John, Danish Hans (born June 5, 1455, Denmark—died Feb. 20, 1513, Ålborg, Den.) king of Denmark (1481–1513) and Norway (1483–1513) and king (as John II) of Sweden (1497–1501) who failed in his efforts to incorporate Sweden into a Danish-dominated Scandinavian union. He was more successful in fostering the commercial development of Danish burghers to challenge the power of the nobility.
John succeeded his father, Christian I, king of Denmark and Norway, in 1481, but only by agreeing to a stringent charter imposed by the Danish nobles to limit royal power. Although he was also recognized as sovereign by the Swedish state council (1483), the Swedish regent, Sten Sture the Elder, was able to postpone John’s coronation as king of Sweden. In 1490 John divided the territories of Schleswig and Holstein with his brother Frederick (later king of Denmark as Frederick I).
Ignoring the royal charter of 1483, John expanded the authority of his office and further offset the nobles’ power by supporting the Danish merchant class against its chief rivals, the traders of the Hanseatic League (a north German trading confederation). His anti-Hanseatic policy was furthered by trade agreements with England, the Netherlands (1490), and the merchants of the south German house of Fugger.
John was able to force Sten Sture to resign the regency of Sweden (1497) and was crowned king after allying himself with Ivan III, grand prince of Moscow, in 1493. He then ordered the building of a navy to control the Baltic Sea but suffered a serious military defeat in 1500 in a peasant uprising in Dithmarschen (now in Germany). The defeat helped persuade dissident Swedish nobles to rebel and reinstall Sten Sture as regent of Sweden, but Norwegian and Danish uprisings against John’s rule were suppressed.
John’s commercial treaty with England led to a war against Sweden and the Hanseatic city of Lübeck (1510–12), in which the new Danish navy scored repeated victories.