History of Schleswig-Holstein extremely harsh. King Christopher was only left in effective control of the small island of Langeland and faced the impossible task of raising 100,000 silver marks to redeem his country. Denmark had effectively been dissolved and was left without a king between 1332 and 1340. Gerhard, however, was assassinated in 1340 by a Dane. In 1340, King Valdemar IV of Denmark began his more than twenty-year-long quest to reclaim his kingdom. While succeeding in regaining control of Zealand, Funen, Jutland, and Scania he, however, failed to obtain control of Schleswig, and its ducal line managed to continue its virtual independence.
Jutland border between the Danish and German realms from c. 850 to 1864. Although most of Schleswig-Holstein is geographically part of the Jutland peninsula, most German residents there would not identify themselves with Jutland or even as "Jutlanders", but rather with "North Germany" () and Schleswig-Holstein, considering themselves "Northern Germans" () and "Schleswig-Holsteiner". The medieval law Code of Jutland applied to Schleswig until 1900 when it was replaced by the Prussian Civil Code. Some rarely used clauses of the Jutlandic Code still apply north of the Eider, even some cities south of the river- all of Rendsburg and more than half