2. Roman period and great invasions
UNIT 2: THE ROMAN PERIOD AND THE GREAT
INVASIONS
1. THE ROMAN INVASION AND THE NORTHERN FRONTIER
The Romans knew little of Britain. Julius Caesar was already in control of the newly won
territory of Gaul and he had ambitious for a higher office. He needed a bold gesture to
further his popularity with the Roman Senate and people. And he knew that the idea of
Roman legions landing in the remote and fabulous island of Britain, would win him fame in
Rome. So, on August 26, 55 BC, a fleet of warships appeared off the Kent coast. The
Britons had followed the Roman fleet along the shore and were waiting on the beach.
The Romans had taken a calculated risk when they had set out for Britain. In midSeptember, Julius Caesar and his men sailed back to Gaul. He had come and seen, but
not conquered. By 54 BC, he was ready with a great force, about 500 vessels laden with
men, horses and equipment. This time the Roman landing was unopposed. They
established a base camp and took the battle north of the Thames into Hertfordshire, the
territory of Catuvellauni, and the people agreed to pay tribute to the Romans. Julius
Caesar won public recognition in Rome for this major victory.
Nearly a century passed before the Roman conquest was seriously undertaken. The delay
suggested that treaties between Rome and British leaders such as Cunobelinus of the
Catuvellauni and Verica had successfully reduced British involvement in Gaul; Rome had
also established valuable trading links with parts of Britain.
In 41 AD, Claudius replaced his nephew Caligula as ruler of the Roman Empire. He had to
restore public confidence and had to show the legions that made him emperor that he
could act decisively. The conquest of Britain served all his political aims.
Claudius, aged over 50, was anxious for military honour. In August 43 AD, an invasion
force, consisting of four legions and auxiliaries numbering over 40,000 men, landed
unopposed on the Kent coast. In command was Aulus Plautius, who was to be Britain’s
first military governor. His objective was Camulodunum, the modern Colchester, then the
Catuvellaunian capital. Claudius remained in Rome waiting for the message which would
bring him to Britain to complete the campaign.
Claudius joined his army on September 5. two days later, he led the attack on the British.
The battle may have been fought on Brentwood Hill, between London and Colchester. In
the ensuing rout, 4700 Britons were killed and 8000 were taken as prisoners. The Romans
lost only 380 dead with 600 wounded. Colchester fell, and Caractacus, the outstanding
British warrior, had to flee for his life.
The Emperor Claudius spent only 16 days in Britain. He received the submission of the
conquered tribes and hurried back to Rome to claim his triumph.
Plautius completed his task unhindered by the imperial court. With the Twentieth Legion in
reserve at Colchester, the remaining three fanned out and occupied the land behind the
frontier Claudius had laid down, a line from Lincoln to the South Devon coast. The new
defences were served by the 190 mile Fosse Way, Britain’s first military frontier road.
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2. Roman period and great invasions
There were forts manned by detachments of troops. Beyond this line, there were the wild
unconquered tribesmen. But within the new frontiers, the process of ruling and civilising
the islanders could now begin.
1.1. The Conquest of the Midlands and the North
The Romans had planned to delay the conquest of Northern Britain until the Midlands and
Wales were dominated. Roman military and naval forces began to intervene in the North in
the 50s and 60s.
Rome nearly lost Britain in 60 AD, when the subjected Britons rose against their new
masters. The revolt was against Roman injustice. Corruption, unfair extortion of tax money
and massive redistribution of land to Roman veterans had already angered the British.
Their tragic heroine, Boudicca, was a formidable woman.
When Boudicca’s husband, the Roman vassal-king Prasutagus of the Iceni, died, Roman
officials seized his domains and took the lands of Icenian nobles. Roman legionaries then
sacked the royal palace, flogged Boudicca and raped her two daughters.
The Iceni exploded in rebellion at the outrage, and the uprising quickly spread to other
tribes in south-east England. Tacitus estimates that 70,000 people died. Boudicca
escaped to the woods, where it is believed she poisoned herself.
There was a short period of vengeance on the Iceni, but in Rome, Emperor Nero
supported a policy of conciliation towards the vanquished tribesmen. Instead of continued
reprisal there was pardon and reform. Boudicca had won a posthumous victory. In the
aftermath of her moment of triumph, a system of justice and order was established which
was to last for over three centuries.
Rome’s problems in the North came to a
head in 69 AD. This was the “Year of Four
Emperors”, an empire-wide political and
military struggle between the rival
successors to Nero in which the British
legions were involved. The eventual victor
was Vespasian, who established the
Flavian dynasty that ruled from 69 to 96
AD.
Vespasian was determined to
renew the intention of conquest in Britain, trying to bring the entire mainland to the Roman
province. There were some substantial territorial gains under Quintus Petillius Cerialis (714) and Gnaeus Julius Agricola (77-83).
During Agricola’s governorship, three different men held this position:
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2. Roman period and great invasions
Vespasian (until mid-79) favoured total conquest; Titus (until late 81) was more
circumspect; and Domitian permitted a renewal of the colonial advance, but perhaps with
the limited objective of reducing the fighting power of the Caledonians in case further troop
withdrawals should prove necessary.
Agricola did his duty. At the battle of Mons Grapius in 83 he effectively committed
genocide on the Caledonians. His campaign camps suggest that he provoked the battle by
denying the Caledonians access to the coastal lowlands to their east and northeast, just as
the Gask Ride forts had blocked the glens through which they could reach the lowlands to
their southeast. He continued his advance to the shores of Moray, and even to modern
Inverness.
By 87, the building of the new fortress had been abandoned, and one of the four British
legions in Britain, Legio II Adiutrix, was in the process of transferring to the continent,
indicating that frontier problems in Europe were increasing. Britain did not take priority over
these problems. Agricola’s victory at Mons Graupius at least made it possible and
relatively safe for Rome to halt its territorial expansion within Britain. The period of
conquest was complete; the necessity of consolidation and occupation had now taken
over.
1.2. The Two Walls
During the first 70 years of the Roman occupation of Britain, the wildest frontier of the
Empire was ravaged by tribesmen from the north and threatened from the south by the
restless Brigantes of Yorkshire. Into this turmoil, in the year 122 AD came Emperor
Hadrian. He was a man of new ideas and the greatest of these was to see that the mighty
empire could expand no further.
He turned out the legionaries into defenders and it was in Britain that he met the greatest
test of his policy, which changed the history of the Roman Empire.
He decided to build a wall to separate the barbarians from the Romans. It was an
enormous task, one of the greatest ever undertaken by Roman Power. This stone wall
occupied the ridge to the north of the Stanegate and extended
from Pons Aelii (Newcastle) to join the turf wall at Willowford.
The construction took only seven years. Altogether, at least
8500 men were employed to build the wall. Every Roman mile
(1620 yds) they built a mile-castle, and in between, two watch
towers. 16 large forts, about 5 miles apart, were built to house
the garrison.
“Turf wall” (image on the left)
The great barrier crept across the hills, taking advantage of
every major slope and craggy outcrop of rock. This was a
dangerous and lonely posting for the legions. The climate was
cold and the work very hard. It is probable that the soldier builders had to down tools to
fight off the wild raiders, who must have resented this unnatural barrier across land they
had considered to be their own. Possibly it was this opposition that forced the Romans to
cut the thickness of the wall from 10 ft to 8 ft, to speed up the work.
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2. Roman period and great invasions
When the wall was finished, a great ditch known as the vallum was dug on the south side,
perhaps because the Romans could not even be sure of the loyalty of the tribes to their
rear, such as the Brigantes. By the time of Hadrian’s death (138), the turf wall had been
rebuilt in stone, and the fortifications stretched, mostly in turf, along the coast to Aluana
(Maryport).
In 138, Antoninus Pius planned to build a new wall and to reoccupy territories up to the line
from the river Clota to the Bodotria estuary. It was built throughout of turf. It was designed
with forts of varying size at much shorter intervals.
The Antonine Wall was the northern frontier of the
Roman Empire. The barrier consisted of a line of
auxiliary forts and fortlets connected by a
continuous rampant wall and ditch. These
entrenchments ran from Borrowstounnes near
Carriden in Edinburgh on the firth of Clyde. For the
most part, the defences were positioned to the
south of these two streams, which themselves
formed a natural line of defence against attack from
the north. Its main objective may have been closer
policing of the northern tribes.
Hadrian’s fortification served its purpose for 250
years. In 407, the last effective Roman forces left
Britain for the Continent. So no final, glorious battle
decided the fate of the wall. It was simply
abandoned to the wind, rain, wild flowers and the
barbarian.
1.3. The Roads
When the Romans began the conquest of Britain in 43 AD, they found a collection of roads
and paths, most connecting local fields and hamlets, but also some longer distance trade
routes. However, the Roman administration needed a better network of roads to connect
its new towns and army posts and to speed the flow of both trade goods and troops. In
building their network of roads, the Romans mostly ignored the previous paths, partly
because the Roman towns and forts were built on new sites away from the Celtic
settlements.
The first frontier was set up along a road stretching from Exeter to Lincoln. This was
known as the Fosse Way, the first great Roman road in Britain. The Fosse Way has been
largely adapted by modern highways.
The next military push established a new frontier between Lincoln and York, Wroxeter and
Chester, and Gloucester and Caerleon. After these ‘front-line’ roads had been established,
the Romans turned their attention to expand the network of minor roads within their new
possessions, to better aid the flow of trade. By 82 AD, the Romans had pushed north as
far as a line between the Clyde and the Firth of Forth. During this campaign alone, the
army built over 60 forts and over 1200 miles of roads.
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2. Roman period and great invasions
The minor roads, called “economic roads,” were also built by the Roman army to link
economic centres. There was a third level of roads at the local level, connecting villas,
temples, farms and villages to larger roads and market towns.
They were the arteries of Roman rule and the embodiment of the saying that “All roads
lead to Rome.” In fact, every Roman road in Britain was linked with the routes to London,
and from there to Dover, where regular ferries linked Britain with Rome.
The roads followed the shortest distances between military camps or towns. They often
passed straight over steep ranges of hills, as they were primarily designed for marching
men and horsemen rather than wheeled transport. Usually, the roads were made with a
bottom layer of large stones embedded in sand and covered with rammed gravel to a
thickness of about 18 in. The surface was paved with local materials, the best that could
be found. Every 6 to 16 miles, there were halts where couriers carrying official dispatches
from Rome could get fresh horses.
At the same time, by the first century, there were already busy sea routes linking the
various territories of the Roman Empire. On the coast of Britain, the Romans built harbours
which were linked to the roads they had already built in the island. In Britain, as elsewhere,
the mastery of communication was the secret of Roman power.
2. THE ROMANISATION OF THE BRITISH ISLES
Before the arrival of the Romans, Britain was split into warring tribes, but the Romans
established a system of law and order which gave the island its first taste of national unity,
and opened up communications so trade could flourish. Under Rome, Britain was to enjoy
three centuries of unprecedented peace and prosperity.
Although the Romans rated military glory highly, conquest was not an end in itself. If a
province was to be integrated into the empire, the willing cooperation of its people had to
be guaranteed through a process of Romanisation. In a few cases, existing British leaders
were sufficiently highly regarded to be left in charge of their territories after the Roman
conquest, temporarily, at least. The rapid growth outside Roman forts of small towns (vici)
shows that the army’s need of support services provided wealth-generation opportunities
that the local people were willing and able to take. In the countryside, the Roman need for
food led to arrangements with tribes both inside and outside the province for the supply of
grain.
The Romans encouraged their subject nations to adopt their ways
Roman civilization was based on racial toleration and it was also firmly based on a society
of different classes. There were Roman citizens and slaves. But it was always possible for
non-Italians to gain the privilege of Roman citizenship by merit, as a result of service to
Rome. The centres of Roman influence and administration were the towns, and there, their
civilisation had its main impact.
Trade flourished under the protection of the Roman legions, not only within the island, but
between Britain and the rest of Europe. Local enterprises flourished and their products
were sold in the market towns, along with the work of native craftsmen.
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2. Roman period and great invasions
The British benefited from a range of economic and social opportunities offered by Roman
occupation. This explains why, at the end of the fourth century, they competed with one
another not in rediscovered tribalism, but over the most effective way of sustaining their
Romanised culture.
Introduced to Britain in the 3rd century, Christianity flourished under the Romans and
inspired its own art.
As the barbarians advanced on their trail of pillage and destruction, the Christians fled to
the hills, where their faith was fostered and kept alive. And there, in the remoter reaches of
the country, Christianity grew, to become the greatest legacy of Roman civilisation.
2.1. Society, Economy and Art
When the legions came and conquered, the Romans built towns. They were to stamp the
order of Rome on barbarian Britain. To the towns came lawyers and tax collectors. They
bound the people of the empire into the legal and fiscal network of Rome.
Roman towns were built according to a chessboard pattern. They often began as
collections of soldiers’ families and traders beside fortresses. Streets carved the towns into
blocks, and at the centre was the forum, the town square. Along one side of the forum
stood the basilica, or town hall, and the other sides were lined with shops and colonnades.
In the basilica, the taxmen, administrators and the local council met, and legal disputes
were settled by Roman justice. The language of the law was Latin.
Most of the villas reached their peak of comfort and artistic elegance during the first half of
the 4th century. They incorporated such comforts as very large warm baths, and reception
rooms with under-floor central heating.
All the larger villas were self-sufficient, with adjoining buildings for slaves and ranges of
barns for the animals. They were surrounded by well-cultivated fields or great estates.
These lands were the source of most of the products which were offered for sale in the
market towns. Inside, the villas were furnished with statues, armchairs of wood, bronze
chests, ornamental tables and comfortable couches with cushions covered with bright,
woven cloth.
Every important town in Britain had its public baths, which became the community centres
of Roman civilisation.
Fashion played an important part in the lives of women in Roman Britain. But the Romans
also brought a deeper culture to Britain. The first schools opened in British cities soon after
the invasion. Tutors gave lessons in elegant salons. Here, the descendants of the old tribal
chiefs studied Latin, literature and art. In the space of a few generations, the island and its
people had been transformed. These were the hallmarks of the luxurious life Rome
imported to Britain.
The Romans brought with them to Britain the mosaic. This is a form of art which they had
made very much their own. Mosaic floors, made of fragments of hard stone, were
designed to last and they have proved the most enduring of all the works of Roman Britain.
Many beautiful floors have survived almost intact, while buildings of brick and stone which
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2. Roman period and great invasions
surrounded them have crumbled away leaving little trace. Mosaic floors were used to
decorate town houses, country villas and to pave bath-houses. Gradually, British
craftsmen learnt the art from their Roman masters. Some of their mosaics portray animals
and flowers, as well as a host of the gods and goddesses which the Roman introduced to
Britain. They provide a fascinating glimpse of life in Roman Britain.
2.2. Urban and Rural Centres
The Romanised tribes (civitates) did not necessarily correspond precisely in territorial
terms with their predecessors but they provided an important element of continuity. Within
these territories, sites were chosen for towns to be the administrative centres. These were
the same tribal meeting-places, though they did not usually occupy the same sites. These
new cities and towns were closely integrated into the system of communications.
The towns of Roman Britain were also places to work. These towns were lively places full
of people, noise and bustle.
The ties between urban and rural life were very strong, especially since many of those
people who administered the civitas made their money from industry, which was
dependent on raw materials from the countryside or from agriculture, main source of all
income.
Rural settlement types are different in the lowlands and in the highlands of Roman Britain.
In the rich lowland areas south and east of the line from the Humber to the Severn, the
villa was a major feature of the landscape. These ranged from small, rectangular cottages
to large country houses. Most of them were built on profitable arable farms estates or
stock-rearing farms. In the lowland areas of Yorkshire, Cheshire and South Wales circular
and rectilinear huts were more frequent. In the highlands of the West Country, North
Wales and the North areas, no villas at all were found, and rural settlement consisted
entirely of huts owned by local people and retired soldiers.
Roman Britain was divided into two broad social and economic zones. In the fertile
lowlands of the south and east, a prosperous agricultural economy based on villas
developed. Culturally, this area became the most Romanised and urbanised area of the
province. In the high country of the north and west, they were valued as much for their
mineral resources as their agriculture. Both farming and settlement here showed greater
continuity with Iron Age practices. In the north, the economic opportunities they offered
were similar to those in the south and east.
3.`LONDINIUM´: ROMAN LONDON
The Romans established a political unity in the South, and the Tamesis (Thames) was an
important commercial route for communications with other parts of the Roman Empire.
The earliest activity associated with Londinium (London) was probably military and was
connected with the crossing of the river at Southwark.
The earliest settlement laid north on the Thames and to the east of the Walbrook. It was
located on a major east-west road (the standard via decumana) of Roman military
establishments. Originally built of timber, the town was rebuilt after Boudicca’s rebellion,
using timber for shops and private houses and stone and tile for public buildings.
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2. Roman period and great invasions
In the first century a ‘palace’ (praetorium) was built for the governor and there were other
structures for the judicial officer (legatus iuridicus) and the procurator, some official
buildings to house the governor’s guards (speculatores), and an amphitheatre. There were
also some bath-houses, a forum and a basilica. These buildings were the heart of
administrative and commercial life in all major Romanised British towns.
However, much of the city’s space was taken up with small houses of craftsmen of
different kinds, in busy streets.
In 130, a major fire caused a notable interruption in the development of the city.
Londinium’s relevance in the fourth century was undeniable. The building of a riverside
wall and the equipping of the existing walls with bastions of artillery also suggest that the
city was important enough to try to defend it. In fact, some archaeological remains indicate
the evident interest of local leaders in maintaining a Romanised lifestyle in Londinium until
the fifth century.
The whole of Roman London occupied roughly the area of the Modern City of London,
from the Fleet River in the far west to the site of the later Tower in the east.
4. THE END OF ROMAN BRITAIN
The Roman style of life in Britain did not end overnight. It eithered away gradually under
the pitiless onslaught of invaders and the draining of resources as the legions were
withdrawn for Continental campaigns. But the barbarian invasion of 367 marked a turning
point. In that year Roman Britain faced its greatest challenge, when barbarians assailed it
from north, east and west. Acting in unison, Picts poured over Hadrian’s wall, Saxons
landed on the North Sea coast, and the Irish swooped down on the western seaboard.
Emperor Valentinian sent a Spaniard, Count Theodossius, to deal with the situation. He
landed with fresh troops in 368. the invaders, laden with loot, were no match for them.
Teodossius liberated London and pulled the army together and in the spring, the great
advance northwards began.
Marauders were flushed from their lairs, legionary strong points were retaken and shore
defences revitalised. Naval patrols watched the Irish. In two years peace was restored, but
a very fragile one.
From 367 on, life in the British province sank towards the chaos of the Dark Ages. Forty
years later, Britain ceased to be part of the Roman world.
During 300 years of Roman rule, the Britons had become accustomed, at least in the
south-east, to prosperity and peace. Great villas, or farming estates, worked by a great
supply of peasants and slaves, produced food for the flourishing cities.
But this situation was changing. The central government in Rome was now weak.
Barbarian attacks were increasingly strong and more frequent. And above all, the powerful
army had aspirations of its own. In 383, and again in 406, British commanders took their
troops to the Continent, to pillage and to bid for the Imperial throne.
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A brief pause came in 396-8 when Stilicho, a vandal-born general of brilliance, reorganised
British defences. But in 401, Stilicho and his army left Britain to defend Italy, the heart of
the empire itself. By 407, matters had reached a crisis point. Three times in 25 years
Britain had been depleted of its army. Confidence had never fully returned after 367. Villas
and fields were abandoned as well as trade and agriculture.
In 410, the Saxons raided the coasts once more. The Britons seized the opportunity to
break away from Rome, establishing their own administration as best they could.
Centralised government had evidently broken down completely. In the death agony of
Roman Britain, the towns wrote to Emperor Honorius asking for help, only to be told that
from now on they must look after their own defences. Britain was on its own. After nearly
350 years of peace and civilisation, Roman Britain had finally come to an end.
5. THE GREAT MIGRATIONS AND INVASIONS
The collapse of the Roman province of Britannia created a fragile structure that drew
Germanic migrants from across the Channel and propelled native people around the
British Isles. These waves of land-hungry warriors come to Britain first as raiders and then
as settlers. This period of mass migrations across the North and Irish seas initiated the
creation of a new political order, social unrest and warfare.
This long period of conflicts and ethnic tensions redefined a New Britain. It lasted from 600
to 1066. There was a new political landscape, consisting of little kingdoms. Celtic and
Anglo-Saxon social organisation was not so different, but there were great religious and
linguistic differences. By the end of the Roman Britain, Christianity had a significant
number of believers in Britain, while the Saxons remained pagan until the seventh century.
There were three cultural areas of English settlement: Britain was divided between the
English speaking Anglo-Saxon east and the Celtic north and west, where the British and
Pictish languages persisted, while in Ireland and in some parts of western Britain a
different Celtic language, Gaelic, was spoken. These zones, while not static, can be found
through early medieval place-names.
5.1. The Saxons, Angles and Jutes
With the Anglo-Saxon invasions of the 5th century, a
new era was opened in British history. It lasted for
six centuries and ended in apparent disaster at the
Battle of Hastings in 1066. Yet during this time,
these newcomers of West Germanic ancestry,
Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Frisians, created the
pattern of villages that was to endure to modern
times.
The Anglo-Saxons brought an alien way of life with
them, and their settlement was not unopposed or
easy. The native British, now more Celtic than
Roman, were still capable of putting up stout
resistance.
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2. Roman period and great invasions
Various ancient hill-forts became the bases of British war leaders for their campaigns
against the invaders.
For a time the British managed to halt the tide of settlement and conquest. But, by the late
6th century, the Anglo-Saxons had resumed the offensive. After victory at the Battle of
Dyrham in 577, they were well poised to overrun all of Britain to the borders of Wales,
Devon and Cornwall. They also advanced into the lowlands of the north-west, and as far
as the Firth of Forth and modern Edinburgh in the north-east.
After about 600, the Saxons in Britain were organized into several small kingdoms. In the
early days, Northumbria, formed by the merging of two kingdoms in the north, Deira and
Bernicia, was the most powerful. The East Angles of Norfolk and Suffolk formed a
somewhat isolated kingdom. In the south-east, Kent, Sussex and Essex were among the
earliest kingdoms.
The formation of the two most important of these early kingdoms, Mercia and Wessex,
was slower and more complicated. It was not until de second quarter of the 7 th century that
the Mercians, led by their pagan and war-loving ruler, Penda, built up a powerful military
confederation over the Midlands. Wessex was an earlier creation. But like Mercia, it was
not until the 7th century that it achieved the power its founders sought.
All these kingdoms were converted to Christianity in the course of the 7th century. This
way, the religious unity was achieved about 300 years earlier than the political unity.
Generation by generation over the succeeding centuries, the divided kingdom of Saxon
England moved towards unity. But national unity was not to be won by English effort alone.
It took a new, external threat to force unity upon England. After 800, the heathen Vikings,
notably the Danes, were an ever-increasing menace.
Northumbria, the Christian stronghold of the north, suffered severely until Alfred, the king
of Wessex, and his successors were able first to contain and finally to re-conquer the
lands that had fallen under Scandinavian control.
The Anglo-Saxons were not totally concerned with war. They were primarily a farming
people. But during the 8th century, their vigour and vitality began to manifest itself in urban
life. London flourished.
The Church was powerful under both Celtic and Roman churchmen. Scholarship also
flourished. Monks such as Bede produced works in Latin. But authors also wrote in AngloSaxon, the beginnings of the English language. In this century was written ‘Beowulf’.
Learning was encouraged by kings such as Alfred, who assembled a notable group of
scholars. They translated many works from Latin. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle also took
shape at this time. But, despite Alfred’s victories, Scandinavian influence was long-lasting,
and in the late 10th and early 11th centuries a fresh move brought the Danes success.
From 1016 to 1042 a Christian Danish dynasty ruled England.
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The Anglo-Saxons now produced their last king of the direct Saxon line, Edward the
Confessor. Under Edward’s rule, art flourished, carrying on a long tradition of Anglo-Saxon
craftsmanship. And his own contribution was the creation of Westminster Abbey.
On Edward’s death in early 1066, the throne passed to his brother-in-law, Harold, Earl of
Wessex, the strongest man in the kingdom. In 1066 England was wealthy and potentially
powerful. Its throne was a rich temptation to any warrior. William of Normandy played for
hugh stakes when he landed on the Sussex shore that autumn.
5.2. The Vikings
The Viking period in Britain and Ireland started with the killing by Norwegian pirates of a
royal official at the port of Portland in Wessex around 789. a ‘Viking’ was simply someone
who went í Viking, that is, plundering. Danish and Norwegian Vikings had launched raids
around the entire coastline of Britain and Ireland, as well as the channel and Atlantic coast
of the Frankish empire. The Viking targets were monasteries placed near the coast or
navigable rivers. Not only were monasteries rich, but they were also defenceless and,
being pagans, they were not deterred by the spiritual sanctions that protected the Church
when Christians were at war.
On June 8, 793, a band of Norwegian Vikings beached their long ships on the north Shore
at Holy Island and sacked the wealthy monastery of Lindisfarne. They slaughtered cattle,
murdered many of the monks, and other
monks, the most valuable, were taken as
slaves. This was the first great Viking raid on
England, and horror at the wanton savagery
of it swept across the Christian world.
The sacking of Lindisfarne came without any
real warning, for until then the monks had
hardly heard of the Vikings. But the following
year, when the raiders returned to plunder
the monastery at Jarrow, 50 miles further
south, the monks were ready for them. Many
Vikings were killed and their leader was
captured and put to death. In addition, a
storm in the North Sea wrecked several of
the Vikings ships. Some 40 years passed
before they struck the English coast again.
But when they returned, they came in
strength and they came to stay.
It was probably Ireland that suffered most
severely during this time of Viking attacks.
Ireland was divided into some half-dozen
competing provincial kingdoms, whose kings exercised a loose sway over dozens of
quarrelsome tributary sub-kingdoms. This decentralised power structure made any kind of
coordinated defence difficult. In 836, the Vikings began to build fortified bases, called
longphorts by the Irish, in which they spent the winter so as to be able to make an early
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start to raiding when the spring arrived. A few Vikings set up towns in these bases such as
the case of Dublin, founded in 841.
In 835, heathen men, as the Chronicle calls the
Danes, ravaged Sheppey. And after that,
hardly a year passed without a new attack,
sometimes by Vikings already settled in Ireland
and the Scottish isles. Both Rochester and
London were attacked with great savagery in
842, and the raiders plundered the south coast
as far as Cornwall. These raids were carried
out from temporary bases established along
the coast. From these, the Vikings ravaged the
surrounding country-side, leaving British
shores when they had gathered enough booty.
They seldom penetrated more than 15 miles
inland.
In 851, Vikings spent the winter on British soil
for the first time, on the Isle of Thanet.
Fourteen years later, they began campaigns
that brought them within an ace of conquering
all Britain. After ravaging East Anglia and all of
eastern England, the ‘Great Danish Army’
invaded Northumbria in 867. Three years later,
King Edmund of East Anglia was martyred when the Danes took his kingdom. Mercia was
overrun too, and the three kingdoms were forced to make peace on Danish terms.
The Viking invasions of Britain reached their peak in 870-1. Then a great trial of strength
took place – the ‘year of battles’, as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle called it. In the thick of the
fighting, Ethelred of Wessex died, and was succeeded by Alfred. But it was not until 878
that Alfred could confine the Danes to eastern England, the Danelaw. As elsewhere in
Europe, the Vikings inspired their enemies to unite against them.
Scandinavian attacks led the Picts of eastern Scotland and the Scots of Dalriada (Argyll) to
unite under Kenneth MacAlpin (843-58). This union marked the birth of the kingdom of
Scotland. But the Vikings’ impact was most direct of all on England. The Danelaw, where
they settled and imposed their legal customs, survived even after the Norman Conquest.
By the mid 870’s, the Vikings had shown signs of settling permanently in the ravaged
lands of Britain. The victorious heathens shared out land in the Saxon kingdoms of East
Anglia, Northumbria and Mercia. The days when the Danes were just raiders by sea and
marauders on land were over. And now they looked enviously towards the rich profitable
lands of Wessex.
On a May morning in 878, two armies met at Edington, near Westbury in Wiltshire, 15
miles south of the Danes’ encampment at Chippenham that once was Alfred’s fortress.
Guthrum and his Danes held out a fortnight. And the outcome was a decisive victory for
Alfred, King of Wessex, and his west Saxons, over the heathen Danes led by their king,
Guthrum. The last great threat that the whole of England would experience under heathen
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2. Roman period and great invasions
control was averted. The Danes swore that they would leave Alfred’s kingdom and that
their king would be baptised. The Chronicle says that they kept their promise. Three weeks
later, King Guthrum, with 30 of his most important warriors, came to Alfred at Aller, near
Athelney, where the king stood sponsor to him at his baptism. And Guthrum himself
accepted the Christian faith.
Finally, in 880, the Danes moved to East Anglia, where they settled down and shared out
the land in peace. Between 892 and 896, England suffered a fresh set of savage attacks,
but Alfred rallied resistance, and maintained his hold over Wessex, West Mercia and
London, which he had occupied since 886. On October 26, 899, he died in the faith that he
had done so much to serve. He had saved England, not only for the English but for
Christianity.
Alfred was a great reformer. He reorganised the army and set up a whole complex of
fortified towns, the burghs. He built a new type of long ship, twice as long as existing
Saxon ships and much swifter. Alfred also drew up a great code of laws for his entire
kingdom. Alfred’s son, Edward the Elder, and his daughter, Aethelflaed of Mercia, brought
the Danish lands under their control. His grand-son, Athelstan, crushed the last resistance
at Brunanburg in 937.
The Vikings forced the Saxons to unite. Eventually, the kingdom of Alfred’s great-grandson
Edgar (959-75) came to include also the Danes themselves. Political success was
accompanied by legislative and administrative success. Recognition was given to the
special laws and customs of the Danes, but the monarchy, supported by the Church,
emerged as a unifying force. The country was divided into shires on the Wessex pattern.
Great officers, ‘ealdormen’, were appointed to look after royal rights in every part of the
kingdom. And though local differences and distinctions remained important, the idea of a
united kingdom of England was fast becoming a reality.
A Danish dynasty was to succeed to his crown. Edgar’s son Ethelred was defeated by the
Danes under Sweyn Forkbeard and his son Canute. When Ethelred’s son Edmund
Ironside died in 1016, Canute was the only king and although he was a heathen, he was
quickly converted to Christianity. He proved a worthy successor to the best Saxon rulers.
Although England was now part of a great Scandinavian empire, its interests were not
neglected. Administration, encouragement of monasteries, and the coinage continued
along Saxon lines. For a quarter of a century, under its Danish kings, the country was
given peace.
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