= Ribe =
When the missionary Ansgar of Bremen was looking for a place to errect a church in 860 his choice went to Ribe. It was not by accident as the city was even then an important trade loaction of the North due to its good port and its navigable river. Therefore the Request of Ansgar to Kink Horik II. was the first written mentioning, but the site can archeologically be proven to exist till back into the 8th century. As the digs prove the city was diminated by various crafts like iron melting, tannery, weaver and pottery. Already early on there must have been trade connections to Northern Germany and England, especially to Stade, Bremen, Cologne, Bruges, Deventer, Groningen and Utrecht. A whole shamrock pot was dug up on the cemitary of Ribe in 2015. The 1000 year old pot was manufactured in Fance or Belgium and is the first such finding in Denmark.
Although Ribe was supposedly looted in 1043 by Abodrites and destroyed by seven blazes between 1176 and 1402, the city recovered from these setback same as from the plague that raged in 1350 and two large floodings, the seocn Marcellus flooding in 1362 and the storm flood if 1512. In the end of the 15th century Ribe counted 5000 inhabitants and was thereby among the larger cities in northern Europe (compare Haburg with 10'000 and Lübeck with about 25'000). In 1460 the Treaty of Ripen (German city name) was signed there which should ensure the undividability of Schleswig and Holstein. Before 1496 the old townhall was built. Athough Ribe still prospered in the 16th century it lost its significance in the Daneish seatrading. The trade routes had changed, Copenhagen and other cities roese. The population decresed continuously.
[https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ribe, 2016-05-12]