It is a cliche in some quarters of the international media that the Danes are holding back on European integration because of Nordic nationalism and xenophobia. Like a lot of cliches, it is not lacking a grain of plausibility. When you are in the middle of a rally by the Danish People's Party, for example, you tend not to notice black or coloured faces and there seems to be a higher-than-usual proportion of blond, Aryan-looking gentlemen with jutting jaws and a firm commitment to the fatherland.
While the DPP and its feisty leader, Ms Pia Kjaersgaard, would reject the xenophobe tag, they are undoubtedly on the nationalist end of the political spectrum. However, opposition to the common currency and further European integration - at least at this stage - is not entirely or even mainly confined to nationalist voters.
Survey data found that 40 per cent of those supporting the main government party, the Social Democrats, were voting No in this week's referendum. One of the chief anti-euro campaigners was Mr Holger Nielsen, leader of the left-wing Socialist People's Party which broadly supports the government on domestic issues.
In these campaigns, however, the broad-front, extra-parliamentary groups can be at least as important as the political parties. Prof Drude Dahlerup of the June Movement (which was formed in June 1992 after the Danish rejection of the Maastricht Treaty) comes across as a typical left-liberal intellectual. Far from being ultra-nationalist or xenophobic, she takes a pragmatic approach to the EU and the duties and implications of membership.
More nationalistic but still in a fairly moderate way, Prof Ole Krarup MEP of the People's Movement favours withdrawal from the EU. Somewhat quaintly, he regards Britain as one of the Nordic countries: more accurately, perhaps, he feels there is a political culture in northern Europe which is different from what prevails in the south and which he wants to preserve.
On the Yes side there were certainly no overt xenophobes or ultra-nationalists. Social Democrat ministers were highly visible in the campaign and they mostly seemed to fit the standard technocrat-politician mould prevalent in today's Europe. If anything, they were rather dull.
However, there was no lack of earnestness on the No side either. Danish politics is a serious affair where the focus is solidly on the issues: admittedly less entertaining than the media-driven blood sport of the Irish scene. Not only the politicians but the ordinary people take politics seriously - the turnout in Thursday's referendum was reported to be close to 90 per cent and some polling stations stayed open after hours to accommodate long queues.
Ordinary Danes I spoke to protested that they were not against the EU but felt joining the common currency was a step too far at this stage. European co-operation, yes, but they wanted to see the small print and know exactly what they were getting involved in, whether in fiscal, military or political terms.
Time and again, people told me how appalled they were by the EU sanctions imposed against Austria when Jorg Haider's right-wing party joined the government there. They insisted they had no political sympathy with Mr Haider, it was a question of the right of a member-state to choose its own government without outside interference.
The Dane values sovereignty like a precious jewel. I had a discussion with Mr Jens-Peter Bonde MEP, one of the more prominent anti-euro campaigners. He was warning that the EU charter of fundamental rights could mean that Denmark would no longer have a Protestant monarch and might end up with a Catholic or a Muslim on the throne.
He was not opposed to this in principle but felt it should be decided by Danes, not by the EU and he noted similar concerns expressed in Ireland on the controversial abortion issue.
Whereas there is a widespread belief that Ireland was lifted up financially and socially by EU membership and transformed from an economic backwater to a modern European state, Denmark would probably have remained relatively prosperous even outside the EU, as Norway has succeeded in doing.
In terms of social legislation and the welfare state it was already more advanced than many of its European partners when it joined the Union.
However, the nagging worry for Danes who voted No must be the prospect of isolation and a loss of political and economic influence by refusing to go the extra mile with Brussels.
Indeed, one of the puzzles for outsiders watching the campaign was the fact that the Danish currency is effectively tied to the euro by its own Central Bank, but the people turned down the chance for their representatives to have a say in how the common currency should be administered.
A large section of the electorate appeared to distrust Brussels and indeed their own government: if they bought into the euro, what other commitments were involved? Maybe the rulers of Europe need to spell out, more clearly and in plainer language, what they are planning to do and why they are planning to do it.