FROM THE MAKERS OF BBC HISTORY MAGAZINE The story of Vikings and Anglo-Saxons Migrations, invasions and the battle for Britain Alfred the Great Treasures of Sutton Hoo Early Christianity The first Anglo-Saxons Why the Vikings attacked Warriors of the seas The creation of England Vikings in America FROM THE MAKERS OF MAGAZINE Save when you subscribe to the digital edition BBC History Magazine is Britain’s bestselling history magazine. We feature leading historians writing lively and thought-provoking new takes on the great events of the past. Available from WELCOME MAGAZINE EDITORIAL From the crumbling of Roman rule in the fifth century AD Editor Rob Attar until the triumph of the Normans (themselves descended [email protected] from Norsemen) in 1066, Britain’s – and especially England’s Managing editor Charlotte Hodgman – history is dominated by two groups: the Anglo-Saxons and the Production editor Spencer Mizen Sub-editor Paul Bloomfield Vikings. Both originating in northern Europe, the Anglo-Saxons Picture editor Samantha Nott and Vikings arrived in waves of migrants and invaders, battling [email protected] and making accommodations with both each other and the peoples Art editor Rosemary Smith already inhabiting these islands. They left a profound legacy in our Additional work by Rachel Dickens, language, our laws, our place names and remarkable artefacts that Matt Elton, Susanne Frank, Katherine Hallett, Sarah Lambert, Rosemary Smith, Sue Wingrove, continue to be discovered today. Paul Jarrold In this special edition of BBC History Magazine we explore both groups in depth, with articles written by some of the country’s foremost experts. Discover the latest thinking about the ‘Dark Ages’, find out about the Vikings’ fearsome martial prowess and get the S AGE BBC History Magazine is published by Immediate Media Company lowdown on leading figures of the age such as Alfred the Great and M Bristol Limited under licence from BBC Worldwide who help fund Æthelstan – England’s first king. Plus, we take the story further afield Y I new BBC programmes. ETT BBC History Magazine was established to publish authoritative by charting some of the Vikings’ voyaging adventures, including M/G history, written by leading experts, in an accessible and their famed expeditions to America. U attractive format. We seek to maintain the high journalistic SE standards traditionally associated with the BBC. This special edition is a compendium of some of the U M best articles on the Anglo-Saxons and Vikings to H PRESS AND PUBLIC RELATIONS Y/BRITIS 0PS2rYe0Ns 7sD1 o5If0Cfi 5Ac0eT1r I5DO –oNm doinmici nLiocb.lloebyl e [email protected] yheaavres a. Ip hpoepaere tdh aint y BoBuC f Hinisdt oitr ayn M eangjoayzianbel eo vreear dre. Dceon t M Head of licensing & syndication Tim Hudson also check out our monthly magazine, in which we LA International Partners’ Manager Anna Brown ES: A PPrRoOduDcUtioCnT dIiOreNctor Sarah Powell will continue to analyse this fascinating era. 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Unauthorised reproduction in VELLI wefhfoorlet hoar sp baerte ins mpraodhei btoit esde cwuirteh poeurtm wirsisttioenn fpoer rcmopisysriiognh.t Emvaetreyr ial. – they navigated NG In the event of any material being used inadvertently, or where it S/ PI pwriollv bede immapdoses iinb lae tfou tturarcee i sthseu ec.o pyright owner, acknowledgement the motorways of RBI MSS, photographs and artwork are accepted on the basis that P, CONOTT BloBsCs oHri sdtaomrya Mgea gtoa zsianme ea.n Vdi eitws sa geexpnrtse sdsoe ndo atr aec ncoetp nt elicaebsilsitayr filoyr the sea, trading in KING SHIGE: JENI tWohueor s ameb aoidgfe at hzbeiyn peIPusS,b pOlisl’esha ersure.le vsi saint idm rmegeudliaattieo.ncso.. Tuok ,g eivmea fiel edback about goods and ideas at EPLICA VIS THIS PA eCLImdooinmntdoleorodninai, al WIcmtoe6m mM 7peeBlddaTiiianat teCs oM@meimpdiaman eCyd oisi.a, wtVeoi.ncrekoyi.nuagkrd t ooHr eo wnusrsiuetre,e 4t to4h KaBta ratohlol eokrf i Gintrsee en, tkhneo lwimni wts oorfl dth”e RE E COVER: OSEBERG COVER: GETTY IMAG acpbonaelpy lre eegcrci ftiysitcos sln,e o sdpua,or mfcioneprtd .lue fssreo o minr wnwereawlpls-pmpianapgne aarsgn dea dnd difs oppraeocssketas og. fiTn ihtg ia.s tP myleoaaugsrae lo zricenamel ocvaen Hdsoeis-btcuoanrliklaesnd e J‘nDAtarNerkInN cAAhg eRedsA ’i MdoenIa RpsaE agZbe o 1u1t4 the N THACK OB The Story of Vikings and Anglo-Saxons 3 CONTENTS 62 Was Alfred’s greatness mostly down to luck? 80 26 How hapless King Æthelred lost Discover where Britain England to the Viking Swein Forkbeard embraced Christianity 6 Timeline 22 Beowulf Ecgfrith, the powerful king of Ryan Lavelle traces successive Who wrote the epic Old English Northumbria who nearly ruled waves of settlement and conlict poem? Alex Burghart investigates the whole island 10 WORLD OF THE 26 T he rise of Christianity 42 Offa: beyond the Dyke ANGLO-SAXONS Sarah Foot visits key sites in the Sarah Foot proiles the king who spread of the gospel in Britain built a barrier against the Welsh 12 Who were the 46 ANGLO-SAXONS Anglo-Saxons? 30 The dark side of the VERSUS VIKINGS Nick Higham tackles the big Anglo-Saxon world questions about their origins Life for lowly peasants was far 48 W hy did the Vikings’ from idyllic, says Ryan Lavelle 16 When the Dark Ages violent raids begin? Y were lit up 38 The Anglo-Saxon who The Norsemen launched their TT E Alex Burghart on the impact of the (almost) united Britain attacks in an attempt to defend Y/G M discovery of the Sutton Hoo hoard Nick Higham introduces their culture, says Robert Ferguson LA A 4 The Story of Vikings and Anglo-Saxons 98 Learn how ships were key to the success of the Vikings 30 Why Anglo-Saxon England wasn’t a rural idyll for all 104 How Vikings built a new society in Iceland 74 16 Æthelstan: the king Lessons from the who made England Sutton Hoo hoard 56 How England rode 74 927: the year Æthelstan 98 How the Vikings ruled the Viking storm made England the waves Ryan Lavelle explains how Michael Wood plots the events that Gareth Williams shows how great compromise was crucial in saw Alfred’s grandson rule England seamanship ensured success countering Viking aggression Y 80 The Viking conquest 104 A land without kings M ALA 62 Alfred the Great: of England Philip Parker on how Vikings TTY/ a lucky king? Sarah Foot on how Swein Forkbeard created a new society in Iceland E G Alex Burghart asks whether the became England’s irst Viking king Y/ AR iconic leader owed his success to 108 Vikings in America LIBR good fortune rather than greatness 88 WORLD OF John Haywood tracks the exploits H THE VIKINGS S of a small band of explorers RITI 68 Æthelflæd: iron lady B G- of Mercia 90 The Vikings at home 114 Opinion K A Y/ Alex Burghart lauds the exploits of Cameron Balbirnie explores life Janina Ramirez explains why the M LA King Alfred’s dynamic daughter and death in Viking settlements ‘Dark Ages’ were far from dark A The Story of Vikings and Anglo-Saxons 5 Timeline The Vikings and Anglo-Saxons Ryan Lavelle traces the rise of the Anglo-Saxons and the arrival of the Vikings from the wane of Rome to the Conquest of 1066 597 Sent from Rome by Pope Gregory the Great, the missionary Augustine arrives in Kent, where A fourth- century King Æthelberht agrees to adopt gold Christianity in his kingdom. solidus Augustine (later Saint Augustine) bearing the becomes the first archbishop of head of Canterbury, and Whitby Abbey, now ruined, was Emperor Honorius Christianity gives originally founded in 657 Æthelberht a means 410 664 of extending Kentish As Rome is sacked, its emperor domination over At a synod in Whitby, overseen Honorius advises the inhabitants of other Anglo-Saxon by the Northumbrian king Oswiu, ‘Brettania’ to defend themselves. kings – at least the Irish and Roman churches in Around this time, people from the North until Æthelberht’s Britain agree to celebrate Sea coasts of continental Europe settle death in 616. Easter according to the in Britain, first as Roman mercenaries, same calendar. This represents then later claiming land for themselves. a triumph for the Roman organi- St Augustine, These will later become known as sation of the church to which the shown in a study Anglo-Saxons, and the area of Britain Anglo-Saxon kingdoms at that for a stained they come to dominate is England. glass window time subscribed. 400 500 600 700 c500 Gildas, a west British churchman, writes of generations of barbarian invaders – their invasions punishment for the unrighteous. His work is read by many, and his narrative of invasions, exterminations and conflicts (including a victory over the Saxons later ascribed to ‘Arthur’) proves influential for centuries to come. An artist’s impression of the ship buried at Sutton Hoo and unearthed in 1939 c625 A ship is laid into the ground at what’s now Sutton Hoo in Suffolk during the burial of a high-ranking figure, possibly King Rædwald of the East Angles, who had accepted Christian baptism while apparently retaining pagan religious beliefs. The dead man is laid to rest in a shelter on N the deck with the regalia of office, A M including a magnificent helmet and GE D shield that show Swedish workman- RI B An illumination from ship. A mound of earth is laid over the Y/ tRhoec 1h4etfho-ucceanutuldr yG rail top of the vessel, and the barrow ALAM grave remains (virtually) untouched Y/ shows King Arthur T T fighting the Saxons for just over 13 centuries. GE 6 The Story of Vikings and Anglo-Saxons An early 20th-century illustration shows the victory of Ecgberht’s Wessex over the Mercian army at Ellendun 731 Writing at St Paul’s Monas- tery in Jarrow, the Venerable Bede sets the tone for an ‘English people’ when he completes his manuscript Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum (Ecclesiastical History of the English People). Bede’s work, telling the story of the conversion of the peoples of Britain, is admired and used as a model for historical writing throughout the Middle Ages. It also gives birth to an idea of Englishness. 825 The defeat of a Mercian army at Ellendun (near Wroughton in Wiltshire) by King Ecgberht of A 15th-century German Wessex leads to the domination of the south woodcut shows the of England by the West Saxons. Ecgberht is Venerable Bede, who able to wrest a swathe of territory, from Essex and chronicled the early history of Christian England Kent to Sussex, from Mercian overlordship. 800 787 851 Thirty years after seizing A Viking army first camps power in the Mercian king- overwinter in Anglo-Saxon dom, King Offa secures England, on the Isle of Thanet the succession of his son, (Kent). Subsequent campaigns Ecgfrith. Though Ecgfrith by a ‘Great Heathen Army’, dies within months of his which forms and re-forms over father’s death in 796, Offa’s the next two decades, show that reputation endures, thanks to Vikings are concerned not just his ruthless tactics in securing with seizing treasure but could much of England between the also bring long-established Thames and Humber – and kingdoms to their knees as they for the eponymous dyke he seek land for settlement. built along the Welsh border. The Lindisfarne Stone, believed to depict the first Viking raid on England in 793 793 In the earliest datable Viking raid on the British Isles, a group of pirates arrives at the Northumbrian island monastery of Lindisfarne and loots the church. Alcuin, an Anglo-Saxon scholar at Charlemagne’s Y M court, writes of his horror at the news, A AL telling both the community at Lindisfarne N/ A and the Northumbrian royal court that such EM Viking longships crewed by the DG A penny bearing the head of calamities are a warning to become better ‘Great Heathen Army’ land in BRI King Offa of Mercia Christians. More Viking raids follow. England in a later print The Story of Vikings and Anglo-Saxons 7 Timeline 874 Leaving Norway because of a blood- feud, Ingólf Arnarson and his foster- brother Hjorleif sail to Iceland. According to the Icelandic Land- námabók (Book of Settlements), Ingólf casts the pillars from his old Norwegian house into the sea, declaring that he will settle where they wash up. The English forces This proves to be a bay of hot of Æthelstan defeat Scots, Norse-Irish springs – Reykjavík. and Viking warriors at Brunanburh in 937 911 937 Alfred’s daughter Æthelflæd An alliance of Scots, Norse-Irish assumes control of Mercia and Viking forces takes a stand following the death of her against the kingdom of Æthelstan husband, Æthelred. The ‘Lady (924–39), king of the English. of the Mercians’ leads armies Æthelstan and his half- against Anglo-Scandinavian brother Edmund defeat the forces in the Midlands. Her invaders at Brunanburh, Einar death and the imprisonment of somewhere in north England. Jónsson’s her daughter Ælfwynn by her The battle is remembered in an 1924 statue uncle Edward ‘the Elder’ in 918 Old English poem recorded in of pioneer diverts this resurgence of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as Ingólf Arnarson in Mercian power into the interests well as by generations of writers Reykjavík of a West Saxon kingdom. across the British Isles. 900 878 c911 954 King Alfred ‘the Great’ of Wessex A Viking army is granted land Eirik ‘Bloodaxe’, a Norwegian (871–99) defeats a force of Vikings around Rouen, France. The army’s exile who took control of the led by the Danish warlord Guthrum leader, Rollo, accepts Christian- Viking kingdom of York following at Edington (Wiltshire). Alfred and ity and marries the daughter the death of the southern English Guthrum agree a peace treaty of the French king. The settle- king Edmund (939–46), is driven that divides the English kingdoms ment of the army of Northmen from York by his own people and Y between Anglo-Saxons and in what becomes Normannia killed at Stainmore. Following his TT E Danes. Guthrum is baptised with (Normandy) is ostensibly to defend death, York becomes part of Y/G M the West Saxon name Æthelstan access to Paris but increasingly the English realm, no longer A L and, for a time, becomes the ruler shows its independence as a ruled as a separate kingdom. G/A K of the East Anglian kingdom. powerful and influential principality A on the coast of what we call the English Channel. The stone effigy of A 13th-century Rollo, first ruler manuscript of Normandy, in illumination Rouen Cathedral is depicting Alfred a modern copy of the the Great 13th-century original 8 A 20th-century American tapestry c965 depicts the voyage of Leif Eriksson to Harald ‘Bluetooth’ erects a the New World memorial stone at Jelling in Jutland, in the Viking kingdom of Denmark, with runes recording the memory of his father, Gorm, and mother, Thyra. The Jelling stone boasts an image of the crucified Christ and the statement that Harald had converted all of Denmark to Christianity, as well as a claim to control Norway. c1000 The Jelling Stone, carved Leif Eriksson, a Norse inhabitant c965, bearing of Greenland, persuades some an image of families to join him on a voyage the crucified 1016 Christ westward to find land sighted by an earlier voyager. Making After decades of Viking raids and landfall in what we now know attempts to wrest the English as North America, he names it kingdom from Æthelred and his Vínland after the wild grapes that son Edmund Ironside, a peace is grow there. A settlement, possibly brokered with the Danish king more than one, is established but Cnut, seeing the kingdom divided hostility from the native people once more. After Edmund’s death leads this westernmost outpost on 30 November the Dane claims of Viking expansion to be aban- the whole kingdom, eventually doned after only a few years. ruling a North Sea empire. 1000 1066 Duke William of Normandy launches an invasion of the English kingdom following the seizure of the crown by Harold Godwinson. The new king defeats Harold Hardrada of Norway at Stamford Bridge near York on 25 September, but is killed in battle with William at Hastings on 14 October. William’s Edward the victory launches Martyr, shown in an illumination in the Anglo-Norman a 14th-century era in England. manuscript 978 King Edward ‘the Martyr’ is murdered at Corfe, Dorset – perhaps, it is claimed, by Y T his stepmother. As the perpetrators remain T E G unpunished, some writers wonder whether Y/ M the murder was a sign of God’s wrath with A AL the English. N/ A M King Harold is shown on E DG the throne in a scene from RI the Bayeux Tapestry B The Story of Vikings and Anglo-Saxons 9 WORLD OF THE ANGLO- 10 The Story of Vikings and Anglo-Saxons