how did denmark get greenland

Denmark ended up with Greenland through centuries of Norwegian–Danish rule, then a series of international decisions that confirmed Danish sovereignty rather than any dramatic “purchase” or land grab.

Big picture: how Denmark got Greenland

• Greenland was first settled by Inuit cultures and later by Norse settlers from Iceland and Norway around the late 10th century under Erik the Red, making it part of the Norwegian realm.

• In 1380, the crowns of Denmark and Norway were united; with that union, Denmark inherited Norway’s overseas dependencies, including Greenland.

• When Denmark and Norway split after the Napoleonic Wars in 1814, Denmark kept Greenland (along with Iceland and the Faroe Islands), so Greenland stayed under the Danish crown.

Key milestones in Danish control

1. Medieval & early modern claims
   • After the medieval Norse colonies disappeared, contact was lost, but the Danish‑Norwegian monarchy maintained a legal claim to Greenland as a former Norwegian possession.

 * In 1721, missionary Hans Egede led a Danish‑Norwegian expedition that began formal recolonisation and administration, turning Greenland into an active colony of the united Danish‑Norwegian kingdom.

2. From Norway–Denmark union to Danish colony
   • The 1814 Treaty of Kiel dissolved the union of Denmark–Norway, assigning mainland Norway to Sweden, but leaving Denmark in control of Greenland, Iceland, and the Faroe Islands.

 * During the 18th–19th centuries, Denmark tightened its control, granting itself a trade monopoly over Greenland’s coast in 1776 and treating the island as a closed colonial territory.

3. International recognition of Danish sovereignty
   • In 1916–1917, as part of the deal where the United States bought the Danish West Indies (now the U.S. Virgin Islands), the U.S. explicitly recognised Greenland as Danish territory.

 * Norway tried to claim parts of eastern Greenland in the early 20th century, but the Permanent Court of International Justice ruled in 1933 that Greenland belonged to Denmark, firmly confirming Danish sovereignty in international law.

4. World War II and the Cold War angle
   • When Nazi Germany occupied Denmark in 1940, Greenland’s link to Copenhagen was cut, and the island effectively came under U.S. protection for the rest of the war, but sovereignty was still considered Danish.

 * After the war, the island was formally “returned” to Danish control in 1945, though U.S. strategic interest remained strong and led to military bases like Thule Air Base under agreement with Denmark.

5. From colony to part of the Danish realm
   • In the 1953 revision of the Danish constitution, Denmark officially ended Greenland’s colonial status and incorporated it as a county within the Kingdom of Denmark, extending Danish citizenship to Greenlanders.

 * The United Nations accepted this change in 1954, removing Greenland from the list of colonies and recognising it as an integral part of Denmark rather than a separate colonial territory.

Today’s status and self‑rule

• Greenland remains part of the Kingdom of Denmark but has extensive self‑government: home rule was granted in 1979, followed by expanded self‑rule in 2009, which recognised Greenlanders as a distinct people under international law.

• Denmark still handles foreign policy, defence, and parts of economic policy, but Greenland’s own government controls most internal matters and has the right to pursue eventual independence if its population chooses.

In short: Denmark “got” Greenland not via a single event but through medieval Norwegian claims absorbed into a Danish–Norwegian union, kept by Denmark when that union split, and then reinforced by 20th‑century court rulings, treaties, and a constitutional change that turned a colony into a self‑governing part of the Danish kingdom.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.