Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM
History of Britain and the USA 1 BA, 2011-12
LECTURE FOUR
Anglo-Saxons 400-800 AD
Chronology
449-1066 - Anglo-Saxon times
409-597 - Sub-Roman Britain
450-600 - Dark Ages
7th-9th cent. - Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy
c. 400 800 Early Christian Ireland
c. 800 beginning of the Viking age in the British Isles
" historical evidence mixed legends and myths
" insular culture develops in greater separation from mainstream Europe than in Roman
times
Chronicles
1. Gildas - De excidio et conquestu Brittanniae (540s)
2. The Venerable Bede - Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum (731)
3. Nennius - Historia Britonum (9th cent.)
4. Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (891-1154)
Roman Britain 409 449
" migrations of peoples all over Europe
" employment of Germanic mercenaries in the Roman army
" legions withdrawn
" constant raids of the Picts and the Irish
" local British rulers, e.g. Vitalinus who declares himself the VORTIGERN, i.e.
Overlord of All Britain
Anglo-Saxon invasion
According to Bede, Vortigern invites Germanic Jutes led by legendary Hengest and Horsa
to Kent (449) to help him against invading Picts. Having defeated the Picts they start their
expansion in Britain, followed then by the Angles and the Saxons.
" Jutes - Kent
" Saxons - along the Thames toward Cornwall
" Angles - Midlands, northward
1
Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM
History of Britain and the USA 1 BA, 2011-12
LECTURE FOUR
Anglo-Saxons 400-800 AD
450-600 Dark Ages (Sub-Roman Britain)
" constant expansion and of Anglo-Saxons westward and northward, destruction
of the Romano-British civilization and foundation of numerous tribal kingdoms
" Anglo-Saxons bring their own pagan culture and LANGUAGE Britons submit
under Anglo-Saxon social and linguistic influence, Roman cities are abandoned
some evidence of annihilation of the Britons but not as extensive as once imagined
British resistance by Ambrosius Aurelianus (King Arthur?) dux bellorum - Battle of
Mount Badon 500 or 515 - Anglo-Saxon invasion is stopped for some decades in the 6th
century
Between the 5th and 7th century, two broad cultural zones are established in post-Roman
Britain
I. Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the south-east.
II. Britons in the west and the north.
1. west: Wales (WEALLAS -'land of foreigners')
2. south-west: Dumnonia/Cornwall
3. south: some Cornish Britons flee across the English Channel to settle in Brittany
4. north: Cumbria (Rheged)
5. north-west: Strathclyde
Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy
From late 7th to 9th century - fluid consolidation of numerous Anglo-Saxon kingdoms into the
Heptarchy:
Saxons: ESSEX, SUSSEX, WESSEX
Angles: EAST ANGLIA, NORTHUMBRIA, MERCIA
Jutes: KENT
In constant conflict over supremacy and against the neighboring British kingdoms
Breatwaldaships
Since the 7th c. tendency to gain supremacy over other kingdoms of Heptarchy
A ruler who gains supremacy (overkingship) over the other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms is called
Bretwalda - the Lord of Britain
Bretwaldaship order:
2
Dr Tomasz Skirecki, IFA, UAM
History of Britain and the USA 1 BA, 2011-12
LECTURE FOUR
Anglo-Saxons 400-800 AD
I. 6th cent. Sussex and Kent
II. 7th cent. - Northumbria
III. 8th cent. Mercia
" King Offa of Mercia (757-796)
" Offa's Dyke c. 789
North of Hadrian S Wall ( Scotland ) 5th-8th century
Four main groups:
" Picts to the north
" Irish Dalriadans (Scotti) in Argyll
" Britons Strathclyde
" Angles Lowlands 630s - Edwin of Northumbria overtakes the ancient British
kingdom of the Gododdin, whose capital Dunedin is renamed Edinburgh
By 800 the nations of England, Scotland and Wales begin to crystalize
ANGLO-SAXON LEGACY
- English language
- NAMES: ENGLAND, SCOTLAND, IRELAND, WALES
- Place names ending in -ing, -ington, -ingham, -burgh or bury, wic or wich, etc.
- The Futhorc Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet
- the RUTHWELL CROSS with inscription being part of the poem The Dream of the
Rood (8th cent.)
- Sutton Hoo, Woodbridge, Suffolk
- Beowulf, Widsith and other literary pieces
- Names of weekdays after Germanic gods:
Sunday - Old English sunne - day of sun
Monday - OE mona - day of moon
Tuesday - (Tiw - Germ. god of war)
Wednesday - (Woden - Germ. head god)
Thursday - (Thor - Germ. god of thunders)
Friday - (Frigg - Germ. goddess of marriage)
Name of Easter - (Eostre - Germ. goddess of dawn)
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