2 Best Sights in Copenhagen, Denmark

A mounted statue of Christian V dominates Kongens Nytorv, King's New Square. The square is the beautiful center of the royal, historic, and affluent part of the city. The statue was crafted in 1688 by the French sculptor Abraham-César Lamoureux, and the subject is conspicuously depicted as a Roman emperor. Every year, at the end of June, graduating high school students arrive in truckloads and dance beneath the furrowed brow of the sober statue.

City Hall Square is dominated by the 1905 mock-Renaissance Rådhus (City Hall). Architect Martin Nyrop's creation was popular from the start, perhaps because he envisioned that it should give "gaiety to everyday life and spontaneous pleasure to all." A statue of Copenhagen's 12th-century founder, Bishop Absalon, sits atop the main entrance.

Besides being an important ceremonial meeting place for Danish VIPs and a popular wedding hall for locals, the intricately decorated City Hall contains the first world clock. The multi-dial, highly accurate, astronomical timepiece has a 570,000-year calendar and took inventor Jens Olsen 27 years to complete before it was put into action in 1955.

Topped by two Vikings blowing an ancient trumpet called a lur, the Lurblæserne (Lur Blower Column) displays a good deal of artistic license—the lur dates from the Bronze Age, 1500 BC, whereas the Vikings lived a mere 1,000 years ago. City tours often start at this landmark, which was erected in 1914.