Romans, Anglo-Saxons and Vikings

‘Romans, Anglo-Saxons and Vikings' is the longest British period in the primary history curriculum,
lasting a thousand years – a millennium. It is also the most formative period in British history, when the
country experienced several waves of invasion, including the last invasion to have been successful, in 1066. It
both begins and ends with an invasion: the first Roman invasion in 55 BC and the Norman invasion of William
the Conqueror in 1066. Add ‘in between were the Anglo-Saxons and then the Vikings'.
There is overlap between the various invaders, and through it all, the Celtic British population remained
largely in place. In some areas, such as Wales and Cornwall, the invaders hardly changed the language or way
of life of the people. In others, the British Celts learned the language of the invaders, and adapted to their
way of life. After 400 years of Roman rule, Romanised Britons tried to defend the religion and civilisation of
Roman Britain against the Anglo-Saxon invaders.
During this 1000-year period there was constant shifting of boundaries, boundaries both on the map and in
the minds of the people living then. Different cultures met and clashed time after time. Spiritually, the British
moved from a group of people worshiping Celtic pagan gods at the start of the period to a nation of
Christians at its end.

Terminology and names

At the start of the period, Britain was inhabited by Celtic peoples. The Romans called them Brittones, so they
named the areas they conquered Britannia. Caledonians, Irish and Picts lived in what is now Scotland. The
Scotti later settled in Scotland, giving it its modern name by the 10th century. The point is that we have to be
careful about names during this period.
When the Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Frisians invaded Britain, during the 5th and 6th centuries AD, the area
they conquered slowly became known as England (from Angle-land). Before this we cannot accurately use
the term ‘England'.
By the end of the millennium, 1000 AD, the island was divided into the three recognisable countries of
England, Scotland and Wales. Christianity was the established religion. In England, Celtic, Roman, Anglo-
Saxon and Viking place-names reflected the mixture of peoples now living there, and the main places where
they had settled.

The Celts

Who were the Celts?

The name ‘Celts’ (pronounced ‘kelts’) is used to describe all of the people who lived in Britain and
northwest Europe during the Iron Age – from 600 BC to 43 AD, which is when the Romans arrived.

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The Celts were a very advanced society. For instance, they learned how to make weapons from iron, which is
why we call the time they lived in the “Iron Age”. In Britain, the Celts settled in areas such as Cornwall and
Wales.

Top 10 facts
1. The Celts lived during the Iron Age, from about 600 BC to 43 AD. This is the time when iron was
discovered and used.
2. The Iron Age ended when the Romans invaded Britain and set up their own civilisation and
government.
3. The people who lived in Britain during the Iron Age were not called ‘Celts’ until the 1700s. The name is
used to describe all the different tribes that lived in Britain then.
4. There were three main branches of Celts in Europe – Brythonic, Gaulic and Gaelic. Brythonic Celts
(Britons) settled in England.
5. The Celts who settled in England were split into many different tribes, each ruled by a king or queen.
6. The Celts believed in many different gods who affected every part of everyday life. Druids, who were
priests in Celtic society, tried to figure out what the gods wanted.
7. Men and women in Celtic times usually wore long tunics with different accessories, such as coats,
capes or belts.
8. Most Celts were farmers, and they lived in houses that were round instead of square.
9. In battle, Celts mainly fought with swords and spears, and they used long shields to protect
themselves.
10. Some people can still speak Celtic languages such as Welsh and Gaelic.

The Celts timeline

 600 BC: The Iron Age began
 335 BC: Celtic tribes signed a peace treaty with Alexander the Great, ensuring peace between the
Celts and the Greeks
 70 BC: Druids arrived in Britain
 43 AD: The Romans invaded Britain, marking the end of the Iron Age
 60 AD: Queen Boudicca led an attack on Roman London

Did you know?

 There were three main branches of Celts:
 Brythonic (also called Britons), who lived around modern-day Cornwall and Wales
 Gaelic (also called Gaels), who were based in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man
 Gaulic (also called Gauls), who lived across modern-day France, Belgium, Switzerland and
northern Italy
 The Celts wore brightly coloured clothing, and made fabric dyes from berries, plants and even
seaweed. Dyeing was something that only women could do – it was considered bad luck to dye cloth
if a man was around!
 The Celts lived in round houses with thatched roofs – they were made in the shape of circles, rather
than with four walls.
 Many Celts were farmers, so they grew their own food and learned where they could gather nuts,
berries and honey around their village.
 The Celts also kept their own cows, chickens and other livestock – sometimes the animals would come
into their homes at night, as they didn’t have their own stable.

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  Groups of houses built on top of hills were called hill forts – people living there could see if any
enemies were coming just by looking out over the valleys, and could build strong walls around their
hill to help defend it.
 Some people can still speak languages that the Celts spoke, Welsh and Gaelic.

The Romans in Britain

From the founding of the city of Rome in the 8th century BC, Roman power had grown steadily until by the
1st century AD Rome ruled over an empire that stretched north, east and south of its Mediterranean centre.
After 43AD this included much of Britain. The Romans stayed in Britain for nearly 400 years, until the last
troops left to defend Rome in 410AD.
The Romans' great strengths were organisational and military. They brought urban life, roads, permanent
military garrisons, centralised government, taxation, their language – Latin – and later Christianity to all the
lands they conquered.
Key events to highlight
 Julius Caesar's two brief visits, 55 and 54 BC.
 Invasion and settlement, 43 AD.
Claudius, elephants, province of Britannia established, building of roads, towns, forts.
 The attack on the Druids' stronghold on Anglesey, 60 AD.
 Boudicca's rebellion, AD 60/61. This makes a good case study of relations between invaders and
invaded.
 The building of Hadrian's wall, 122 AD (see vol 3 Pax Romana).

The beginning of the end

During the 3rd and 4th centuries AD the province of Britannia was under threat of invasion by Hibernians
(Irish), Caledonians and Picts (Scots), and pirates and raiders from northern Europe. The Romans' answer was
to build a series of forts around the south and east coasts of Britannia, known as the Forts of the Saxon Shore.
For a while they kept the attackers from across the North Sea at bay. Attacks on the whole Roman Empire
increased, until finally in 410 AD the Roman army was withdrawn from Britannia and the Britons were left to
fend for themselves.
Remember that although the Roman army was recalled in 410 AD, the Romans themselves did not all leave.
Examples of those who stayed were retired legionaries and government employees who had settled in
Britain, had married Celtic women, or had nothing to go back to in their countries of origin.
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The Anglo-Saxon period
The Anglo-Saxon period in Britain spans approximately the six centuries from 410-1066AD. The period used
to be known as the Dark Ages, mainly because written sources for the early years of Saxon invasion are
scarce.

It was a time of war, of the breaking up of Roman Britannia into several separate kingdoms, of religious
conversion and, after the 790s, of continual battles against a new set of invaders: the Vikings.
Climate change had an influence on the movement of the Anglo-Saxon invaders to Britain: in the centuries
after 400 AD Europe's average temperature was 1°C warmer than we have today, and in Britain grapes could
be grown as far north as Tyneside. Warmer summers meant better crops and a rise in population in the
countries of northern Europe.
At the same time melting polar ice caused more flooding in low areas, particularly in what is now Denmark,
Holland and Belgium. These people eventually began looking for lands to settle in that were not so likely to
flood. After the departure of the Roman legions, Britain was a defenseless and inviting prospect.

A short history of the Anglo-Saxons in Britain

When the Roman legions left Britain, the Germanic-speaking Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Frisians began to
arrive – at first in small invading parties, but soon in increasing numbers. Around 500 AD, however, the
invaders were resisted fiercely by the Romano-British, who might have been led by King Arthur, if he existed
– and there is no hard evidence that he did. However, the monk Gildas, writing in the mid-6th century, talks
about a British Christian leader called Ambrosius who rallied the Romano-British against the invaders and
won twelve battles. Later accounts call this leader Arthur.
The various Anglo-Saxon groups settled in different areas of the country. They formed several kingdoms,
often changing, and constantly at war with one another. These kingdoms sometimes acknowledged one of
their rulers as a ‘High King', the Bretwalda. By 650 AD there were seven separate kingdoms, as follows:

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Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, c. 650-800AD
1. Kent
2. Mercia
3. Northumbria
4. East Anglia
5. Essex (East Saxons)
6. Sussex (South Saxons)
7. Wessex (West Saxons), later the kingdom of King Alfred, the
only English king ever to have been called ‘the Great', and his
equally impressive grandson, Athelstan, the first who could
truly call himself ‘King of the English'.
By 850 AD the seven kingdoms had been consolidated into
three large Anglo-Saxon kingdoms: Northumbria, Mercia, and
Wessex. The Anglo-Saxons had become a Christian people.

Poetry
Three poems give excellent insights into the Anglo-Saxons:
 The Ruin, an anonymous poem written about the ruin
and decay of a Roman town
 Beowulf, about the great hero who fought and killed the monster Grendel and his mother, became a
great king and met his death fighting an enraged dragon.
 The Battle of Maldon, about the Saxons' heroic defence against a force of raiding Vikings in Essex.
After 793, when the Vikings raided Lindisfarne Monastery, the history of the Anglo-Saxons becomes
entangled with that of the Vikings. In many ways they were similar: in language, religion and Northern
European origins, yet they are not the same. The very fact that they invaded Britain at different times makes
them two very distinct peoples in our history.

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The Viking Age
The Vikings' homeland was Scandinavia: modern Norway, Sweden and Denmark. From here they travelled
great distances, mainly by sea and river – as far as North America to the west, Russia to the east, Lapland to
the north and the Mediterranean World (Constantinople) and Iraq (Baghdad) to the south.
We know about them through archaeology, poetry, sagas and proverbs, treaties, and the writings of people
in Europe and Asia whom they encountered. They left very little written evidence themselves. As well as
warriors, they were skilled craftsmen and boat-builders, adventurous explorers and wide-ranging traders.
The Viking Age lasted from approximately 800 to 1150 AD. During this period, around 200,000 people left
Scandinavia to settle in other lands, mainly Newfoundland (Canada), Greenland, Iceland, Ireland, England,
Scotland, the islands around Britain, France (where they became the Normans), Russia and Sicily. They traded
extensively with the Muslim world and fought as mercenaries for the Byzantine emperors of Constantinople
(Istanbul). However, by the end of the 11th century the great days of Viking expansion were over.
Vikings in Britain: background and legacy
Historians disagree about the origin of the word, Viking. In Old Norse the word means a pirate raid. This
captures the essence of the Vikings, fast-moving sailors who used the water as their highway to take them
across the northern Atlantic, around the coasts of Europe and up its rivers to trade, raid or settle. In their
poetry they call the sea 'the whale road'.
Anglo-Saxon writers called them Danes, Norsemen, Northmen, the Great Army, sea rovers, sea wolves, or the
heathen.
From around 860AD onwards, Vikings stayed, settled and prospered in Britain, becoming part of the mix of
people who today make up the British nation. Our names for days of the week come mainly from Norse gods
– Tuesday from Tiw or Týr, Wednesday from Woden (Odin), Thursday from Thor and so on. Many of their
other words have also become part of English, for example egg, steak, law, die, bread, down, fog, muck, lump
and scrawny.
A short history of the Vikings in Britain
In 793 came the first recorded Viking raid. These ruthless pirates continued to make regular raids around the
coasts of England, looting treasure and other goods, and capturing people as slaves. Monasteries were often
targeted, for their precious silver or gold chalices, plates, bowls and crucifixes.
Gradually, the Viking raiders began to stay, first in winter camps, then settling in land they had seized, mainly
in the east and north of England.
Outside Anglo-Saxon England, to the north of Britain, the Vikings took over and settled Iceland, the Faroes
and Orkney, becoming farmers and fishermen, and sometimes going on summer trading or raiding voyages.
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Orkney became powerful, and from there the Earls of Orkney ruled most of Scotland. To this day, especially
on the north-east coast, many Scots still bear Viking names.
Meanwhile, back in England, the Vikings took over Northumbria, East Anglia and parts of Mercia. In 866 they
captured modern York (Viking name: Jorvik) and made it their capital. They continued to press south and
west. The kings of Mercia and Wessex resisted as best they could, but with little success until the time of
Alfred of Wessex, the only king of England to be called ‘the Great'.
King Alfred and the Danes
King Alfred ruled from 871-899 and after many trials and tribulations (including the famous story of the
burning of the cakes!) he defeated the Vikings at the Battle of Edington in 878. After the battle the Viking
leader Guthrum converted to Christianity. In 886 Alfred took London from the Vikings and fortified it. The
same year he signed a treaty with Guthrum. The treaty partitioned England between Vikings and English. The
Viking territory became known as the Danelaw. It comprised the north-west, the north-east and east of
England. Here, people would be subject to Danish laws. Alfred became king of the rest.

Alfred's grandson, Athelstan, became the first true King of England. He led an English victory over the Vikings
at the Battle of Brunaburh in 937, and his kingdom for the first time included the Danelaw. In 954, Eirik
Bloodaxe, the last Viking king of York, was killed and his kingdom was taken over by English earls.
The final Viking invasion of England came in 1066. The English king, Harold Godwinson, marched north with
his army and defeated Hardrada in a long and bloody battle. However, immediately after the battle, King
Harold heard that William of Normandy had landed in Kent with yet another invading army. With no time to
rest, Harold's army marched swiftly back south to meet this new threat. The exhausted English army fought
the Normans at the Battle of Hastings on 14th October, 1066. At the end of a long day's fighting the Normans
had won, King Harold was dead, and William was the new king of England.
The irony is that William was of Viking descent: his great-great-great-grandfather Rollo was a Viking who in
911 had invaded Normandy in northern France. His people had become French over time, but in one sense
this final successful invasion of England was another Viking one.

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