Denmark maintains a number of colonies outside Scandinavia, starting in the seventeenth century and lasting until the twentieth century.

Christian IV (reigned 1588–1648) had first initiated the policy of expanding Denmark's overseas trade, as part of the mercantilist trend then popular in European governing circles.

Denmark had established its own first colony at Tranquebar, or Trankebar, on India's south coast, in 1620.

In the Caribbean Denmark had started a colony on St Thomas in 1671 and St John in 1718, and purchases Saint Croix from France in 1733.

Denmark maintains its Indian colony, Tranquebar, as well as several other smaller colonies there, for about two hundred years.

The Danish East India Company operates out of Tranquebar.

During its heyday, the Danish East Indian Company and the Swedish East India Company import more tea than the British East India Company—and smuggled ninety percent of it into Britain, where it sells at a huge profit.

Both of the Scandinavia-based East India Companies fold during the course of the Napoleonic Wars.

Denmark also maintains other colonies, forts, and bases in West Africa, primarily for the purpose of slave-trading.