The AngloSaxon Period 450-1066 A.D.

AKA

& Emergent Period – kingdoms emerging from

Rome’s control

& Old English – before the modern Britain

& the Dark Ages – time of regression from Rome’s

influence, breakdown of society

& This was a time of bloody conflicts, ignorance, violence and barbarism.

& Life was difficult and the literature reflected this.

& England has had many invaders, each leaving their stamp on what we think of as “England” today.

&The Celts

&The Romans

&The Anglo-Saxons

Let’s step back for a moment . . .

& The first person to ever have written about England may have been the Roman General Julius Caesar, who is 55 B.C. attempted to conquer the British Isles.

& Put off by the Celtic warriors, he quickly claimed a victory and returned to Rome.

& Thus leaving the Celts (and their neighbors to the north and west the Picts and Geats) in peace.

The Celtic Heroes: A Magical World

& (around 300 BC) the

island of Britain was

inhabited by tall blond

warriors who called

themselves Celts

& a group of these warriors,

called Brythons, left their

permanent stamp on

Britain

Religion of the Celts

& Animism – the Celts saw spirits everywhere, in rivers, trees, stones, ponds, fire, and thunder. These spirits were all around and needed to satisfied constantly.

& Priests, called Druids, acted as intermediaries between the gods and the people.

& Ritualistic dances, human sacrifices and religious rites having to do with the lunar and solar cycles were performed.

Celtic stories

& Their legends focus on and are full of strong

women (very different from Anglo-Saxon

legends that focus on strong men and women

faded into background).

& Celtic stories leap into sunlight after battle, no

matter how much blood was spilled.

& Full of fantastic animals, passionate love affairs,

and fabulous adventures

The Romans: The

Great Administrators

& Beginning with an invasion led by Julius Caesar in 55 BC and culminating in one organized by the Emperor Claudius about a hundred years later, the Britons (the Celts) were finally conquered by the legions of Rome.

& Rome brought organization to Britain – armies that prevented further invasions, networks of roads, and a great defensive wall seventy-three miles long.

remains of Hadrian’s Wall

Religion of the Romans

& Rome brought

Christianity, and soon

the old Celtic religion

began to vanish.

& Christianity became a

unifying force

But, Rome pulled out . . .

& The Romans were having trouble in Rome.

& By 409 AD, they had evacuated their troops

from Britain, leaving roads, walls, villas, and

public baths, but no central government.

& Without Roman control, Britain was a country

of separate clans.

& separation led to weakness, weakness led to

vulnerability to other conquering nations

The Anglo-Saxons

Sweep Ashore& In the middle of the fifth century (~450

AD), the attack came from the north, from the Angles and Saxons from Germany and Jutes from Denmark.

& The Anglo-Saxon language became the dominant language in this land, thus a new name – Angle-Land, or England.

& The Celts did put up a brave fight but finally retreated into Cornwall and Wales in the far west of the country and Scotland in the north.

King Alfred of Wessex

& At first the domination of the Anglo-Saxon was no more politically unified than Celtic Britain had been.

& Each independent principality was divided and had its own “king.”

& It wasn’t until Alfred of Wessex, or Alfred the Great, led the Anglo-Saxons against the invading Vikings from Norway and Denmark that England became in any true sense a nation.

King Alfred (continued)

& The Viking people of the north were plundering

and destroying everything in their path.

& At first their aim was to hit and run, to get what

they could. Later they realized that England’s

winters were easier than their harsh, icy ones.

& The Danish invaders set up camps and

eventually gained control of parts of the country.

King Alfred (continued)& But, there was still some instability in England. It is possible that

without the help of Christian monks and missionaries converting Anglo-Saxon kings, and, thus, their subjects, there would not have been a unification of England.

& Under King Alfred and Christianity, the Anglo-Saxons fought to protect their land and way of life from the Danes.

& His children, Ethelfleda, a brilliant military leader and strategist, and her brother Edward, carried on King Alfred’s fight against the Danes.

& The battle continued until both the Anglo-Saxons and the Danes were defeated in 1066 by William, Duke of Normandy, and his invading force of Normans from northwestern France.

The Norman Conquest & In 1042 a descendent of Alfred’s took the throne,

the deeply religious Edward the Confessor.

& Edward died and left the throne childless.

& William, Duke of Normandy, declared that

Edward had sworn an oath making the heir.

& When a counsel of nobles and church officials

chose an English earl, Harold, to succeed

Edward, William invaded England.

& At the Battle of Hastings in 1066, Harold was killed and

William the Conqueror was crowned king on Christmas

Day. Thus ending the Anglo-Saxon time period.

Daily life of Anglo-Saxons& Warfare was the order of the day.

& People were fiercely loyal to their individual clans and leaders.

& Fame and success were gained only through loyalty to the leader.

& They tended to live close to their animals in single-family wooden-

buildings that surrounded a warm-lit communal hall, or mead hall.

& In the dark, death-shadowed world of the Anglo-Saxons, the bards

gave one element of hope: the possibility that heroic deeds would be

remembered in the society’s songs and oral poems.

Anglo-Saxon Religion & The Anglo-Saxon religion was very dark, honoring

warrior gods. & Woden – god of death, poetry and magic

& Thunor – god of thunder and lightning

& Religion focused on the fact that life was hard and the way to be remembered after death was to fight gloriously in battle.

& Their religion focused on a strong belief in wyrd, or fate, and they saved any admiration for heroic warriors whose fate it was to prevail in battle.

& On the whole the religion was more concerned with ethics than mysticism. Focused on the earthly virtues of bravery, loyalty, generosity, and friendship.

Scops or Bards& In the great mead halls of the lords and nobles,

Anglo-Saxons would gather to celebrate and listen to the scops, or professional singing poets, as they brought epic poems to life.

& These poems were more than just simple entertainment. They were history lessons, moral sermons, and pep talks all rolled into one.

& With no hope of an afterlife, only an epic poem could provide a measure of immortality.

& These poems were strictly oral art forms.

Spread of Christianity

& In 597 a Roman missionary named Augustine

arrived in the kingdom of Kent, where he

established a monastery at Canterbury.

& From there Christianity spread, and all of

England was at least nominally Christian (some

still held to the pagan beliefs.

The Christian Monasteries& Monasteries served as centers of learning.

& They are responsible for preserving the earlier Greek

and Latin works, but also local works and epic poems

like Beowulf.

& In the scriptorium, or writing room, Monks spent their

days hand copying texts. (Printing is still 800 years

away.)

& Latin remained the “serious” language of learning until

the time of King Alfred.

& He instituted the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a lengthy

running history of England. Because of these efforts,

English gained respect as language of culture.