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Etymology

The etymology of the name "Denmark", the relationship between "Danes" and "Denmark", and the emergence of Denmark as a unified kingdom are topics of continuous scholarly debate. This is centred primarily on the morpheme "Dan" and whether it refers to the Dani or a historical person Dan and the exact meaning of the - "mark" ending.

Most etymological dictionaries and handbooks derive "Dan" from a word meaning "flat land", related to German Tenne "threshing floor", English den "cave". The element mark is believed to mean woodland or borderland (see marches), with probable references to the border forests in south Schleswig.

The first recorded use of the word Danmark within Denmark itself is found on the two Jelling stones, which are runestones believed to have been erected by Gorm the Old (c. 955) and Harald Bluetooth (c. 965). The larger of the two stones is popularly cited as the "baptismal certificate" (dåbsattest) of Denmark, though both use the word "Denmark", in the accusative ᛏᛅᚾᛘᛅᚢᚱᚴ tanmaurk () on the large stone, and the genitive ᛏᛅᚾᛘᛅᚱᚴᛅᚱ "tanmarkar" (pronounced) on the small stone, while the dative form tąnmarku (pronounced) is found on the contemporaneous Skivum stone. The inhabitants of Denmark are there called tani (), or "Danes", in the accusative.