Løven og hesten

Løven og hesten is a bronze sculpture in Kongens Have, Copenhagen, showing a lion attacking a horse. The garden, also called Rosenborg Garden, keeps its Renaissance layout with avenues, flowerbeds and low boxwood hedges.

King Christian IV commissioned the work in 1617, and Peter Husum began it before Jørgen Wulff completed it. The sculpture copies a similar work held in a museum in Rome. For a period, the piece stood at the king’s castle in Glückstadt, Holstein. Its lion represented the Danish royal arms, while the horse referred to the noble arms of Christian’s cousin. In 1648, the work returned to Kongens Have and joined a small arrangement between two columns.

Christian IV established the garden around 1606 as a royal kitchen garden for fruit and vegetables. Ring-riding later added entertainment, probably using the surviving columns. Opened to the public in the eighteenth century, the grounds became a Copenhagen park while retaining their royal beginnings. This bronze group remains the oldest sculpture in Kongens Have, linking a garden path with a pointed royal joke.