Sveinn Tjúguskegg, known also as Sweyn I Forkbeard and Sven the Dane, (960 – February 3, 1014), was king of Denmark and England, as well as parts of Norway. He was a Viking leader and the father of Canute the Great. On his father Harald Bluetooth's death in late 986, he became King of Denmark; in 1000, with allegiance of the Trondejarl, Erik of Lade, he was ruler over most of Norway. After a long effort at conquest, and shortly before his death, in 1013 he became King of England. For the last months of his life, he was the Danish sovereign of a North Sea empire, which only his son Canute was to rival in northern Europe.