An Introduction to Early Medieval England (C.410–1066)
The six and a half centuries between the end of Roman rule and the Norman Conquest are among the most important in English history. This long period is also one of the most challenging to understand – which is why it has traditionally been labelled the ‘Dark Ages’.
Yet this was a period that saw the gradual emergence of an English nation – one that narrowly escaped Scandinavian domination – and with it a new ‘English’ identity and language.
After the Romans
The 5th and 6th centuries are certainly wrapped in obscurity. Records are few, difficult to interpret, propagandist, or written long after the events they describe.
What is certain is that the Romans didn’t suddenly leave Britain. After 350 years of Roman rule – as long a period as separates the present day from the reign of Charles II (1660–85) – all Britons were, in a sense, Romans.
Tradition has it that in 410 the Emperor Honorius wrote to the British Romans instructing them to look to their own defence. While it seems likely that the letter was not sent to Britain after all, such advice would have reflected the realities of the time. Britain was no longer subject to an imperial power that could protect it.
Read more about the end of Roman BritainNew arrivals
At first, the chief enemies of an independent Britain were Irish raiders from the west and Picts from the north. Later, Angles, Saxons and Jutes arrived from across the North Sea. We don’t know exactly how they invaded or settled in England, but by AD 500 Germanic speakers seem to have settled deep into Britain.
The Britons successfully counter-attacked, however, at first under Ambrosius Aurelianus, ‘the last of the Romans’. It’s during this early period that the figure of Arthur – possibly completely legendary – emerges. A record made three centuries later credits him with 12 battles, from Scotland to the south coast. Only the last, in about 500, is confirmed in earlier sources – but it makes no mention of Arthur. This British victory halted the Saxon advance for half a century.
In independent kingdoms across the north and west, the British also resisted the repeated onslaughts of the peoples who were later called ‘English’. But by the 650s, almost all the lowlands were under English control.
Conversion and coalescence
Religion also divided the Christian British from the invading pagan Angles and Saxons, but from 597 English rulers were converted by Roman or Irish missionaries. Within a century a flourishing English Church had made dramatic advances in art and architecture.
Once separate groups of disparate peoples from the east coalesced into larger independent kingdoms, whose power fluctuated in parallel with their success and failure in war. The 7th-century dominance of Northumbria in the north was succeeded by that of Mercia in the midlands, especially under King Offa (r.757–96), builder of Offa’s Dyke.
It was the crisis of Viking invasion, however, that brought a single, unified English kingdom into existence.
The threat from the North
Sporadic Viking raids began in the 790s, and Lindisfarne Priory in Northumbria was an early victim. Then in 865 an invading ‘Great Army’ began plundering from kingdom to kingdom, extorting protection money. Northumbria, Mercia and East Anglia all fell, leaving only Wessex to fight on.
King Alfred of Wessex (r.871–99) defeated the Viking army decisively at Edington (878). Its leader, Guthrum, accepted Christian baptism, and agreed a treaty which allowed the Vikings to control much of northern and eastern England – the Danelaw.
But from the 910s King Edward the Elder (r.899–924) and his sister Æthelflæd, the ‘Lady of the Mercians’, conquered the Danelaw south of the Humber. Edward’s son Æthelstan (r.924–39) advanced still further: in 937 he destroyed a coalition of Vikings and Scots, and became known as ‘Ruler of All Britain’.
In the 980s, however, Viking raids resumed, motivated by the ease of extorting vast quantities of silver from English coffers. The raids developed into full-scale invasions which eventually overwhelmed the
Empire and conquest
The Danish leader Cnut (r.1016–35), later also King of Denmark and Norway, was popularly recognised as Æthelred’s successor and made England part of a Scandinavian empire.
The old West Saxon (Wessex) dynasty was revived with the accession of Edward the Confessor in 1042. But when he died without heirs in 1066, Harold Godwinson seized the throne.
England was immediately threatened both by Cnut’s heir, Harald Hardrada of Norway, and Edward’s choice of successor, Duke William of Normandy. Hardrada invaded first and was beaten at Stamford Bridge in Yorkshire, on 25 September 1066.
Harold marched his weakened army south to face William at the Battle of Hastings, the outcome of which would open up an entirely new chapter in the story of England.
The people of the period
We have used these terms for the different peoples of the period:
- British, Romano-British and Britons – the inhabitants of Britain following the end of Roman rule in the early 5th century.
- Angles, Saxons and Jutes – the Germanic peoples who migrated from continental Europe and settled, initially in the south and east of the island, from the 5th century.
- Anglo-Saxons – the collective term for the Germanic settlers, first coined in the late 8th century. It came into general use in the 10th century.
- Vikings – the invaders from Scandinavia who between the 8th and 11th centuries raided much of western Europe, including the British Isles.
- Danes – the Vikings who mounted a full-scale invasion in the 860s and then settled across much of what is now northern and eastern England.
- English – refers both to the Anglo-Saxons (the first people to call themselves ‘English’ or ‘Angli’) and later to all settlers in England, including Danes, particularly after the emergence of a unified kingdom of England in the 10th century.
More about early medieval England
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Who Was St Augustine?
In the late 6th century, a man was sent from Rome to England to bring Christianity to the Anglo-Saxons. Who was St Augustine, and how did his mission succeed?
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Queen Bertha: A Historical Enigma
In 597, St Augustine arrived in England to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity. Virtually every modern description of this mission mentions Queen Bertha of Kent. But who was Bertha?
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The Synod of Whitby and the Keys of Heaven
How a decision about the way in which the date of Easter should be calculated was a landmark in the history of Christianity in England.
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The Viking Raid on Lindisfarne
A devastating Viking attack on the church of St Cuthbert in 793 sent a shockwave through Europe. How did a Christian community at Lindisfarne survive?
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Celtic culture in England
People have very different ideas of what ‘Celtic’ means. We explore the complex history behind Celtic culture and its legacy in the present day.
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The Vikings in England
The Vikings had a profound impact on the history of England. Who were they, and how and why did they come to these shores in the first place?