn was approaching. It was a cold and clear morning that promised a sunny day.

8) Stångby stationssamhälle (Stångby station village)

Direction to Stångby stationssamhälle

On the field north and east of Vallkärra road at Stångby station village, the western flank of the Danish army camp was located. A new cycle path and housing has been built there. Therefore, archaeological investigations were carried out on several occasions between 2015 and 2018.

The Danish camp stretched from here, in an almost 3-kilometer-long line, up to Skälshög mill (1). The camp consisted of 1,000 to 1,500 simple ridge tents erected in two rows in order of battle. In the middle there was a camp street that served as a parking area. Here, in Stångby station village, you are standing in the camp street on the western outskirts of the camp.

At this place, in the tents on both sides of the camp street in the western part of the camp, the left flank of the Danish army was located, twenty squadrons of cavalry under command of Major General Anders Sandberg. He was also in charge of the guard forces stationed in the surrounding villages. The three squadrons in the far west came from southern Jutland and were led by Colonel Jørgen Brockenhuus, from Holstein. These squadrons were part of the Danish vanguard that was involved in the initial battle when the Battle of Lund began at Kävlinge road (12).

The Danish left flank distribution area in Stångby station village, with two rows of tents. During the archaeological excavations in the area, lots of objects were found, such as lead bullets, buttons and coins. The most interesting finding was a grave with the remains of two soldiers. One was 19–20 years old and the other between 25 and 30 years old. However, only parts of the lower jaw and scattered loose teeth remained. The rest of the bone material was more or less dissolved.

The grave consisted of a 2.5 by 1.25 meter large irregularly dug pit that was only 35 cm deep. The clay soil under the so-called plough layer was red burned, which showed that a fire had been set at the site to thaw the soil enough to be able to dig through the frost. According to written sources, this happened at the end of January 1677 when the farmers in the area were ordered to take care of all the dead.

One question, not yet answered, is where all the dead after the Battle of Lund have gone. So far, only one mass grave with soldiers has been found, at Nöbbelöv's church (10). There, we will tell more about how many people died during the Battle of Lund and where the dead may have gone.

9) Between the villages Norra Nöbbelöv and Vallkärra

Direction to the place between the villages Norra Nöbbelöv and Vallkärra

The first 200 meters, marked as a cycle path, along the heavily trafficked Kävlinge road, which you turn onto at Vallkärra, is narrow. Be careful and stay close to the roadside. After 200 meters, the cycle path will be better. The Battle of Lund on 4 December 1676 had been ongoing throughout the day. At 15:30, the Danish troops were concentrated in the area between Vallkärra Church and Norra Nöbbelöv Church, and the final battle took place there. Towards 17:00 the ammunition began to run out and the battle looked more like a furious man-to-man fight. The soldiers used what they had, the butts of their rifles, swords and whatever. The final phase of the Battle of Lund has been described more as a massacre than as a battle.

However, the Danish troops were superior in numbers so the Swedish troops never managed to encircle them completely. Therefore, there was a gap to the north where the Danish troops could get away and retreat towards rescue in Landskrona. One last Danish troop held a stand along the cemetery wall at Vallkärra church until they also could leave when darkness fell on 4 December 1676.

10) Norra Nöbbelöv church

Direction to Norra Nöbbelöv Church

With all the dead after the Battle of Lund, there must have been many graves for fallen soldiers and those who died of illness in the weeks before the battle. It is estimated that around 3,000 soldiers died during the battle itself. The barber-surgeons were not able to take care of all the wounded. Therefore, many wounded remained on the battlefield north of Lund, where they froze to death during the night.

Norra Nöbbelöv Church in Lund. After the battle, the Swedish army was able to open the road to Malmö, which had been besieged during the Scanian War. Many of the wounded made their way into Malmö to seek help because there was better care available there than they could get from the barber-surgeons out on the battlefield. It is said that several thousand soldiers were riding or walking to Malmö the night and day after the Battle of Lund.

One question, not yet answered, is where all the dead after the Battle of Lund have gone. It was not only all the soldiers who died during the battle, but also all the five or six thousand who died of diseases in the weeks before. In the days after the battle, the dead were collected and laid near the village cemeteries awaiting burial.

According to written sources, in the end of January 1677, the county governor Augustin Leijonsköld commissioned the farmers in the area to count and bury the dead. Soldiers who were recognized, officers and nobles, and those known to have relatives, were taken care of. They were brought into Lund and buried there or sent home to their hometowns and buried in their family graves. However, the frost made it difficult to dig.

Memorial stone for the mass grave with soldiers from the Battle of Lund outside Norra Nöbbelöv church. The first, and so far, only, mass grave with soldiers from the Battle of Lund was found at the cemetery at Norra Nöbbelöv church in 1995. The grave was just inside the medieval cemetery wall, which is no longer there. In the grave, a lot of disorderly skeletal parts from only men were found, and several of them had gunshot and stab wounds. There were also a lot of objects such as buttons, pieces of cloth and leather in the grave. The corpses were probably in such poor condition after the battle that the farmers who were commissioned to bury them did not want to pick any objects but only dumped the corpses in the grave. Outside the church there is a memorial stone with a plaque that tells about the mass grave.

Where all the other dead are buried is still unknown. There may be more undiscovered mass graves, but it is likely that many of the dead were buried where they lay on the battlefield and in the two camps. If they were then buried in meadows or pastures in shallow graves like the grave found at Stångby station village (8), then those graves were destroyed when the land was ploughed up after the one-shift 150 years later. Then the dead have become soil improvers for the 19th-century farmers, and that could explain why more graves with soldiers from the Battle of Lund have not been found. The graves should otherwise have been found as Lund grown north over the battlefield during the past hundred years.

The plaque In Swedish on the memorial stone about the Battle of Lund. Note that the information about the number of fallen soldiers is overestimated. Since long, it has been said that there were about 9,000 who died during the Battle of Lund. Although, it has turned out that this number probably also includes all those who died of diseases in the weeks before the battle. The information about how many people that were buried has turned out to come from the Swedish court chaplain Haqvin Spegel, who in turn received the information from the farmers who were commissioned to bury the dead. They probably counted how many they buried; not how many who died during the battle. It seems to be about 3,000 who died during the battle and between 5,000 and 6,000 who died of diseases before the battle. Just over a thousand of those fallen in the battle were Swedes and about two thousand were Danes.

Another piece of information that has occurred is that almost none of the 2,000 sailors on Admiral General Cornelis Tromp's ship survived. Although, in 1677, 500 sailors were shipped out of Gothenburg.

11) The Monument

Direction to the Monument

The inauguration of the Monument on 21 October 1883, in memory of the Battle of Lund. To honor the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Lund, a monument was erected in the Monument Park. The monument, as it is called, was designed by the architect Helgo Zettervall, is made of cement, and was inaugurated on October 21, 1883.

However, cement turned out not to be good material, as the Monument soon began to crumble. Around 1930, the original Monument was replaced with a new one made of granite. The reinauguration was attended by both Sweden's and Denmark's foreign ministers at the time.

Despite the very military appearance with cannons and cannonballs, the purpose of the Monument is not to be a monument to the victory. Instead, the purpose is to show the reconciliation and community between Sweden and Denmark. This is also evident from the texts on two sides of the Monument. On one side it says:

1676
on December 4
fought and bled here
people of the same tribe.
-
Reconciliating descendants
raise
the Memorial.

On one of the other sides there is a poem that the Danish priest Hans Gerner wrote in 1681:

Here lies the bold men,
bones and blood are mixed
among each other
and no one says otherwise
than they are of the same tribe;
they were also of the same belief
yet, they could in peace
and with each other live.

12) The Kävlinge road

Direction to the Kävlinge road

The advance of the Swedish army on the morning of December 4 was spotted by the Danes at 07:00. By then, the lead of the Swedish army had reached the main road between Kävlinge and Lund at the height of Stångby church (7). The Danish army quickly got on their feet and the soldiers were lined up in combat order after only half an hour. The Danish Lieutenant Colonel Hans Adam Basse set out with a vanguard towards Lund.

Lieutenant General Otto Wilhelm von Fersen. After the vanguard, the Danish left wing came with two columns, led by Major General Anders Sandberg, Army Chief Carl von Arensdorff, Danish King Christian V and his brother Prince Georg. The two armies continued towards Lund on a converging course and within sight of each other. Earthen embankments and stone walls meant that the armies had to stop from time to time to clear up, so the cannons were able to get through.

The Swedish army forced its march towards Lund along the Kävlinge road. The vanguard, under the command of Lieutenant General Otto Wilhelm von Fersen, reached the Mill Hight (Möllevångshöjden) slightly ahead of the Danish vanguard. However, both vanguards waited to attack until the bulk of the army units had reached their positions and lined up.

When Otto Wilhelm von Fersen was to group his forces to the left and to the right of the windmill on the Mill Hight, he discovered that he had fewer troops than the approximately 300 soldiers he was supposed to have. He then requested reinforcements from king Karl XI, who sent forward the dragoon guard led by Lieutenant Colonel Hans Henrik von Siegroth. As soon as the dragoon guards had arrived, Otto Wilhelm von Fersen attacked.

The place at the Kävlinge road in Lund where the Battle of Lund began. Accordingly, it was the Swedish army that began the Battle of Lund shortly after 08:30on 4 December 1676. The battle started at the current intersection of the north Bobbin Road (Norra Spolegatan) and the Kävlinge road. The Kävlinge road went between Lund and Landskrona to Helsingborg, but the area was mostly open landscape. The whole city of Lund was still inside the old city wall.

The Danish vanguard was about the same numbers as the Sweds to begin with, but the Danes had overestimated their vanguard. Then, the Danish commander-in-chief General Carl von Arensdorff intervened with his troops. The Danish superiority meant that the Swedes initially recoiled, but then a Swedish counterattack managed to take possession of Mill Hight about 9 o´clock, when the sun just had risen.

During the vanguard battle, the Danish commander-in-chief, General Carl von Arensdorff, was shot in his right arm and so seriously wounded that he had to be taken away from the battlefield. That was an episode that perhaps was fatal for the continuation of the Battle of Lund.

13) The Mill Hight

Direction to the Mill Hight

Until 1967, the Lund brewery was located on the yard at the southern tip of the current intersection of the Kävlinge road and the Getinge road. Previously there was a post mill (an older type of windmill) with a mill yard, and therefore the place was called the Mill Hight.

The place in Lund were the Mill Hight was in 1676. While the vanguard battle was going on, the two armies reached the area north of Lund. At 09:00 the right wing of the Swedish army, led by the supreme commanders Rutger von Ascheberg and Erik Dahlberg, got there. The soldiers lined up on a line between the place Lerbäckshög, where the present Monument is, and the Mill Hight.

The left wing of the Danish army lined up north of the Swedish. The two lines of soldiers were about a kilometer long with the fronts about 200 meters apart. After some fire preparation, the Swedish attacked the Danish army. It was a fierce battle that undulated back and forth in the terrain north of Mill Hight. Both sides suffered heavy losses, but after about an hour, the Danish troops began to fold, and at 10:00 they began to set off towards the Danish camp (1). King Karl XI and the Swedish army followed the Danish troops and the battle at the Mill Hight stopped. Further north, more and more Swedish and Danish soldiers continued to fight as they arrived at the battlefield.

The Swedish court chaplain Haqvin Spegel The Danish army was superior in number of troops, so the battle was uneven. After lunchtime, the Swedish troops were pushed back down towards the Mill Hight and the city of Lund. The troops then turned against each other and prepared for what they thought would be the final battle. The Swedish troops were discouraged and did not know if the king, who had left the battlefield, was still alive or where he was. The Swedish court chaplain Haqvin Spegel, who was there, tried to instill courage by admonishing words. The Danish troops, on the other hand, were confident of victory and shoot the ransom with three shots as a sign that the final battle had begun. There and then, the Swedish army could have lost the Battle of Lund, if it had not been for the fact that a miracle occurred.

At lunchtime, king Karl XI and his staff had held a council of war after they had won the battle at Krutmöllan (4) (in English Gunpowder mill). They discussed whether it was worthwhile continuing the battle or whether it had already been decided in the fields north of Lund. Finally, they decided to return, and at 14:00 king Karl XI came back with a smaller troop. He discovered that the situation did not look good, with the Swedish forces squeezed towards Lund's northern gate, and a superior number of Danish forces in front of them. The Danish troops were just about to begin their attack in what they thought would be the final battle when they saw that a Swedish troop was approaching from the north. To the surprise of the Swedish troops, the Danes at the Mill Hight turned around to meet the new threat. The Swedes did not understand what was going on.

The Swedish supreme commanders Rutger von Ascheberg och Erik Dahlbergh. Since the Danish troops were so superior in numbers, the situation did not look good for the Swedish troop the King Karl XI brought with him. But then there was a miraculous and decisive turn in the battle.

King Karl XI and his closest men Rutger von Ascheberg and Erik Dahlbergh managed to get through the Danish troop lines to the Swedish troops on the Mill Hight just outside the northern city gate of Lund. The Swedish troops had been waiting for the attack from the Danish troops to begin. But instead, they surprisingly saw King Karl XI approaching. The king's return immediately raised the soldier’s courage and made them rise and take up arms again. The king made them start going north and attack the Danish troops, who then suddenly found themselves squeezed between the Swedish troops. At 15:30 the Danish troops were concentrated in the area between Vallkärra church and Norra Nöbbelöv church where the final battle then took place.

King Karl XI's breakthrough, which turned the Battle of Lund to Sweden's advantage, has been depicted in a famous painting by Johan Philip Lemke, hanging at Drottningholm Castle outside Stockholm.

14) The Kings house

Direction to the Kings House

The King's House, where the exhausted Karl XI was rested and got supper the night after the Battle of Lund. When night fell, about 3,000 dead soldiers were left in the fields north of Lund. King Karl XI and his staff rode into the city and to the King's House at 23:00. There they visited Bishop Peder Winstrup and got supper and a rest during the night. The king must have been totally exhausted after having been up almost twenty-four hours, fought a long and extended battle without eating much during the day.

Bishop Peder Winstrup was loyal to the Swedish king throughout the Scanian War, and thereby he kept the pledge of allegiance he made to the former king, Karl X. Peder Winstrup's wife, the Bishopess Dorothea, it is said, was more Danish-minded, and she would have preferred to see the Danish king Christian V at supper. It is also said that she replaced the supper with a simpler meal and poor wine when she saw the Swedish king coming instead of the Danish. Whether this is true or not is not clear, possibly it is just a tall tale.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to visit the King's House. In January 2025, the building was renovated, and the Vice-Chancellor of Lund University and the University Management moved in.

After the Battle of Lund

The Battle of Lund did not end the Scanian War between Sweden and Denmark. The war continued for just over two more years. In 1679, peace negotiations began in Lund Cathedral. The first preparatory negotiations took place on May 12, 1679, but the disagreement was so great that the parties could not even agree on who should be allowed to enter the cathedral through the main portal. The solution was then that the Danish delegation had to enter via the southern portal and the Swedish delegation via the northern portal.

The Dean’s House where the peace treaty after the Scanian War and the Battle of Lund was signed on the second floor. At the end of June, the major delegations arrived in Lund. At that time, the French ambassador was involved in leading the negotiations, since France was Sweden's ally in the war. However, the French king had got tired of the slow pace of the peace negotiations in Lund, and therefore the peace was signed in Fontainebleau outside Paris without Swedish participation. When that was known in Lund, the Swedes were outrageous, not least the king Karl XI, who made sure that an identical peace treaty was signed in Lund on the night between 26 and 27 September 1679. That peace treaty was signed on the second floor in the Dean’s House, which at that time stood on Church Street (Kyrkogatan) . The building is now located at the open-air museum Kulturen in Lund. The peace treaty meant that Sweden was allowed to keep everything that had been won in the peace treaties of 1658 and 1660. The war had led to nothing, but many human lives had been sacrificed without Denmark gaining anything from it.

The Dean’s House is open to visitors to the open-air museum Kulturen, but not the second floor where the peace treaty was signed. It is only a part of the original larger house that has been preserved and moved to the museum.