This Sceptred Isle

by Christopher Lee

  In this year Beorhtric took to wife Eadburh, daughter of King Offa. And in his days came first three ships of Norwegians from Horthaland; and then the reeve rode hither and tried to compel them to go to the royal manor, for he did not know what they were: and then they slew him. These were the first ships of the Danes to come to England.

  The Vikings arrived first at Portland in Dorset. They killed many and then withdrew. A small incident, but important to the inhabitants of these islands: this landing and these murders were the beginnings of the age of the Vikings. They returned in 793, as The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records:

  In this year terrible portents appeared over Northumbria and miserably frightened the people there; these were exceptionally high winds and flashes of lightning and fiery dragons were seen flying in the air. A great famine soon followed these signs; and a little after that in the same year on the eighth day of January the harrying of the heathen miserably destroyed God’s church in Lindisfarne.

  When more raiders arrived not so far away at Jarrow the following year, the locals were ready for them. Those they captured they put to terrible and agonizing death so that the raiders who escaped took home to Denmark the story of vicious and uncompromising islanders. But these were vicious and uncompromising times. This was probably a small group from a much larger fleet of long ships. They sailed on to the north of Scotland and landed. They set up encampments in Caithness and Sutherland, in the Orkneys and Shetland. They went on to Ireland and eventually conquered a small community and it is thought that their Viking king, Olaf, founded what is now called Dublin.

  In AD 865 the great invasion of the east coast of England started. And the pickings were great. England was proud of its Christianity and the Church had thrived. The people believed that all they had to do was to pay for the absolution of their many sins. And pay they did. So in the churches and monasteries were stored great treasures and the Vikings were delighted. None more so than Ivar Ragnarsson, known as Ivar the Boneless, so named because he may have suffered from a form of osteogenesis imperfecta.10 There is no sure way to confirm this. If it seems unlikely that a warrior of such bloodthirsty fame would suffer from something akin to brittle bone disease, then that is reason to doubt his condition. However, this reason for his name has persisted.11 His father was Ragnar Lodbrok, who was captured by Ælla, the King of Northumbria, and thrown into a pit of poisonous adders to die. When the four sons of Ragnar Lodbrok heard this, each swore the vengeance known as Blood-Red Eagle. The killer of their father should be captured, his flesh and ribs cut and turned back so that the avenging son could tear out the living lungs – or so legend has it. However, whatever its form, no son took this oath of revenge more seriously than Ivar the Boneless.

  More importantly to our story, the defeat of Ælla at York in 866 and all that followed marked the end of the kingdom of Northumbria as the dominant regional power. Although in later times, the Percy family would hold the fortunes of the monarchy and the State in its hands, after the 860s, northern England was never again so important in the military and constitutional make-up of the British Isles. And what happened to the Boneless? It is not recorded with any certainty, but in the surviving fragments of the eleventh-century Middle Irish Fragmentary Annals of Ireland, it may be construed that Ivar the Boneless died in Dublin in 873. By that time, the English were celebrating one of the most famous leaders from these islands, Alfred the Great.

  Alfred is an early monarch known by most people, few of whom are quite sure what he did apart from trying to keep the Danes at bay by paying them not to fight him – which is where the expression ‘Danegeld’ comes from – and supposedly being the founder of the British navy. And of course, Alfred burned the cakes. Much of what we know of Alfred comes from Asser’s Life of King Alfred, written in 893. Asser was a Welsh monk from St David’s who became Bishop of Sherborne (now in Dorset). He was an acolyte of Alfred’s and employed to revive theological understanding in Wessex. Inevitably there are those who would question the authority and authorship of Asser’s Life of Alfred, but for most it is accepted as a reasonable account of this famous monarch even though it sings his praises louder than some might. His graphic accounts of skirmishes and battles (most battles were really skirmishes) are detailed and necessarily in praise of his king.

  In the year of our Lord’s incarnation 849, was born Alfred, king of the Anglo-Saxons, at the royal village of Wanating [Wantage], in Berkshire, which country has its name from the wood of Berroc, where the box-tree grows most abundantly. His genealogy is traced in the following order. King Alfred was the son of king Ethelwulf, who was the son of Egbert, who was the son of Elmund, was the son of Eafa, who was the son of Eoppa, who the son of Ingild. Ingild, and Ina, the famous king of the West-Saxons, were two brothers. Ina went to Rome, and there ending this life honourably, entered the heavenly kingdom, to reign there for ever with Christ.

  Alfred’s life was committed to fighting and making peace if he could by paying off the Danish invaders. Before becoming king himself, he helped his brother Æthelred, King of Wessex, in his struggle against the Danes. Asser is quite certain of the mood of looting and pillaging led to slaughter and retribution:

  In the year of our Lord’s incarnation 871, which was the twenty-third of king Alfred’s life, the pagan army, of hateful memory, left the East-Angles, and entering the kingdom of the West-Saxons, came to the royal city, called Reading, situated on the south bank of the Thames, in the district called Berkshire; and there, on the third day after their arrival, their earls, with great part of the army, scoured the country for plunder, while the others made a rampart between the rivers Thames and Kennet on the right side of the same royal city. They were encountered by Ethelwulf, earl of Berkshire, with his men, at a place called Englefield; both sides fought bravely, and made long resistance. At length one of the pagan earls was slain, and the greater part of the army destroyed; upon which the rest saved themselves by flight, and the Christians gained the victory.

  Feeling triumphant and not a little brave by their victory, Æthelred and his brother Alfred fell upon the Danes at Reading and gutted those they found outside the stronghold. But the Danes counterattacked and the men of Wessex, Asser’s Christians, broke ranks and turned tail.

  Roused by this calamity, the Christians, in shame and indignation, within four days, assembled all their forces, and again encountered the pagan army at a place called Ashdune, which means the ‘Hill of the Ash’. The pagans had divided themselves into two bodies, and began to prepare defences, for they had two kings and many earls, so they gave the middle part of the army to the two kings, and the other part to all their earls. Which the Christians perceiving, divided their army also into two troops, and also began to construct defences. But Alfred, as we have been told by those who were present, and would not tell an untruth, marched up promptly with his men to give them battle; for king Æthelred remained a long time in his tent in prayer, hearing the mass, and said that he would not leave it, till the priest had done, or abandon the divine protection for that of men. Now the Christians had determined that king Æthelred, with his men, should attack the two pagan kings, but that his brother Alfred, with his troops, should take the chance of war against the two earls. Things being so arranged, the king remained a long time in prayer, and the pagans came up rapidly to fight. Then Alfred, though possessing a subordinate authority, could no longer support the troops of the enemy, unless he retreated or charged upon them without waiting for his brother. At length he bravely led his troops against the hostile army, as they had before arranged, but without awaiting his brother’s arrival; for he relied in the divine counsels, and forming his men into a dense phalanx, marched on at once to meet the foe. And when both armies had fought long and bravely, at last the pagans, by the divine judgment, were no longer able to bear the attacks of the Christians, and having lost great part of their army, took to a disgraceful flight. One of their two kings, and five earls were there slain, together with many thousand pagans, who fell on al
l sides, covering with their bodies the whole plain of Ashdune. The whole pagan army pursued its flight, not only until night but until the next day, even until they reached the stronghold from which they had sallied. The Christians followed, slaying all they could reach, until it became dark.

  Shortly after Easter 871, Æthelred died and was buried at Wimborne Minster. Alfred was now king, but in miserable times. Within a month he was fighting the Danes just outside Salisbury, at Wilton. His losses were horrific. According to The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, after that battle at Wilton there were at least nine major campaigns against the Vikings in the south. And, says the Chronicle, ‘In the course of this year were slain nine earls and one king; and this year the West Saxons made peace with the host.’

  Made peace? Alfred bought them off with the Danegeld. The Vikings moved for the winter to London and it is here that coins with the Danish king, Hafdan, on one side and the monogram of London on the other first appeared. The Vikings were intent on staying, if not in London, in England. But there was not going to be peace for the Saxons and the Danes. Certainly King Alfred didn’t think so. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle tells us that in 875 Alfred, ‘sailed out to sea with a fleet and fought against seven ships’ companies and captured one of them and put the others to flight’. But there was little long-term victory. His armies were dispersed and many in Wessex thought he had deserted them for France or even that he was dead. In fact Alfred, not yet ‘The Great’, was in hiding and reduced to foraging for food. And it is here that we come to Asser’s version of the burning buns. It is now 878:

  Alfred, king of the West-Saxons, with a few of his nobles, and certain soldiers and vassals, used to lead an unquiet life among the woodlands of the country of Somerset, in great tribulation; for he had none of the necessaries of life, except what he could forage openly or stealthily, by frequent sallies, from the pagans, or even from the Christians who had submitted to the rule of the pagans.

  But it happened on a certain day, that the countrywoman, wife of the cowherd, was preparing some loaves to bake, and the king, sitting at the hearth, made ready his bow and arrows and other warlike instruments. The unlucky woman espying the cakes burning at the fire, ran up to remove them, and rebuking the brave king, exclaimed:

  Ca’sn thee mind the ke-aks, man, an’ doossen zee ’em burn? I’m boun thee’s eat ’em vast enough, az zoon az ’tiz the turn.

  The blundering woman little thought that it was king Alfred, who had fought so many battles against the pagans, and gained so many victories over them.

  But the Almighty not only granted to the same glorious king victories over his enemies, but also permitted him to be harassed by them, to be sunk down by adversities, and depressed by the low estate of his followers, to the end that he might learn that there is one Lord of all things, to whom every knee doth bow, and in whose hand are the hearts of kings; who puts down the mighty from their seat and exalteth the humble; who suffers his servants when they are elevated at the summit of prosperity to be touched by the rod of adversity, that in their humility they may not despair of God’s mercy, and in their prosperity they may not boast of their honours, but may also know, to whom they owe all the things which they possess.

  In today’s terms, Alfred became a guerrilla fighter. And then came a massive and decisive engagement when Alfred gathered his Saxons together, filled with a new spirit.

  The Danish army remained in camp at Chippenham for that summer of 878. Twelve months on they were gone to East Anglia. But a new Viking army sailed for England and camped at Fulham. By 886 the Danes dominated the high ground including the capital. Alfred and the West Saxons were emboldened. They marched on London slashing and slaying as they went. Into the city they marched, burning and slaughtering and took it from the invaders.

  Alfred, King of the Anglo-Saxons, after the burning of the cities and the slaying of the people, honourably rebuilt the city of London and made it again habitable. He gave it into the custody of his son-in-law, Æthered, earl of Mercia, to which king all the Angles and Saxons, who before had been dispersed everywhere, or were in captivity with the pagans, voluntarily turned and submitted themselves to his dominion.

  This date, 886, is important because for the first time London became the centre for resistance to England’s enemies. It meant also that at this point Alfred could claim the title ‘The Great’; he was the great leader, obeyed, with the exception of the Dane lands (see Chapter 3) by all the English-speaking peoples.

  CHAPTER THREE

  886–1065

  Alfred the Great made an uneasy truce with the Vikings – or the Danes – in the late 800s, the last years of his life. The map of England, Scotland and Wales looked something like this: Wales was much as it is now. Wessex was a triangle with one corner in Land’s End, another in North Foreland on the far Kent coast and the top corner on the north-west coast near Liverpool. In that corner is what was called English Mercia. The rest, including East Anglia, was Danish, known as Danelaw. Danelaw’s northern boundary was a squiggly line from the North Sea coast, about thirty miles south of Durham, across to the Cumbrian coast. The cauldron of peace bought in bribes (Danegeld), inter-marriages and baptisms were about to boil over. However, the fire was lit, not in England, but on the Continent where the Viking raiders were at war and here the timing is sensitive to the impending death of the Viking king, Guthrum, who lived in England. In 878, Guthrum had been defeated by Alfred, but spared. What is more, Alfred had converted Guthrum to Christianity and was his godfather; there followed a sort of peace that was closer to a truce than a settlement for all time. Here, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle notes that the era was about to end.

  And Guthrum, the northern king, whose baptismal name was Athelstan, passed away. In the year 892 the great host . . . went again from the kingdom of the East Franks westward to Boulogne and were there provided with ships, so that they crossed in one voyage, horses and all, and they came up into the mouth of the Lympne [pronounced Limn] with 250 ships. The river flows out from the forest; they rowed their ships up as far as the forest, four miles from the entrance to the estuary and there stormed a fort within the fen; occupying it were a few peasants and it was half built. Then soon after this, Haesten came with eighty ships into the mouth of the Thames and made himself a fort at Milton Regis.

  Milton Regis is still there, now a, suburb of Sittingbourne and there is no great forest. But back to the battle. Three points emerge. First, Alfred once again offered gold to the invaders. This was a common practice. It was partly common sense, a recognition that if gold could buy peace then why not buy it. Second, Alfred, having paid up and so delayed the attack, persuaded the Viking King, Haesten, to have his two young sons baptized. And third, King Alfred was, perhaps, in failing health because he gave way to a younger leader, Edward, his twenty-two-year-old son. Alfred also had an ally, the young Mercian prince, Æthelred. The Vikings, as expected, broke their oaths of peace and Edward and Æthelred prepared for battle.

  Alfred’s men chased the Danes, fought them near Aldershot and chased them again until they reached the Thames, across which the Danes escaped, for the moment. At Benfleet, they captured Haesten’s wife and two sons. Alfred ordered their return, an act of clemency for which he was much criticized. And the Danes? They were free but instead of attempting to take English Mercia, they roamed and pillaged Wales before returning to the safety of East Anglia and then the Thames estuary. The long-term result was a stalemate. Thanks to earlier Viking successes, the Danes were always going to be able to rely on support in Northumbria and East Anglia. Alfred was never going to get any more support than he had. Peace was impossible. And so it was that Alfred’s kingdom was still at war when he died, in 901 according to the monk Florence of Worcester (although the accepted date is 899).12 Alfred had ruled for almost twenty-nine years. His son, Edward, succeeded him and this led to a split with his cousin Æthelwald, who turned to the Vikings of Northumberland for help. The Vikings were happy to oblige. In 902, Eric, their king, and Æthelwald
headed south and attacked Wiltshire. When Edward in turn attacked the Danes in East Anglia he could hardly have anticipated that in spite of many of his men, especially those from Kent, being butchered by the Danes, his cousin and the Danish king would be among the dead. The new King of the Danes, Guthrum II, made peace with the King of Wessex through a treaty in 886. True, the peace did not last long. When it broke in 910, it was to the detriment of any ambitions the Danes had of ruling more of England. At Tettenhall in Staffordshire, the Danes were vanquished so much so that the Danish lands of East Anglia and the English Midlands were at last vulnerable to the English soldiers.

  At this point, we have to remind ourselves just how powerful were the Viking holdings in Britain. At about this time, 900, the south of England was Wessex. The Midlands stretched from the course of the Thames north-westerly to the coast at about what is now Liverpool. This Midlands region was called Mercia. Only the western part of Mercia was English territory. Moreover, the rest of England – Cambridgeshire, East Anglia, Lincolnshire, Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire, the whole of Yorkshire and Lancashire, Cumbria, Durham and Northumberland, in our geographical terms – was all the so-called Viking Conquests.

  The Mercians were ruled not by kings but by ealdormen, from the Old English ‘Elder Man’, a term that had all but disappeared by the eleventh century when it developed from the same root into the altogether more important title ‘eorl’, which was eventually earl. The ealdormen openly acknowledged King Edward of Wessex as their liege. When Alfred died and Edward became king, the Ealdorman of Mercia was Æthelred. He had married Alfred’s first child, (and so Edward’s sister) Æthelflaed. She had inherited the Alfredian Wessex genes of being a thoughtful and very tough leader. In about 902, her husband Æthelred became seriously ill and effectively handed over the rule of the Mercians to her. She ruled wisely as her husband’s regent for almost a decade, opposing the Vikings and building fortresses until his death in 911 when she was acclaimed by the Mercians as ‘Myrcna hlaefdige’, Lady of the Mercians. Brother and sister had become a powerful and thoughtful alliance against the Vikings. The Lady of the Mercians administered the land of her people and led them in battle to great success, particularly when she took Derby – a strategic fortress – from the Danes. It was only a matter of time and opportunity before she would take the war into Viking territory and that meant heading north into Cumbria and across the Solway Firth. When she died in the summer of 918 at home in Tamworth, Æthelflaed was, as the Annals of Ulster noted, a famous queen of the Saxons.13 The siblings had conquered the five boroughs of Danelaw and when Edward, now without his sister, pressed north there was little to stop him. Both the north and Wales were the outposts of the Britons, not the English, but the Welsh princes declared for Edward and soon the task started by Alfred the Great was completed. Then, in 924, Edward died and in 925, the year that St Dunstan was born, Edward’s son, the remarkable Athelstan, who had served his squiredom at the court of his aunt Æthelflaed, came to the throne. If it is at all possible to say who the first king of all England was, then that person was Athelstan.