Anglo-Saxon History Notes

440-1066 AD

 

Stonehenge, standing shrouded in mystery on barren Salisbury Plain, suggests the ancient, unknown history of England.  Who built it and when it was built are still riddles, as are the names of the races that inhabited Britain before the beginnings of recorded history.

 

The Coming of the Anglo-Saxons

 

For nearly 400 years, Britain remained a part of the mighty Roman Empire.  Romans and Britons intermarried, towns grew and prospered, magnificent roads fanned out over the province, and peace was maintained under Roman law. 

 

The Romanized Britons, left without defense from Roman legions were son involved in conflicts with other Celtic tribes – Irishmen from the west, Scots and Picts from the north.  Eventually, however, the remnants of the Roman province of Britain were conquered by Germanic invaders from across the North Sea – Angles, Saxons, & Jutes.

 

When the Huns came pouring into Europe from the East in the 4th and 5th centuries, they pushed the Germanic tribes of Central Europe farther west.  These in turn exerted pressures on the Anglo-Saxons, who became for a time Vikings, or sea rovers.

 

Anglo-Saxon Society

 

When the Anglo-Saxons invaded England, they were an agricultural, semi-nomadic

people.  They recognized two classes of society: the earls of the ruling class, who could claim kinship to the founder of the tribe; and the churls, who were bondmen tracing their ancestry only to some unfortunate former captive of the tribe.

 

The warrior occupied a preeminent position in Anglo-Saxon society.  The prestige of the successful warrior was immense.  Even the king was essentially a warrior.  Although, he ruled absolutely, he was attentive to the advice of his assembly of elders, the Witan (wise men).

 

The churls were responsible for the hard labor that sustained the predominantly agricultural community.  They spent their days tilling the soil, hunting and fishing and fowling, working metal and weaving.  They were bound to the service of the earls unless they could earn possessions and special royal favor, which could transform them into the relatively small group of freemen, or independent landholders.

 

The place of women in the social scale was unimportant.  A queen, the wife of a powerful earl, or, later a churchwoman occupied a position of honor and power.  But, most women were regarded as valuable only for domestic duties.

 

Great feasts were also a part of Anglo-Saxon life.  To celebrate the deeds of a hero, there had been from ancient times the professional bard, called the scop, who combined in his person the roles of chief entertainer, antiquarian, poet laureate, and press agent for the king and tribe.  At the feast the scop would come forward to regale the company with legends relating to the deeds of great Germanic heroes of the past.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


The Advent of Christianity

 

The Anglo-Saxon, while he lived on the continent of Europe, had surrounded himself with greater and lesser deities – forces of nature or personifications of the supernatural, which he could comprehend only as animal or human agencies of superior strength.  In Britain, he came into contact with Christianity through remnants of Christian missionaries from Ireland. 

 

The flow of Christianity came straight from Rome when, in 597, Pope Gregory the Great sent his emissary Augustine to convert King Ethelbert of Kent.  To the Anglo-Saxons who heard the message of the Christian teachers, the new religion that promised something more certain than his pagan deities offered seemed worthy to be followed. 

 

In spite of the widespread effects of Christianity on the Anglo-Saxons, the underlying paganism of the people shows up here and there in telltale fashion in the written records.  It is particularly evident in the surviving folklore and epic/heroic poetry such as that of 

 


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King Alfred the Great & the Danish Invasion

 

Around 850 in the kingdom of Wessex, there emerged the figure of King Alfred the Great, most remarkable of the Anglo-Saxon kings.  Strong and skillful ruler though he was, his reign was nevertheless one of critical strife in the island.  His enemies were Viking Danes, who were following the pattern set by the Anglo-Saxons 400 years earlier.  The Vikings advanced farther and farther into the northern and central portions of England, pillaging and burning.  Raids had been followed by settlements, until during the reign of Alfred, the Danes were threatening the entire island.  Alfred checked the Danish menace.  To establish peace, however, he had to cede to the Danes the northern and central portions of England, which were eventually won back by the Anglo-Saxons during the 10th century, so that one can at last begin to think of a unified English nation. 

 

More unrest followed, the Anglo-Saxons returned to rule in 1042, and in 1066 the Norman Invasion put an end to the Anglo-Saxon history of England.  However, a new chapter in English history begins with William the Conqueror.