Saxo Grammaticus (c. 1150–1220) traces the Danish dynasty back to a founder by the name of Dan, a native of the country, who is supposed to have had twenty successors before the birth Christ. As some of these reigns were very long, the date of the foundation of the Danish kingdom corresponds approximately to that of the foundation of Rome (753 BC). According to Saxo, the Danes have no connection to any other people. He thus rejects Dudo of St. Quentin’s suggestion that the Danes are descended from the ancient Greeks; i.e., the Danai, and he omits every reference to the Roman Empire until the age of Charlemagne, emphasizing that the Danes had no part in it. Consequently, the contemporary Roman Empire, bordering Denmark to the south, has no claim on suzerainty.