The Munkholm facility - Mariager

For a century, the Munkholm facility was the favorite excursion destination of the Mariager citizens. In the park, which has been donated to the city, you will find beautiful nature, a lake with a fountain and a cozy little pavilion.

Munkholmen is a fantastic gem very close to the center of Mariager. Here is the most beautiful nature and obvious opportunities for a walk in the green. The site has a small lake, stream and fountain. The forest floor is full of anemones in the spring and large, beautiful beech trees. 

A wonderful place in the middle of the city, close to the center, right next to the Rose Garden, the nature playground, the church, the monastery, the museum and much more. 

Munkholm is also a place with lots of history:

The story:

Well into this century, the city's citizens gathered on special holidays (Constitution Day, election days, royal birthdays, etc.) on the Square. From here, the tour, led by music and banners, went to the festival square in Munkholm, where speeches were given, and where on some of these occasions there could be both jesters and circuses. The festival site was formerly at the Eremithytten, where a space had been dug into the hill. When something happened down in this square, you could be absolutely sure that the hills above were densely populated with the city's interested youth. From here you had an excellent overview of the place, even when the city's best citizens - believe it if you want - played cricket here.

The first children's parties (known from at least 1891) meant that a larger and more solid dance floor had to be arranged. It was built at the Skovvej entrance to the facility. Usually the first hour was for the children, but after that the city's youth and the adults took over.

The previously mentioned Eremithytte has a history that is believed to stretch all the way back to monastic times, where it may have been used for the temporary accommodation of monastic residents to cool off when the desires of the flesh overwhelmed them.

Herdsfoged Dahlerup's daughter, Nanna, mentions in her childhood memories the possibility that the cabin may have housed a particularly pious brother who had moved away from the society of the others and lived quite alone in the quiet forest. One wall was then (c.1875) occupied by a shabby stone bed, while by the other there was a fireplace, where large stones were still black from the fire, where the hermit had prepared his shabby meal.

She goes on to say that once, together with some other children, she had ventured into the Hermit's Hut, although this was almost sacrilegious. However, a pair of glowing eyes of fire flashed at them, so they came out again very quickly. It was as if the old hermit still guarded his shrine.

Not far from the hut is the "Holy One", which for a long time after the Reformation was much sought after because of its healing powers. Folk tradition designates the spring as the place where two murderous knights, Hem and Shem, fought their famous duel over the beautiful Virgin Mary. However, fate wanted both knights to perish. In grief over this, the maiden drowned herself in the fjord. Her rich property went to the monastery, and the place where she found her final resting place was named Mariæ-Ager after her. The spring has naturally sprung on the spot where she shed her brave tears over the soulless bodies of the suitors!

Even in the 1800th century, people had great faith in the spring water. For a Mariager family, the children's walk with the nanny always went to the spring in Munkholm, where they fetched drinking water for the dinner table in a field bottle.

At the same time, the city's families strolled in the facility on Sundays and public holidays. They ate food they had brought and boiled water on a machine for tea. During such preparations, it sometimes happened that the young people, reflecting in the spring, discovered that the two images became one, which could no longer be separated.

From the viewing pavilion, which was built in 1888 according to a drawing by the well-known architect Lundquist, you used to have a magnificent view of the city and fjord. The pavilion is decorated with the names of countless visitors, and there are even whispers that the visitors may have had other things to do on the site than simply scratching their names into the old posts. The pavilion is still a favorite excursion destination.

On the site was a former pavilion, described by the aforementioned Nanna Dahlerup as a "funny little house with a thatched roof". She continues in her memoirs: "Here there were round benches along the sides, and in the middle a large table where you could sit and drink your tea with delicious prawn food - yes, that is, when you brought it yourself, because here were no attendants balancing hills…”

Finally, mention should also be made of the giant pine tree "Granfatter", which not so many years ago was used by the city's youth as a test of manhood, where it was important to get all the way to the top and back down safely.

Francisco Maro Tetens was born on 18 November 1791 in Maren Mølle, where his father, Heinrich Tetens (1789-1814 bailiff in Mariager), lived at the time. Already at the beginning of the 1800s, bailiff Tetens had the Munkholm facility established, and the son left the facility to the city for use. According to the deed of gift in 1839, it was not least the town's willingness to maintain and beautify Munkholm that motivated the Tetens to transfer it to the town as property.

The young Tetens' hu stood at sea, and he was only 15 years old when he passed the mateship exam. Soon after, the war against the English broke out, and when Denmark quickly found itself without any real navy, in 1801 he was employed as commander of one of the many Danish privateer boats. In January 1811, during a stay with his parents in Mariager, he was awarded the dannebrog cross because of expelled conduct, but the same year things went wrong. An attack on an English convoy failed and Lieutenant Tetens had to wander in the "prison". However, he was released the same year.

After the peace, Teten sought office in the customs service, and in the following years he worked his way up through the ranks. In 1834 he became acting superintendent of customs for Jutland. He still lived at Maren Mølle, and contemporary accounts mention him as a skilled farmer.

When he was appointed chief customs inspector for Nørre-Jylland in 1847, however, the family had to take up residence in Århus, where he died on 2 March 1862. As an official, he is characterized as extremely capable and fair-minded.

Source:

The brochure "Munkholm Weddings" from the Tourist Association for Weddings and Surroundings

Updated by:
Destination Himmerland | info@destinationhimmerland.dk