1.
Bretwalda
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Bretwalda is an Old English word the first record of which comes from the late 9th century Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. It is given to some of the rulers of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms from the 5th century onwards who had achieved overlordship of some or all of the other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. It is unclear whether the dates back to the 5th century and was used by the kings themselves, or whether it is a later, 9th-century. The term bretwalda also appears in a 10th-century charter of Æthelstan, the literal meaning of the word is disputed, and may translate to either wide-ruler or Britain-ruler. The Annals of Wales continued to recognise the kings of Northumbria as Kings of the Saxons until the death of Osred I of Northumbria in 716, the second element is taken to mean ruler or sovereign, though is more literally wielder. Thus, this interpretation would mean sovereign of Britain or wielder of Britain, the word may be a compound containing the Old English adjective brytten, an element also found in the terms bryten rice, bryten-grund and bryten cyning. Though the origin is ambiguous, the draughtsman of the charter issued by Æthelstan used the term in a way that can only mean wide-ruler. The first recorded use of the term Bretwalda comes from a West Saxon chronicle of the late 9th century that applied the term to Ecgberht, the chronicler also wrote down the names of seven kings that Bede listed in his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum in 731. All subsequent manuscripts of the Chronicle use the term Brytenwalda, which may have represented the original term or derived from a common error. There is no evidence that the term was a title that had any use, with implications of formal rights, powers and office. Similarly, in his list of bretwaldas, the West Saxon chronicler ignored such Mercian kings as Offa, the use of the term Bretwalda was the attempt by a West Saxon chronicler to make some claim of West Saxon kings to the whole of Great Britain. The concept of the overlordship of the whole of Britain was at least recognised in the period and this was particularly attractive as it would lay the foundations for the establishment of an English monarchy. The 20th-century historian Frank Stenton said of the Anglo-Saxon chronicler that his inaccuracy is more than compensated by his preservation of the English title applied to these outstanding kings. He argued that the term bretwalda falls into line with the evidence which points to the Germanic origin of the earliest English institutions. Over the later 20th century, this assumption was increasingly challenged, patrick Wormald interpreted it as less an objectively realized office than a subjectively perceived status and emphasised the partiality of its usage in favour of Southumbrian rulers. In 1991, Steven Fanning argued that it is unlikely that the term ever existed as a title or was in usage in Anglo-Saxon England. The fact that Bede never mentioned a special title for the kings in his list implies that he was unaware of one and we might ask whether kings in the eighth and ninth centuries were quite so obsessed with the establishment of a pan-Southumbrian state. A complex array of dominance and subservience existed during the Anglo-Saxon period, a king who used charters to grant land in another kingdom indicated such a relationship
2.
Sutton Hoo helmet
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The Sutton Hoo helmet is a decorated Anglo-Saxon helmet discovered during the 1939 excavation of the Sutton Hoo ship-burial. Buried around 625, it is believed to have been the helmet of King Rædwald. The helmet is the most iconic object from one of the most spectacular archaeological discoveries ever made, and one of the most important Anglo-Saxon artefacts ever found. Along with all the finds from Sutton Hoo, the helmet was determined by a treasure trove inquest to be the property of the landowner of the site of the ship-burial. She subsequently donated all the objects to the British Museum, where they were conserved and put on display, the helmet was buried among other regalia and instruments of power as part of a furnished ship burial, probably dating from the early 7th century. Although the man in the grave has not been identified, the contents of the point to its being that of a king. The ship had been hauled from the river up the hill. Inside this, the helmet was wrapped in cloths and placed to the left of the head of the body, an oval mound was constructed around the ship. Long afterwards, the roof collapsed violently under the weight of the mound. It is thought that the helmet was shattered either by the collapse of the chamber or by the force of another object falling on it. However, the fact that the helmet had shattered meant that it was possible to be reconstructed, the Sutton Hoo helmet was made of iron and covered with decorated sheets of tinned bronze. Fluted strips of moulding divided the exterior panels, each of which was stamped with one of five designs. The existence of five designs has been generally understood since the first reconstruction. As referred to below, the designs are numbered according to Rupert Bruce-Mitfords 1978 work, the core of the helmet was constructed of iron and consisted of a cap from which hung a face mask and cheek and neck guards. The cap was beaten up out of a piece of metal. On either side of the cap were hung iron cheek guards, deep enough to protect the side of the face. Two hinges per side—possibly made of leather—supported these pieces, allowing them to be pulled flush with the face mask, the inset portion afforded the neck guard extra movement, and like the cheek guards was attached to the cap by leather hinges. Finally, the mask was riveted to the cap on both sides and above the nose
3.
Edwin of Northumbria
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Edwin, also known as Eadwine or Æduinus, was the King of Deira and Bernicia – which later became known as Northumbria – from about 616 until his death. He converted to Christianity and was baptised in 627, after he fell at the Battle of Hatfield Chase, Edwin was the son of Ælle king of Deira and seems to have had two siblings. His sister Acha was married to Æthelfrith, king of neighbouring Bernicia, an otherwise unknown sibling fathered Hereric, who in turn fathered Abbess Hilda of Whitby and Hereswith, wife to Æthelric, the brother of king Anna of East Anglia. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle reported that on Ælles death a certain Æthelric assumed power, the exact identity of Æthelric is uncertain. He may have been a brother of Ælle, a brother of Edwin. Æthelfrith himself appears to have been king of Northumbria—both Deira and Bernicia—by no later than 604, during the reign of Æthelfrith, Edwin was an exile. By the 610s he was certainly in Mercia under the protection of king Cearl, by around 616, Edwin was in East Anglia under the protection of king Raedwald. Bede reports that Æthelfrith tried to have Raedwald murder his rival. Æthelfrith faced Raedwald in battle by the River Idle in 616, Raedwalds son Raegenhere may have been killed at this battle, but the exact date or manner of Raedwalds death are not known. He likely died between the years 616–627, and the efficacy of Edwin’s kingship ostensibly depended greatly on his fealty to Raedwald, Edwin was installed as king of Northumbria, effectively confirming Raedwald as bretwalda, Æthelfriths sons went into exile in Irish Dál Riata and Pictland. Edwins reign marks an interruption of the otherwise consistent domination of Northumbria by the Bernicians and has seen as contrary to the prevailing tendency. Edwin expelled Ceretic from the minor British kingdom of Elmet in either 616 or 626, Elmet had probably been subject to Mercia and then to Edwin. The larger kingdom of Lindsey appears to have taken over c. 625, after the death of king Raedwald, Edwin and Eadbald of Kent were allies at this time, and Edwin arranged to marry Eadbalds sister Æthelburg. Bede notes that Eadbald would agree to marry his sister to Edwin only if he converted to Christianity, the marriage of Eadbalds Merovingian mother Bertha had resulted in the conversion of Kent and Æthelburgs would do the same in Northumbria. Edwins expansion to the west may have begun early in his reign, there is firm evidence of a war waged in the early 620s between Edwin and Fiachnae mac Báetáin of the Dál nAraidi, king of the Ulaid in Ireland. A lost poem is known to have existed recounting Fiachnaes campaigns against the Saxons, and this should presumably be placed in the context of Edwins designs on the Isle of Man, a target of Ulaid ambitions. The routine of kingship in Edwins time involved regular, probably annual, wars with neighbours to obtain tribute, submission, and slaves
4.
Sutton Hoo
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Sutton Hoo, near Woodbridge, Suffolk, is the site of two 6th- and early 7th-century cemeteries. The site is in the care of the National Trust, Sutton Hoo is of primary importance to early medieval historians because it sheds light on a period of English history that is on the margin between myth, legend, and historical documentation. The site has been vital in understanding the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of East Anglia, the initial excavation was privately sponsored by the landowner. When the significance of the find became apparent, national experts took over, subsequent archaeological campaigns, particularly in the late 1960s and late 1980s, have explored the wider site and many other individual burials. The ship-burial has, from the time of its discovery, prompted comparisons with the world described in the heroic Old English poem Beowulf, which is set in southern Sweden. The other, called here the new ground, is situated on a second hill-spur close to the present Exhibition Hall. It was discovered and partially explored in 2000 during preliminary work for the construction of the hall and this also had burials under mounds, but was not known because these mounds had long since been flattened by agricultural activity. It formed a path of entry into East Anglia during the period followed the end of Roman imperial rule in the 5th century. South of Woodbridge, there are 6th-century burial grounds at Rushmere, Little Bealings, and Tuddenham St Martin and circling Brightwell Heath, there are cemeteries of a similar date at Rendlesham and Ufford. A ship-burial at Snape is the one in England that can be compared to the example at Sutton Hoo. There is evidence that Sutton Hoo was occupied during the Neolithic period, circa 3000 BCE and they dug small pits that contained flint-tempered earthenware pots. Several pits were near to hollows where large trees had been uprooted, the best surviving example contained a ring of upright posts, up to 30 millimetres in diameter, with one pair suggesting an entrance to the south-east. In the central hearth, a faience bead had been dropped, the farmers who dwelt in this house used decorated Beaker-style pottery, cultivated barley, oats, and wheat, and collected hazelnuts. They dug ditches that marked the surrounding grassland into sections, indicating land ownership, during the Iron Age, iron became the dominant form of metal used in the British Isles, replacing copper and bronze. In the Middle Iron Age, people living in the Sutton Hoo area grew crops again, the use of narrow trenches implies grape cultivation, whilst in other places, small pockets of dark soil indicate that big cabbages may have been grown. Such cultivation continued into the Romano-British period, from 43 to around 410, life for the Britons remained unaffected by the arrival of the Romans. Several artefacts from this period, including a few fragments of pottery, as the peoples of Western Europe were encouraged by the Empire to maximise the use of land for growing crops, the area around Sutton Hoo suffered degradation and soil loss. It was eventually abandoned again and became overgrown, following the withdrawal of the Romans from southern Britain after 410, the remaining population slowly adopted the language, customs and beliefs of the Germanic Angles, Saxons and Jutes
5.
Suffolk
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Suffolk is an East Anglian county of historic origin in England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west, the North Sea lies to the east. The county town is Ipswich, other important towns include Lowestoft, Bury St Edmunds, Newmarket and Felixstowe, the county is low-lying with very few hills, and is largely arable land with the wetlands of the Broads in the north. The Suffolk Coast and Heaths are an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, by the fifth century, the Angles had established control of the region. The Angles later became the folk and the south folk. Suffolk and several adjacent areas became the kingdom of East Anglia, Suffolk was originally divided into four separate Quarter Sessions divisions. In 1860, the number of divisions was reduced to two, the eastern division was administered from Ipswich and the western from Bury St Edmunds. Under the Local Government Act 1888, the two divisions were made the administrative counties of East Suffolk and West Suffolk, Ipswich became a county borough. A few Essex parishes were added to Suffolk, Ballingdon-with-Brundon and parts of Haverhill. On 1 April 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972, East Suffolk, West Suffolk, the county was divided into several local government districts, Babergh, Forest Heath, Ipswich, Mid Suffolk, St. Edmundsbury, Suffolk Coastal, and Waveney. This act also transferred some land near Great Yarmouth to Norfolk, in 2007, the Department for Communities and Local Government referred Ipswich Borough Councils bid to become a new unitary authority to the Boundary Committee. The Boundary Committee consulted local bodies and reported in favour of the proposal and it was not, however, approved by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government. Beginning in February 2008, the Boundary Committee again reviewed local government in the county, West Suffolk, like nearby East Cambridgeshire, is renowned for archaeological finds from the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age. Bronze Age artefacts have been found in the area between Mildenhall and West Row, in Eriswell and in Lakenheath, other finds include traces of cremations and barrows. The majority of agriculture in Suffolk is either arable or mixed, Farm sizes vary from anything around 80 acres to over 8,000. Soil types vary from clays to light sands. The continuing importance of agriculture in the county is reflected in the Suffolk Show, although latterly somewhat changed in nature, this remains primarily an agricultural show. Below is a chart of regional gross value added of Suffolk at current basic prices published by Office for National Statistics with figures in millions of British Pounds Sterling, well-known companies in Suffolk include Greene King and Branston Pickle in Bury St Edmunds
6.
Eorpwald of East Anglia
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Eorpwald, also Erpenwald or Earpwald, succeeded his father Rædwald as ruler of the independent Kingdom of the East Angles. Eorpwald was a member of the East Anglian dynasty known as the Wuffingas, little is known of Eorpwalds life or of his short reign, as little documentary evidence about the East Anglian kingdom has survived. The primary source for Eorpwald is the Ecclesiastical History of the English People, soon after becoming king, Eorpwald received Christian teaching and was baptised in 627 or 632. Soon after his conversion he was killed by Ricberht, a pagan noble, the motive for Eorpwalds assassination was probably political as well as religious. He was the first early English king to death as a consequence of his Christian faith and was subsequently venerated by the Church as a saint. In 1939, a magnificent ship-burial was discovered under a mound at Sutton Hoo. Although Rædwald is usually considered to have been buried with the ship, alternatively, he might also have had his own ship-burial nearby. By the beginning of the 7th century, southern England was almost entirely under the control of the Anglo-Saxons and these peoples, who are known to have included Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Frisians, began to arrive in Britain in the 5th century. Almost no documentary sources exist about the history of the kingdom before the reign of Rædwald, sources of information include the names of a few of the early Wuffing kings, mentioned in a short passage in Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People, written in the 730s. In 616, Rædwald defeated and killed Æthelfrith of Northumbria in the Battle of the River Idle and then installed Edwin as the new Deiran king. Whilst Edwin had been an exile at Rædwalds court, he had had a dream where he was told if he converted to Christianity. After Edwin emerged as the ruler of Deira, with its centre at York and he is thought by many to have been buried in the sumptuous ship burial at Sutton Hoo. Eorpwald was the son of Rædwald by a wife name is not recorded. He had at least one brother, Rægenhere, and another sibling, Sigeberht, according to the historian Barbara Yorke, Sigebert may have been a member of a different line of Wuffings who as his rival was forced into exile, in order to ensure that Eorpwald became king. Eorpwald was still a pagan when he became king of the East Angles and it can be calculated that this event occurred in 627, taking in account the years that Felix of Burgundy was known to have held the East Anglian bishopric. In contrast, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle recorded that Eorpwalds baptism took place during 632 and it is not known whether Eorpwald was baptised in East Anglia, Northumbria or Kent, but it is very likely that Edwin, now the senior ruler, was present as his sponsor. Higham suggests that because of the lack of facilities in East Anglia. The manner of Eorpwalds conversion indicated that he was a subordinate king, following his baptism, Edwins Northumbrian priests were in a position to be able to suppress pagan practices in Eorpwalds kingdom and convert the East Anglians
7.
Dynasty
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A dynasty is a sequence of rulers from the same family, usually in the context of a feudal or monarchical system but sometimes also appearing in elective republics. The dynastic family or lineage may be known as a house, historians periodize the histories of many sovereign states, such as Ancient Egypt, the Carolingian Empire and Imperial China, using a framework of successive dynasties. As such, the dynasty may be used to delimit the era during which the family reigned and to describe events, trends. The word dynasty itself is often dropped from such adjectival references, until the 19th century, it was taken for granted that a legitimate function of a monarch was to aggrandize his dynasty, that is, to increase the territory, wealth, and power of his family members. The longest-surviving dynasty in the world is the Imperial House of Japan, dynasties throughout the world have traditionally been reckoned patrilineally, such as under the Frankish Salic law. Succession through a daughter when permitted was considered to establish a new dynasty in her husbands ruling house, however, some states in Africa, determined descent matrilineally, while rulers have at other times adopted the name of their mothers dynasty when coming into her inheritance. It is also extended to unrelated people such as poets of the same school or various rosters of a single sports team. The word dynasty derives via Latin dynastia from Greek dynastéia, where it referred to power, dominion and it was the abstract noun of dynástēs, the agent noun of dynamis, power or ability, from dýnamai, to be able. A ruler in a dynasty is referred to as a dynast. For example, following his abdication, Edward VIII of the United Kingdom ceased to be a member of the House of Windsor. A dynastic marriage is one that complies with monarchical house law restrictions, the marriage of Willem-Alexander, Prince of Orange, to Máxima Zorreguieta in 2002 was dynastic, for example, and their eldest child is expected to inherit the Dutch crown eventually. But the marriage of his younger brother Prince Friso to Mabel Wisse Smit in 2003 lacked government support, thus Friso forfeited his place in the order of succession, lost his title as a Prince of the Netherlands, and left his children without dynastic rights. In historical and monarchist references to formerly reigning families, a dynast is a member who would have had succession rights, were the monarchys rules still in force. Even since abolition of the Austrian monarchy, Max and his descendants have not been considered the rightful pretenders by Austrian monarchists, nor have they claimed that position. The term dynast is sometimes used only to refer to descendants of a realms monarchs. The term can therefore describe overlapping but distinct sets of people, yet he is not a male-line member of the royal family, and is therefore not a dynast of the House of Windsor. Thus, in 1999 he requested and obtained permission from Elizabeth II to marry the Roman Catholic Princess Caroline of Monaco. Yet a clause of the English Act of Settlement 1701 remained in effect at that time and that exclusion, too, ceased to apply on 26 March 2015, with retroactive effect for those who had been dynasts prior to triggering it by marriage to a Catholic
8.
Wuffingas
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The Wuffingas, Uffingas or Wuffings were the ruling dynasty of East Anglia, the long-lived Anglo-Saxon kingdom which today includes the English counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. The Wuffingas took their name from Wuffa, an early East Anglian king, nothing is known of the members of the dynasty before Rædwald, who ruled from about 599 to c. The Viking invasions of the century destroyed the monasteries in East Anglia where many documents relating to the rule of the Wuffingas would have been kept. The last of the Wuffingas kings was Ælfwald, who died in 749, the following family tree includes the Wuffingas kings from Wehha to Ælfwald. They are numbered in order of ruling, ecgric of East Anglia was also a member of the Wuffingas house, but his exact descent is not decided. He may have been Sigeberts brother, or his step-brother, the kingdom of East Anglia was settled by peoples from northern Europe during the 5th and 6th centuries. Several of the Wuffingas kings are included in a pedigree of Ælfwald, in the pedigree, Ælfwald is claimed to descend from the god Wōden. After 749, East Anglia was ruled either by the Mercians or by kings whose genealogy is not known, sam Newton has claimed that the poem Beowulf may have been composed during the reign of Ælfwald of East Anglia. Before the end of his rule, Ælfwalds kingdom contained a group of ecclesiastical centres and these included the sees at Dommoc and Helmham, St. After comparing Sutton Hoo with archaeological sites in Sweden, Sune Lindqvist suggested in 1948 that the Wuffingas may have related to the Royal House of Uppsala descended from Wiglaf. The Origins of Beowulf and the Pre-Viking Kingdom of East Anglia, the Rise and Rrogress of the English Commonwealth, Anglo-Saxon period. Containing the Anglo-Saxon policy, and the arising out of laws. Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon England
9.
Tytila of East Anglia
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Tytila was a semi-historical pagan king of East Anglia, a small Anglo-Saxon kingdom which today includes the English counties of Norfolk and Suffolk. Early sources, including Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People, a later chronicle dates his reign from 578, but he is not known to have definitely ruled as king and nothing of his life is known. He is listed in a number of genealogical lists, a number of later mediaeval sources recorded that in about 616, Tytila was succeeded by his son Rædwald. The peoples known to us as the Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Frisians, by 600, a number of kingdoms had begun to form in southern and eastern Britain, and by the beginning of the seventh century, southern England was almost entirely under their control. Tytila was a member of the Wuffingas family, the dynasty of the Kingdom of the East Angles that was named after his father Wuffa. The Wuffingas may have been descendants of an earlier Scandinavian dynasty, both he and his father are semi-historical figures. The Victorian ethnologist John Beddoe noted the similarity between the name Tytila and that of Totila, an Ostrogoth king, Tytila is included in a number of different tallies. Tytila is included in an East Anglian royal tally that lists the ancestors of Ælfwald and that names many, the tally, which forms part of the Anglian collection, comes from the 12th century Textus Roffensis. Nothing is known of Tytilas life or his rule, as no records have survived from this period in East Anglian history. The mediaeval chronicler Roger of Wendover dated Tytilas reign from 578, but his source of information is unknown, the date that Tytlila died is unknown, but he is thought to have been succeeded by his son Rædwald in about 616. The descendants of Tytilas ancestor Wehha See Wuffingas for a complete family tree. Anglo-Saxon royal genealogies Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation, the Races of Britain, a Contribution to the Anthropology of Western Europe. The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Anglo-Saxon England, a detailed reference to the Textus Roffensis, with links to images of each page in the manuscript. Milton Keynes, Lightning Source UK Ltd, Manchester and New York, Manchester University Press. Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon English, Tytila 1 at Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England
10.
Old English
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Old English or Anglo-Saxon is the earliest historical form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlers probably in the mid 5th century, Old English developed from a set of Anglo-Frisian or North Sea Germanic dialects originally spoken by Germanic tribes traditionally known as the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes. As the Anglo-Saxons became dominant in England, their language replaced the languages of Roman Britain, Common Brittonic, a Celtic language, Old English had four main dialects, associated with particular Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Mercian, Northumbrian, Kentish and West Saxon. It was West Saxon that formed the basis for the standard of the later Old English period, although the dominant forms of Middle. The speech of eastern and northern parts of England was subject to strong Old Norse influence due to Scandinavian rule, Old English is one of the West Germanic languages, and its closest relatives are Old Frisian and Old Saxon. Like other old Germanic languages, it is different from Modern English. Old English grammar is similar to that of modern German, nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and verbs have many inflectional endings and forms. The oldest Old English inscriptions were using a runic system. Old English was not static, and its usage covered a period of 700 years, from the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain in the 5th century to the late 11th century, some time after the Norman invasion. While indicating that the establishment of dates is a process, Albert Baugh dates Old English from 450 to 1150, a period of full inflections. Perhaps around 85 per cent of Old English words are no longer in use, Old English is a West Germanic language, developing out of Ingvaeonic dialects from the 5th century. It came to be spoken over most of the territory of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which became the Kingdom of England and this included most of present-day England, as well as part of what is now southeastern Scotland, which for several centuries belonged to the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria. Other parts of the island – Wales and most of Scotland – continued to use Celtic languages, Norse was also widely spoken in the parts of England which fell under Danish law. Anglo-Saxon literacy developed after Christianisation in the late 7th century, the oldest surviving text of Old English literature is Cædmons Hymn, composed between 658 and 680. There is a corpus of runic inscriptions from the 5th to 7th centuries. The Old English Latin alphabet was introduced around the 9th century, with the unification of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms by Alfred the Great in the later 9th century, the language of government and literature became standardised around the West Saxon dialect. In Old English, typical of the development of literature, poetry arose before prose, a later literary standard, dating from the later 10th century, arose under the influence of Bishop Æthelwold of Winchester, and was followed by such writers as the prolific Ælfric of Eynsham. This form of the language is known as the Winchester standard and it is considered to represent the classical form of Old English
11.
Anglo-Saxons
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The Anglo-Saxons are a people who have inhabited Great Britain from the 5th century. Historically, the Anglo-Saxon period denotes the period in Britain between about 450 and 1066, after their settlement and up until the Norman conquest. The early Anglo-Saxon period includes the creation of an English nation, with many of the aspects that survive today, including government of shires. During this period, Christianity was re-established and there was a flowering of literature, charters and law were also established. The term Anglo-Saxon is popularly used for the language that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons in England, in scholarly use, it is more commonly called Old English. The history of the Anglo-Saxons is the history of a cultural identity and it developed from divergent groups in association with the peoples adoption of Christianity, and was integral to the establishment of various kingdoms. Threatened by extended Danish invasions and occupation of eastern England, this identity was re-established, the visible Anglo-Saxon culture can be seen in the material culture of buildings, dress styles, illuminated texts and grave goods. Behind the symbolic nature of these emblems, there are strong elements of tribal. The elite declared themselves as kings who developed burhs, and identified their roles and peoples in Biblical terms, above all, as Helena Hamerow has observed, local and extended kin groups remained. the essential unit of production throughout the Anglo-Saxon period. Use of the term Anglo-Saxon assumes that the words Angles, Saxons or Anglo-Saxon have the meaning in all the sources. Assigning ethnic labels such as Anglo-Saxon is fraught with difficulties and this term began to be used only in the 8th century to distinguish the Germanic groups in Britain from those on the continent. The Old English ethnonym Angul-Seaxan comes from the Latin Angli-Saxones and became the name of the peoples Bede calls Anglorum, Anglo-Saxon is a term that was rarely used by Anglo-Saxons themselves, it is not an autonym. It is likely they identified as ængli, Seaxe or, more probably, also, the use of Anglo-Saxon disguises the extent to which people identified as Anglo-Scandinavian after the Viking age or the conquest of 1016, or as Anglo-Norman after the Norman conquest. The earliest historical references using this term are from outside Britain, referring to piratical Germanic raiders, Saxones who attacked the shores of Britain, procopius states that Britain was settled by three races, the Angiloi, Frisones, and Britons. The term Angli Saxones seems to have first been used in writing of the 8th century. The name therefore seemed to mean English Saxons, the Christian church seems to have used the word Angli, for example in the story of Pope Gregory I and his remark, Non Angli sed angeli. The terms ænglisc and Angelcynn were also used by West Saxon King Alfred to refer to the people, at other times he uses the term rex Anglorum, which presumably meant both Anglo-Saxons and Danes. Alfred the Great used Anglosaxonum Rex, the term Engla cyningc is used by Æthelred
12.
Norfolk
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Norfolk /ˈnɔːrfək/ is a county in East Anglia in England. It borders Lincolnshire to the west and north-west, Cambridgeshire to the west and southwest and its northern and eastern boundaries are the North Sea and, to the north-west, The Wash. With an area of 2,074 square miles and a population of 859,400, of the countys population, 40% live in four major built up areas, Norwich, Great Yarmouth, Kings Lynn and Thetford. The Broads is a network of rivers and lakes in the east of the county, the area is not a National Park although it is marketed as such. It has similar status to a park, and is protected by the Broads Authority. Norfolk was settled in times, with camps along the higher land in the west. A Brythonic tribe, the Iceni, inhabited the county from the 1st century BC to the end of the 1st century AD, the Iceni revolted against the Roman invasion in AD47, and again in 60 led by Boudica. The crushing of the second opened the county to the Romans. During the Roman era roads and ports were constructed throughout the county, situated on the east coast, Norfolk was vulnerable to invasions from Scandinavia and Northern Europe, and forts were built to defend against the Angles and Saxons. Norfolk, Suffolk and several adjacent areas became the kingdom of East Anglia, the influence of the Early English settlers can be seen in the many place names ending in -ton and -ham. Endings such as -by and -thorpe are also common, indicating Danish place names, in the 9th century the region came under attack. In the centuries before the Norman Conquest the wetlands of the east of the county began to be converted to farmland, and settlements grew in these areas. Migration into East Anglia must have high, by the time of the Domesday Book survey it was one of the most densely populated parts of the British Isles. During the high and late Middle Ages the county developed arable agriculture, the economy was in decline by the time of the Black Death, which dramatically reduced the population in 1349. During the English Civil War Norfolk was largely Parliamentarian, the economy and agriculture of the region declined somewhat. During the Industrial Revolution Norfolk developed little industry except in Norwich which was an addition to the railway network. In the 20th century the county developed a role in aviation, during the Second World War agriculture rapidly intensified, and it has remained very intensive since, with the establishment of large fields for growing cereals and oilseed rape. Norfolks low-lying land and easily eroded cliffs, many of which are chalk and clay, make it vulnerable to the sea, the low-lying section of coast between Kelling and Lowestoft Ness in Suffolk is currently managed by the Environment Agency to protect the Broads from sea flooding
13.
Wuffa of East Anglia
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Wuffa is recorded in the Anglo-Saxon genealogies as an early king of East Anglia. If historical, he would have flourished in the 6th century, by tradition Wuffa was named as the son of Wehha and the father of Tytila, but it is not known with any certainty that Wuffa was an actual historical figure. The name Wuffa was the eponym for the Wuffingas dynasty, the royal family of the East Angles until 749. Bede regarded Wuffa as the first king of the East Angles, the kingdom of the East Angles was an independent and long-lived Anglo-Saxon kingdom that was established after migrants arrived in southeast Suffolk from the area now known as Jutland. Rainbird Clarke identified Wehha as one of the leaders of the new arrivals, historians have used sources such as the Anglian collection too as an aid in calculating a date for the establishment of the kingdom. The kingdom of the East Angles was bordered to the north and east by the North Sea, to the south by mainly impenetrable forests, the main land route from East Anglia would at that time have been a corridor, along which ran the prehistoric Icknield Way. The Devils Dyke may have at one time formed part of the western boundary. According to the East Anglian dynastic tally in the Anglian collection, Wuffa was the son of Wehha and his name, which is a diminutive form of the Old English word for wolf, is the eponym for his dynasty, the Wuffingas. According to Procopius, a 6th-century Warni prince called Radigis was brotrothed to the sister of the King of the Angli. The historian Michael Wood has suggested that before the arrival of Wuffas dynasty in Britain, it had been founded by some powerful, according to the 13th century chronicler Roger of Wendover, Wuffa ruled from 571 to 578, but the origin of this information is unknown. According to Michael Wood, current evidence suggests that Wuffa ruled the East Angles in around 575, guercha begat Uffa, who begat Tytillus, who begat Eni, who begat Edric, who begat Aldwulf, who begat Elric. D. P. Kirby has however concluded that Nennius intended to mean that it was Wehha, and not Wuffa, who was the earliest Wuffingas king. A lack of documentary evidence prevents scholars from knowing if Wuffa is anything more than a legendary figure, the descendants of Wehha See Wuffingas for a more complete family tree. Gildas, Gildae De excidio Britanniae, fragmenta, liber de paenitentia, accedit et Lorica Gildae, London, Published for the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion by D. Nutt Bredehoft, textual Histories, Readings in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Toronto, Buffalo, London, University of Toronto Press, the Age of Sutton Hoo, The Seventh Century in North-Western Europe. Collingwood, R. G. Myers, J. N. L. Roman Britain, greenway, D. E. Porter, S. Roy, I. Giles, J. A. Roger of Wendovers Flowers of History, the Rise and Progress of the English Commonwealth, Anglo-Saxon Period. Manchester and New York, Manchester University Press, in Search of the Dark Ages
14.
Kingdom of East Anglia
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The kingdom formed in the 6th century in the wake of the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain. It was ruled by the Wuffingas in the 7th and 8th centuries, but fell to Mercia in 794 and it was conquered by Edward the Elder and incorporated into the Kingdom of England in 918. The Kingdom of East Anglia was organized in the first or second quarter of the 6th century with Wehha listed as the first king of the East Angles, until 749 the kings of East Anglia were Wuffingas, named after the semi-historical Wuffa. During the early century, under Rædwald of East Anglia. Rædwald, the first of the East Anglian kings to be baptised as a Christian, is considered by experts to be the person who was buried within the ship burial at Sutton Hoo. During the decades that followed his death in around 624, East Anglia became increasingly dominated by the kingdom of Mercia. Several of Rædwalds successors were killed in battle, such as Sigeberht, under Sigeberhts rule and the guidance of his bishop, Felix of Burgundy, Christianity was firmly established in East Anglia. After Æthelberht II was killed by the Mercians in 794, and until 825, East Anglia ceased to be an independent kingdom and it survived until 869, when the Vikings defeated the East Anglians in battle and their king, Edmund the Martyr, was killed. After 879, the Vikings settled permanently in East Anglia, in 903 the exiled Æthelwold ætheling induced the East Anglian Danes to wage a disastrous war on his cousin Edward the Elder. By 917, after a succession of Danish defeats, East Anglia had submitted to Edward and was incorporated into the kingdom of England, East Anglia was settled by the Anglo-Saxons as early as around 450, earlier than many other regions. According to Bede, the East Angles were descended from natives of Angeln, the first reference to the East Angles is from around 704–713, in the Whitby Life of St Gregory. The East Angles formed one of the seven known to post-mediaeval historians as the Heptarchy. Some modern historians have questioned whether seven independent kingdoms ever really existed contemporaneously, the North Folk and South Folk may have existed before the arrival of the first East Anglian kings. The most powerful of the Wuffingas kings was Rædwald, the son of Tytil, whose father was Wuffa, in 616, he had been strong enough to defeat and kill the Northumbrian king Æthelfrith at the Battle of the River Idle and enthrone Edwin of Northumbria. He was probably the individual honoured by the ship burial at Sutton Hoo. However, as those items previously thought to have come from Sweden are now believed to have made in England. During the seventh century, Anglo-Saxon Christianity was successfully established, the extent to which paganism was displaced in East Anglia is exemplified by a lack of any East Anglian settlements that are named after the old gods. Rædwald was the first East Anglian king to be baptised, in 604 and he maintained a Christian altar, but at the same time continued to worship pagan gods
15.
Vikings
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The term is also commonly extended in modern English and other vernaculars to the inhabitants of Viking home communities during what has become known as the Viking Age. Facilitated by advanced seafaring skills, and characterised by the longship, Viking activities at times also extended into the Mediterranean littoral, North Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia. A romanticized picture of Vikings as noble savages began to emerge in the 18th century, current popular representations of the Vikings are typically based on cultural clichés and stereotypes, complicating modern appreciation of the Viking legacy. One etymology derives víking from the feminine vík, meaning creek, inlet, various theories have been offered that the word viking may be derived from the name of the historical Norwegian district of Viken, meaning a person from Viken. According to this theory, the word simply described persons from this area, however, there are a few major problems with this theory. People from the Viken area were not called Viking in Old Norse manuscripts, in addition, that explanation could only explain the masculine and ignore the feminine, which is a serious problem because the masculine is easily derived from the feminine but hardly vice versa. The form also occurs as a name on some Swedish rune stones. There is little indication of any negative connotation in the term before the end of the Viking Age and this is found in the Proto-Nordic verb *wikan, ‘to turn’, similar to Old Icelandic víkja ‘to move, to turn’, with well-attested nautical usages. In that case, the idea behind it seems to be that the rower moves aside for the rested rower on the thwart when he relieves him. A víkingr would then originally have been a participant on a sea journey characterized by the shifting of rowers, in that case, the word Viking was not originally connected to Scandinavian seafarers but assumed this meaning when the Scandinavians begun to dominate the seas. In Old English, the word wicing appears first in the Anglo-Saxon poem, Widsith, in Old English, and in the history of the archbishops of Hamburg-Bremen written by Adam of Bremen in about 1070, the term generally referred to Scandinavian pirates or raiders. As in the Old Norse usages, the term is not employed as a name for any people or culture in general, the word does not occur in any preserved Middle English texts. The Vikings were known as Ascomanni ashmen by the Germans for the ash wood of their boats, Lochlannach by the Gaels, the modern day name for Sweden in several neighbouring countries is possibly derived from rōþs-, Ruotsi in Finnish and Rootsi in Estonian. The Slavs and the Byzantines also called them Varangians, Scandinavian bodyguards of the Byzantine emperors were known as the Varangian Guard. The Franks normally called them Northmen or Danes, while for the English they were known as Danes or heathen. It is used in distinction from Anglo-Saxon, similar terms exist for other areas, such as Hiberno-Norse for Ireland and Scotland. The period from the earliest recorded raids in the 790s until the Norman conquest of England in 1066 is commonly known as the Viking Age of Scandinavian history, Vikings used the Norwegian Sea and Baltic Sea for sea routes to the south. The Normans were descended from Vikings who were given feudal overlordship of areas in northern France—the Duchy of Normandy—in the 10th century, in that respect, descendants of the Vikings continued to have an influence in northern Europe
16.
Monastery
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A monastery is a building or complex of buildings comprising the domestic quarters and workplaces of monastics, monks or nuns, whether living in communities or alone. A monastery generally includes a place reserved for prayer which may be a chapel, church or temple, a monastery complex typically comprises a number of buildings which include a church, dormitory, cloister, refectory, library, balneary and infirmary. These may include a hospice, a school and a range of agricultural and manufacturing such as a barn. In English usage, the monastery is generally used to denote the buildings of a community of monks. In modern usage, convent tends to be applied only to institutions of female monastics, historically, a convent denoted a house of friars, now more commonly called a friary. Various religions may apply these terms in specific ways. The earliest extant use of the term monastērion is by the 1st century AD Jewish philosopher Philo in On The Contemplative Life, in England the word monastery was also applied to the habitation of a bishop and the cathedral clergy who lived apart from the lay community. Most cathedrals were not monasteries, and were served by canons secular, however, some were run by monasteries orders, such as York Minster. Westminster Abbey was for a time a cathedral, and was a Benedictine monastery until the Reformation. They are also to be distinguished from collegiate churches, such as St Georges Chapel, in most of this article, the term monastery is used generically to refer to any of a number of types of religious community. In the Roman Catholic religion and to some extent in certain branches of Buddhism, there is a more specific definition of the term. Buddhist monasteries are generally called vihara, viharas may be occupied by males or females, and in keeping with common English usage, a vihara populated by females may often be called a nunnery or a convent. However, vihara can also refer to a temple, in Tibetan Buddhism, monasteries are often called gompa. In Thailand, Laos and Cambodia, a monastery is called a wat, in Burma, a monastery is called a kyaung. A Christian monastery may be an abbey, or a priory and it may be a community of men or of women. A charterhouse is any monastery belonging to the Carthusian order, in Eastern Christianity, a very small monastic community can be called a skete, and a very large or important monastery can be given the dignity of a lavra. The great communal life of a Christian monastery is called cenobitic, as opposed to the life of an anchorite. In Hinduism monasteries are called matha, mandir, koil, or most commonly an ashram, jains use the Buddhist term vihara
17.
Kingdom of Northumbria
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The Kingdom of Northumbria was a medieval Anglian kingdom in what is now northern England and south-east Scotland, which subsequently became an earldom in a unified English kingdom. The name reflects the southern limit to the kingdoms territory. Northumbria was formed by Æthelfrith in central Great Britain in Anglo-Saxon times, at the beginning of the 7th century, the two kingdoms of Bernicia and Deira were unified. At its height, the kingdom extended at least from just south of the Humber to the River Mersey, the later earldom came about when the southern part of Northumbria was lost to the Danelaw. The earldom was bounded by the River Tees in the south, much of this land was debated between England and Scotland, but the Earldom of Northumbria was eventually recognised as part of England by the Anglo-Scottish Treaty of York in 1237. On the northern border, Berwick-upon-Tweed, which is north of the Tweed but had changed many times, was defined as subject to the laws of England by the Wales. The local Environment Agency office, located in Newcastle Business Park, otherwise, the term is not the official name for the UK and EU region of North East England. See also, List of monarchs of Northumbria and Timeline of Northumbria Northumbria was originally formed from the union of two independent kingdoms, Bernicia and Deira, Bernicia covered lands north of the Tees, while Deira corresponded roughly to modern-day Yorkshire. Bernicia and Deira were first united by Aethelfrith, a king of Bernicia who conquered Deira around the year 604. He was defeated and killed around the year 616 in battle at the River Idle by Raedwald of East Anglia, who installed Edwin, the son of Ælla, a former king of Deira, as king. Edwin, who accepted Christianity in 627, soon grew to become the most powerful king in England, he was recognised as Bretwalda and conquered the Isle of Man and Gwynedd in northern Wales. He was, however, himself defeated by an alliance of the king of Gwynedd, Cadwallon ap Cadfan. After Edwins death, Northumbria was split between Bernicia, where Eanfrith, a son of Aethelfrith, took power, and Deira, cumbria tended to remain a country frontier with the Britons. Both of these rulers were killed during the year that followed, after the murder of Eanfrith, his brother, Oswald, backed by warriors sent by Domnall Brecc of Dál Riata, defeated and killed Cadwallon at the Battle of Heavenfield in 634. He incorporated Gododdin lands northwards up to the Firth of Forth and also extended his reach westward, encroaching on the remaining Cumbric speaking kingdoms of Rheged. Thus, Northumbria became not only part of modern Englands far north, King Oswald re-introduced Christianity to the Kingdom by appointing St. Aidan, an Irish monk from the Scottish island of Iona to convert his people. This led to the introduction of the practices of Celtic Christianity, a monastery was established on Lindisfarne. In 642, Oswald was killed by the Mercians under Penda at the Battle of Maserfield and this battle marked a major turning point in Northumbrian fortunes, Penda died in the battle, and Oswiu gained supremacy over Mercia, making himself the most powerful king in England
18.
Humber
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The Humber /ˈhʌmbər/ is a large tidal estuary on the east coast of Northern England. It is formed at Trent Falls, Faxfleet, by the confluence of the tidal rivers Ouse, from here to the North Sea, it forms part of the boundary between the East Riding of Yorkshire on the north bank and Lincolnshire on the south bank. Although the Humber is an estuary from the point at which it is formed, Ports on the Humber include the Port of Hull, Port of Grimsby, Port of Immingham, as well as lesser ports at New Holland and North Killingholme Haven. The estuary is navigable here for the largest of deep-sea vessels, inland connections for smaller craft are extensive but handle only one quarter of the goods traffic handled in the Thames. The Humber is now an estuary, when the world sea level was lower during the Ice Ages, the Humber had a long freshwater course across what was then the dry bed of the North Sea. In the Anglo-Saxon period, the Humber was a major boundary, the name Northumbria came from Anglo-Saxon Norðhymbre = the people north of the Humber. The Humber currently forms the boundary between the East Riding of Yorkshire, to the north and North and North East Lincolnshire, from 1974 to 1996, the areas now known as the East Riding of Yorkshire, North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire constituted the county of Humberside. On 23 August 1921, the British airship R38 crashed into the estuary near Hull, the estuarys only modern crossing is the Humber Bridge, which was once the longest single-span suspension bridge in the world. Now it is the eighth longest, before the bridge was built in 1981, a series of paddle steamers operated from the Corporation Pier railway station at the Victoria Pier in Hull to the railway pier in New Holland. Steam ferries started in 1841, and in 1848 were purchased by the Manchester, Sheffield and they, and their successors, ran the ferry until the bridge opened in 1981. Although the railway to New Holland closed in 1977, passenger, the line of the bridge is similar to an ancient ferry route from Hessle to Barton upon Humber, which is noted in the Domesday Book and in a charter of 1281. The ferry was recorded as operating in 1856, into the railway era. The Humber was then one mile across, the Humber Forts were built in the mouth of the river for the First World War. Planned in 1914, their construction started in 1915 and they were not completed until 1919, a coastal battery at Easington, Fort Goodwin or Kilnsea Battery, faced the Bull Sands Fort. They were also garrisoned during the Second World War, and were abandoned for military use in 1956. Fort Paull is further downstream, a Napoleonic-era emplacement replaced in the early 20th century by Stallinborough Battery opposite Sunk Island, graham Boanas, a Hull man, is believed to be the first man to succeed in wading across the Humber since ancient Roman times. The feat, in August 2005, was attempted to cash and awareness for the medical research charity. He started his trek on the bank at Brough, four hours later
19.
Bede
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He is well known as an author and scholar, and his most famous work, Ecclesiastical History of the English People gained him the title The Father of English History. Bedes monastery had access to a library which included works by Eusebius, Orosius. Almost everything that is known of Bedes life is contained in the last chapter of his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, a history of the church in England. It was completed in about 731, and Bede implies that he was then in his fifty-ninth year, a minor source of information is the letter by his disciple Cuthbert which relates Bedes death. Bede, in the Historia, gives his birthplace as on the lands of this monastery, Bede says nothing of his origins, but his connections with men of noble ancestry suggest that his own family was well-to-do. Bedes first abbot was Benedict Biscop, and the names Biscop, Bedes name reflects West Saxon Bīeda. It is an Anglo-Saxon short name formed on the root of bēodan to bid, the name also occurs in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, s. a. 501, as Bieda, one of the sons of the Saxon founder of Portsmouth, the Liber Vitae of Durham Cathedral names two priests with this name, one of whom is presumably Bede himself. Some manuscripts of the Life of Cuthbert, one of Bedes works, mention that Cuthberts own priest was named Bede, at the age of seven, Bede was sent to the monastery of Monkwearmouth by his family to be educated by Benedict Biscop and later by Ceolfrith. Bede does not say whether it was intended at that point that he would be a monk. Monkwearmouths sister monastery at Jarrow was founded by Ceolfrith in 682, in 686, plague broke out at Jarrow. The two managed to do the service of the liturgy until others could be trained. The young boy was almost certainly Bede, who would have been about 14, when Bede was about 17 years old, Adomnán, the abbot of Iona Abbey, visited Monkwearmouth and Jarrow. Bede would probably have met the abbot during this visit, in about 692, in Bedes nineteenth year, Bede was ordained a deacon by his diocesan bishop, John, who was bishop of Hexham. There might have been minor orders ranking below a deacon, in Bedes thirtieth year, he became a priest, with the ordination again performed by Bishop John. In about 701 Bede wrote his first works, the De Arte Metrica and De Schematibus et Tropis and he continued to write for the rest of his life, eventually completing over 60 books, most of which have survived. Not all his output can be dated, and Bede may have worked on some texts over a period of many years. His last-surviving work is a letter to Ecgbert of York, a former student, Bede may also have worked on one of the Latin bibles that were copied at Jarrow, one of which is now held by the Laurentian Library in Florence
20.
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
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The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is a collection of annals in Old English chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. The original manuscript of the Chronicle was created late in the 9th century, probably in Wessex, multiple copies were made of that one original and then distributed to monasteries across England, where they were independently updated. In one case, the Chronicle was still being updated in 1154. Nine manuscripts survive in whole or in part, though not all are of historical value. The oldest seems to have been started towards the end of Alfreds reign and these manuscripts collectively are known as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Taken as a whole, however, the Chronicle is the single most important historical source for the period in England between the departure of the Romans and the following the Norman conquest. Much of the information given in the Chronicle is not recorded elsewhere, in addition, the manuscripts are important sources for the history of the English language, in particular, the later Peterborough text is one of the earliest examples of Middle English in existence. Seven of the nine surviving manuscripts and fragments now reside in the British Library, the remaining two are in the Bodleian Library at Oxford and the Parker Library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge. All of the manuscripts are copies, so it is not known for certain where or when the first version of the Chronicle was composed. It is generally agreed that the version was written in the late 9th century by a scribe in Wessex. After the original Chronicle was compiled, copies were made and distributed to various monasteries, additional copies were made, for further distribution or to replace lost manuscripts, and some copies were updated independently of each other. Some of these copies are those that have survived. The earliest extant manuscript, the Winchester Chronicle, was written by a single scribe up to the year 891, the scribe wrote the year number, DCCCXCII, in the margin of the next line, subsequent material was written by other scribes. It is known that the Winchester manuscript is at least two removes from the original Chronicle, as a result, there is no proof that the Chronicle was compiled at Winchester. The Chronicle, as well as the distribution of copies to other centres of learning, of the nine surviving manuscripts, seven are written entirely in Old English. One, known as the Bilingual Canterbury Epitome, is in Old English with a translation of each annal into Latin, another, the Peterborough Chronicle, is in Old English except for the last entry, which is in early Middle English. The oldest is known as the Winchester Chronicle or the Parker Chronicle, six of the manuscripts were printed in an 1861 edition for the Rolls Series by Benjamin Thorpe with the text laid out in columns labelled A to F. He also included the few remnants of a burned seventh manuscript
21.
Christianity
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Christianity is a Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, who serves as the focal point for the religion. It is the worlds largest religion, with over 2.4 billion followers, or 33% of the global population, Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and the savior of humanity whose coming as the Messiah was prophesied in the Old Testament. Christian theology is summarized in creeds such as the Apostles Creed and his incarnation, earthly ministry, crucifixion, and resurrection are often referred to as the gospel, meaning good news. The term gospel also refers to accounts of Jesuss life and teaching, four of which—Matthew, Mark, Luke. Christianity is an Abrahamic religion that began as a Second Temple Judaic sect in the mid-1st century, following the Age of Discovery, Christianity spread to the Americas, Australasia, sub-Saharan Africa, and the rest of the world through missionary work and colonization. Christianity has played a prominent role in the shaping of Western civilization, throughout its history, Christianity has weathered schisms and theological disputes that have resulted in many distinct churches and denominations. Worldwide, the three largest branches of Christianity are the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and the denominations of Protestantism. There are many important differences of interpretation and opinion of the Bible, concise doctrinal statements or confessions of religious beliefs are known as creeds. They began as baptismal formulae and were expanded during the Christological controversies of the 4th and 5th centuries to become statements of faith. Many evangelical Protestants reject creeds as definitive statements of faith, even agreeing with some or all of the substance of the creeds. The Baptists have been non-creedal in that they have not sought to establish binding authoritative confessions of faith on one another. Also rejecting creeds are groups with roots in the Restoration Movement, such as the Christian Church, the Evangelical Christian Church in Canada, the Apostles Creed is the most widely accepted statement of the articles of Christian faith. It is also used by Presbyterians, Methodists, and Congregationalists and this particular creed was developed between the 2nd and 9th centuries. Its central doctrines are those of the Trinity and God the Creator, each of the doctrines found in this creed can be traced to statements current in the apostolic period. The creed was used as a summary of Christian doctrine for baptismal candidates in the churches of Rome. Most Christians accept the use of creeds, and subscribe to at least one of the mentioned above. The central tenet of Christianity is the belief in Jesus as the Son of God, Christians believe that Jesus, as the Messiah, was anointed by God as savior of humanity, and hold that Jesus coming was the fulfillment of messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. The Christian concept of the Messiah differs significantly from the contemporary Jewish concept, Jesus, having become fully human, suffered the pains and temptations of a mortal man, but did not sin
22.
Kingdom of Essex
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The kingdom of the East Saxons, today referred to as the Kingdom of Essex, was one of the seven traditional kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy. It was founded in the 6th century and covered the territory occupied by the counties of Essex, Hertfordshire, Middlesex. Kings of Essex were frequently subservient to foreign overlords, the last king of Essex was Sigered and in 825, he ceded the kingdom to Egbert of Wessex. The kingdom was bounded to the north by the River Stour, the territory included the remains of two provincial Roman capitals, Colchester and London. The early kingdom included the land of the Middle Saxons, later Middlesex, most if not all of Hertfordshire, for a brief period in the 8th century, the Kingdom of Essex controlled what is now Kent. In the Tribal Hidage it is listed as containing 7000 hides, although the kingdom of Essex was one of the kingdoms of the Heptarchy, its history is not well documented. It produced relatively few Anglo-Saxon charters and no version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, as a result, the kingdom is regarded as comparatively obscure. For most of the existence, the Essex king was subservient to an overlord - variously the kings of Kent. Saxon occupation of land that was to form the kingdom had begun by the early 5th century at Mucking, a large proportion of these original settlers came from Old Saxony. Della Hooke relates the territory ruled by the kings of Essex to the territory of the Trinovantes. The kingdom of Essex grew by the absorption of smaller subkingdoms or Saxon tribal groups, Essex emerged as a single kingdom during the 6th century. The dates, names and achievements of the Essex kings, like those of most early rulers in the Heptarchy, the historical identification of the kings of Essex, including the evidence and a reconstructed genealogy are discussed extensively by Yorke. The dynasty claimed descent from Woden via Seaxnēat, a genealogy of the Essex royal house was prepared in Wessex in the 9th century. Unfortunately the surviving copy is somewhat mutilated, at times during the history of the kingdom several sub-kings within Essex appear to have been able to rule simultaneously. They may have exercised authority over different parts of the kingdom, the Essex kings issued coins that echoed those issued by Cunobeline simultaneously asserting a link to the first century rulers while emphasising independence from Mercia. The tomb of Sæbbi of Essex was visible in Old St Pauls Cathedral until the Great Fire of London of 1666 when the cathedral, the earliest English record of the kingdom dates to Bedes Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, which noted the arrival of Bishop Mellitus in London in 604. Æthelberht was in a position to exercise authority in Essex shortly after 604. It was Æthelberht, and not Sæberht, who built and endowed St. Pauls in London, bede describes Æthelberht as Sæberht’s overlord
23.
Kingdom of Kent
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The kingdom of the Kentish, today referred to as the Kingdom of Kent, was an early medieval kingdom in what is now South East England. Establishing itself in either the fifth or sixth centuries CE, it continued to exist until being absorbed into the Kingdom of England in the tenth century. Following the end of Roman administration in 410, further linguistically Germanic tribal groups moved into the area and it has been argued that an East Saxon community initially settled West Kent, before being conquered by the expanding East Kentish in the sixth century. The earliest recorded king of Kent was Æthelberht, who as bretwalda wielded significant influence over other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the sixth century. The Christianization of the Anglo-Saxons began in Kent under Æthelberht’s reign with the arrival of the monk Augustine of Canterbury and it was one of the seven traditional kingdoms of the so-called Anglo-Saxon heptarchy, but it lost its independence in the 8th century when it became a sub-kingdom of Mercia. In the 9th century, it became a sub-kingdom of Wessex and its name has been carried forward ever since as the county of Kent. In the Romano-British period, the area of modern Kent that lay east of the River Medway was a known as Cantiaca. Its name had taken from an older Common Brittonic place-name, Cantium used in the preceding pre-Roman Iron Age. During the late third and fourth centuries, Roman Britain had been raided repeatedly by Franks, Saxons, Picts and these foederati would have assimilated into Romano-British culture, making it difficult to distinguish them archaeologically. In 407, the Roman legions left Britain in order to deal with incursions into the Empires continental heartlands and this may represent a memory of a genuine exodus of the Roman aristocracy. According to archaeologist Martin Welch, the century witnessed a radical transformation of what became Kent, politically, socially. Both literary and archaeological records show the migration of linguistically Germanic peoples from northern Europe into Britain during this century, the fate of the Romano-British is also debated, many may have fled to Western Britain or Brittany. In Kent, it is likely that some the Romano-British population remained, as the Roman name for the area, Cantiaca, influenced the name of the new Anglo-Saxon kingdom, the Cantware. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a king of the Britons known as Vortigern invited two Germanic leaders, Hengist and Horsa, to Britain to help defend against Pictish raiders. After arriving at Ebbas Creek in Kent in 449, Hengist and Horsa led the defeat of the Picts before turning on the British and inviting more Germanic tribes to colonise Briton. Among these were the Old Saxons, the Angles, and the Jutes, the latter settled in Kent, according to the Chronicle, in 455 Hengist and Horsa fought Vortigern at Ægelesthrep, in which battle Horsa was killed. Hengist succeeded him as king, followed in turn by his son Æsc, in 456 Hengest and Æsc battled the Britons at Crecganford. The Britons then fled Kent for their London stronghold, the accuracy of these accounts is questioned, S. E. Kelly states that the legendary details are easy to dismiss
24.
England
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England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west, the Irish Sea lies northwest of England and the Celtic Sea lies to the southwest. England is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east, the country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain in its centre and south, and includes over 100 smaller islands such as the Isles of Scilly, and the Isle of Wight. England became a state in the 10th century, and since the Age of Discovery. The Industrial Revolution began in 18th-century England, transforming its society into the worlds first industrialised nation, Englands terrain mostly comprises low hills and plains, especially in central and southern England. However, there are uplands in the north and in the southwest, the capital is London, which is the largest metropolitan area in both the United Kingdom and the European Union. In 1801, Great Britain was united with the Kingdom of Ireland through another Act of Union to become the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1922 the Irish Free State seceded from the United Kingdom, leading to the latter being renamed the United Kingdom of Great Britain, the name England is derived from the Old English name Englaland, which means land of the Angles. The Angles were one of the Germanic tribes that settled in Great Britain during the Early Middle Ages, the Angles came from the Angeln peninsula in the Bay of Kiel area of the Baltic Sea. The earliest recorded use of the term, as Engla londe, is in the ninth century translation into Old English of Bedes Ecclesiastical History of the English People. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, its spelling was first used in 1538. The earliest attested reference to the Angles occurs in the 1st-century work by Tacitus, Germania, the etymology of the tribal name itself is disputed by scholars, it has been suggested that it derives from the shape of the Angeln peninsula, an angular shape. An alternative name for England is Albion, the name Albion originally referred to the entire island of Great Britain. The nominally earliest record of the name appears in the Aristotelian Corpus, specifically the 4th century BC De Mundo, in it are two very large islands called Britannia, these are Albion and Ierne. But modern scholarly consensus ascribes De Mundo not to Aristotle but to Pseudo-Aristotle, the word Albion or insula Albionum has two possible origins. Albion is now applied to England in a poetic capacity. Another romantic name for England is Loegria, related to the Welsh word for England, Lloegr, the earliest known evidence of human presence in the area now known as England was that of Homo antecessor, dating to approximately 780,000 years ago. The oldest proto-human bones discovered in England date from 500,000 years ago, Modern humans are known to have inhabited the area during the Upper Paleolithic period, though permanent settlements were only established within the last 6,000 years
25.
The Fens
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The Fens, also known as the Fenland, is a naturally marshy region in eastern England. Most of the fens were drained several centuries ago, resulting in a flat, dry and it is one of the driest areas in England, thanks to a system of drainage channels and man-made rivers and automated pumping stations. A common misconception is that the fens are damp, in whole it occupies an area of nearly 1,500 sq mi. Most of the Fenland lies within a few metres of sea level, with the support of this drainage system, the Fenland has become a major arable agricultural region in Britain for grains and vegetables. The Fens are particularly fertile, containing half of the grade 1 agricultural land in England. The Fens have been referred to as the Holy Land of the English because of the monasteries, now churches and cathedrals, of Crowland, Ely, Peterborough. Other significant settlements in the Fens include Boston, Cambridge, Spalding, the Fens are very low-lying compared with the chalk and limestone uplands that surround them – in most places no more than 10 m above sea level. Indeed, as a result of drainage and the subsequent shrinkage of the peat fens, within the Fens there are a few hills, which have historically been called islands as they remained dry when the low-lying fens around them were flooded. The largest of the fen-islands is the Isle of Ely, on which the city of Ely was built. Some areas of the Fens were once permanently flooded, creating small lakes or meres, the rest of the Fenland was dedicated to pastoral farming, fishing, fowling and the harvesting of reeds or sedge for thatch. In this way, the medieval and early modern Fens stood in contrast to the rest of southern England, drainage in the Fenland consists of both river drainage and internal drainage of the land between the rivers. The internal drainage was organised by levels or districts, each of which includes the fen parts of one or several parishes, in the 17th century, the Great Level was divided into the North, Middle and South Levels for the purposes of administration and maintenance. In the 20th century, these levels have gained new boundaries, the South Level lies to the southeast of the Ouse Washes and surrounds Ely, as it did in the 17th century. The Middle Level currently lies between the Ouse Washes and the Nene, but historically lay between the Ouse Washes and Mortons Leam, a 15th-century canal which runs north of the town of Whittlesey. Deeping Fen, in the part of Lincolnshire, lies between the River Welland and the River Glen with its tributary the Bourne Eau. The Black Sluice District, much of which was known as the Lindsey Level when it was first drained in 1639, extends from the Glen and its water is carried through to the Haven at Boston. The above were all redrained at one time or another after the Civil War, at the end of the most recent glacial period, known in Britain as the Devensian, ten thousand years ago, Britain and continental Europe were joined by the ridge between Friesland and Norfolk. The topography of the bed of the North Sea indicates that the rivers of the part of eastern England flowed into the Rhine
26.
History of Anglo-Saxon England
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Anglo-Saxon England was early medieval England, existing from the 5th to the 11th century from the end of Roman Britain until the Norman conquest in 1066. It consisted of various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms until 927 when it was united as the Kingdom of England by King Æthelstan and it became part of the North Sea Empire of Cnut the Great, a personal union between England, Denmark and Norway in the 11th century. The Anglo-Saxons were the members of Germanic-speaking groups who migrated to the half of the island from continental Europe. Anglo-Saxon identity survived beyond the Norman conquest, came to be known as Englishry under Norman rule, Bede completed his book Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum in around 731. Thus the term for English people was in use by then to distinguish Germanic groups in Britain from those on the continent, the historian James Campbell suggested that it was not until the late Anglo-Saxon period that England could be described as a nation state. It is certain that the concept of Englishness only developed very slowly, as the Roman occupation of Britain was coming to an end, Constantine III withdrew the remains of the army, in reaction to the barbarian invasion of Europe. The Romano-British leaders were faced with a security problem from seaborne raids. The expedient adopted by the Romano-British leaders was to enlist the help of Anglo-Saxon mercenaries, in about 442 the Anglo-Saxons mutinied, apparently because they had not been paid. There then followed several years of fighting between the British and the Anglo-Saxons, the fighting continued until around 500, when, at the Battle of Mount Badon, the Britons inflicted a severe defeat on the Anglo-Saxons. There are records of Germanic infiltration into Britain that date before the collapse of the Roman Empire and it is believed that the earliest Germanic visitors were eight cohorts of Batavians attached to the 14th Legion in the original invasion force under Aulus Plautius in AD43. There is a hypothesis that some of the tribes, identified as Britons by the Romans. It was quite common for Rome to swell its legions with foederati recruited from the German homelands and this practice also extended to the army serving in Britain, and graves of these mercenaries, along with their families, can be identified in the Roman cemeteries of the period. The migration continued with the departure of the Roman army, when Anglo-Saxons were recruited to defend Britain, and also during the period of the Anglo-Saxon first rebellion of 442. The arrival of the Anglo-Saxons into Britain can be seen in the context of a movement of Germanic peoples around Europe between the years 300 and 700, known as the Migration period. In the same there were migrations of Britons to the Armorican peninsula, initially around 383 during Roman rule. The historian Peter Hunter-Blair expounded what is now regarded as the view of the Anglo-Saxon arrival in Britain. He suggested a mass immigration, fighting and driving the Sub-Roman Britons off their land and into the extremities of the islands. This view was influenced by sources such as Bede, where he talks about the Britons being slaughtered or going into perpetual servitude
27.
Viking expansion
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The Vikings extended their journeys all the way to the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea, and on the way they raided Galicia. In contemporary texts, the Vikings are often referred to as normandos or lordimani and our knowledge of Vikings in Spain is mainly based on written accounts. There are archeological findings of anchors of Viking ships, and some shapes of mounds by riversides look similar to the Norse longphorts in Ireland and these were ports or docks for Viking longships. After plundering a number of villages they were ultimately repulsed in the vicinity of Farum Brecantium i. e. the Tower of Hercules. Ramiro I of Asturias who was king of Asturias at the time, after the Asturian victory, the Vikings continued their voyage in direction of Lisbon. A major storm was unleashed, sinking most of the fleet, Vikings returned to Galicia in 859, during the reign of Ordoño I of Asturias. It was a contingent of a hundred ships from looting expeditions by the French coast that was now directed toward the Arousa estuary, after looting Iria Flavia they continued to Santiago de Compostela, where they laid siege. Their neighbours had paid tribute to avoid looting, but in spite of this and they were faced with an army led by Don Pedro who dispersed them and destroyed thirty eight of their ships, after which the surviving Vikings went south. As a result of this expedition the episcopal see of Iria relocated to Santiago de Compostela, in 951, the Vikings reappeared and attacked the Galician coast. Galician cities would then strengthen their defenses over the following years, in 964, the Vikings arrived again in Galicia, because the own bishop of Mondonedo, Rosendo of Celanova, they had to face. The expedition of 1015 was led by Olaf Haraldsson, who became king Olaf II of Norway. He destroyed four settlements, Castropol, Betanzos, Rivas de Sil and Tui
28.
Monk
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A monk is a person who practices religious asceticism, living either alone or with any number of other monks. The concept is ancient and can be seen in many religions, in the Greek language the term can apply to women, but in modern English it is mainly in use for men. The word nun is typically used for female monastics, although the term monachos is of Christian origin, in the English language monk tends to be used loosely also for both male and female ascetics from other religious or philosophical backgrounds. However, being generic, it is not interchangeable terms that denote particular kinds of monk, such as cenobite, hermit, anchorite, hesychast. In Eastern Orthodoxy monasticism holds a special and important place. Orthodox monastics separate themselves from the world in order to pray unceasingly for the world and they do not, in general, have as their primary purpose the running of social services, but instead are concerned with attaining theosis, or union with God. However, care for the poor and needy has always been an obligation of monasticism, the level of contact though will vary from community to community. Hermits, on the hand, have little or no contact with the outside world. Orthodox monasticism does not have religious orders as are found in the West, basil the Great and the Philokalia, which was compiled by St. Nikodemos of the Holy Mountain and St. Makarios of Corinth. Hesychasm is of importance in the ascetical theology of the Orthodox Church. Meals are usually taken in common in a dining hall known as a trapeza. Food is usually simple and is eaten in silence while one of the brethren reads aloud from the writings of the Holy Fathers. The monastic lifestyle takes a deal of serious commitment. Within the cenobitic community, all monks conform to a way of living based on the traditions of that particular monastery. In struggling to attain this conformity, the comes to realize his own shortcomings and is guided by his spiritual father in how to deal honestly with them. For this same reason, bishops are almost always chosen from the ranks of monks, Eastern monasticism is found in three distinct forms, anchoritic, cenobitic, and the middle way between the two, known as the skete. One normally enters a community first, and only after testing and spiritual growth would one go on to the skete or, for the most advanced. However, one is not necessarily expected to join a skete or become a solitary, in general, Orthodox monastics have little or no contact with the outside world, including their own families
29.
Scribe
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A scribe is a person who writes books or documents by hand in hieratics, cuneiform or other scripts and may help keep track of records for priests and government. The profession, previously found in all cultures in some form, lost most of its importance. Later the profession developed into public servants, journalists, accountants, typists, in societies with low literacy rates, street-corner letter-writers may still be found providing a service. The most important was a person educated in the arts of writing, sons of scribes were brought up in the same scribal tradition, sent to school and, upon entering the civil service, inherited their fathers positions. Much of what is known about ancient Egypt is due to the activities of its scribes, scribes were also considered part of the royal court, were not conscripted and did not have to pay taxes. The scribal profession had companion professions, the painters and artisans who decorated reliefs and other relics with scenes, personages, a scribe was exempt from the heavy manual labor required of the lower classes, or corvee labor. Thoth was a god associated by the Ancient Egyptians with the invention of writing, being the scribe of the gods, besides the scribal profession for accountancy and governmental politicking, the scribal professions immediately branched out into the socio-cultural areas of literature. The first stories probably related to religious stories, and gods. In ancient Egypt, an example of this is the Dispute between a man and his Ba, an example from the small list of Sumerian disputations is the debate between bird and fish. In the other Sumerian disputes, in the Debate between Summer and Winter, Winter wins, the other disputes are, cattle and grain, the tree and the reed, Silver and Copper, the pickax and the plough, and millstone and the gul-gul stone. Some scribes also copied documents, but this was not necessarily part of their job, the Jewish scribes used the following process for creating copies of the Torah and eventually other books in the Tanakh. They could only use animal skins, both to write on, and even to bind manuscripts. Each column of writing could have no less than forty-eight, the ink must be black, and of a special recipe. They must say each word aloud while they were writing and they must wipe the pen and wash their entire bodies before writing the most Holy Name of God, YHVH, every time they wrote it. There must be a review within thirty days, and if as many as three pages required corrections, the manuscript had to be redone. The letters, words, and paragraphs had to be counted, the middle paragraph, word and letter must correspond to those of the original document. The documents could be stored only in sacred places, as no document containing Gods Word could be destroyed, they were stored, or buried, in a genizah. Sofers are among the few scribes that still ply their trade by hand, renowned calligraphers, they produce the Hebrew Torah scrolls and other holy texts by hand to this day
30.
Ecclesiastical History of the English People
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It is believed to have been completed in 731 when Bede was approximately 59 years old. The Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, or An Ecclesiastical History of the English People is Bedes best-known work, the first of the five books begins with some geographical background and then sketches the history of England, beginning with Caesars invasion in 55 BC. The second book begins with the death of Gregory the Great in 604, and follows the progress of Christianity in Kent. These encountered a setback when Penda, the king of Mercia. The setback was temporary, and the book recounts the growth of Christianity in Northumbria under kings Oswald. The climax of the book is the account of the Council of Whitby. The fourth book begins with the consecration of Theodore as Archbishop of Canterbury, the fifth book brings the story up to Bedes day, and includes an account of missionary work in Frisia, and of the conflict with the British church over the correct dating of Easter. Bede wrote a preface for the work, in which he dedicates it to Ceolwulf, the preface mentions that Ceolwulf received an earlier draft of the book, presumably Ceolwulf knew enough Latin to understand it, and he may even have been able to read it. Divided into five books, the Historia covers the history of England, ecclesiastical and political and this is impressive, nevertheless, the Historia, like other historical writing from this period has a lower degree of objectivity than modern historical writings. It seems to be a mixture of fact, legend and literature, the monastery at Jarrow had an excellent library. Both Benedict Biscop and Ceolfrith had acquired books from the Continent, for the period prior to Augustines arrival in 597, Bede drew on earlier writers, including Orosius, Eutropius, Pliny, and Solinus. He used Constantiuss Life of Germanus as a source for Germanuss visits to Britain, Bedes account of the invasion of the Anglo-Saxons is drawn largely from Gildass De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae. Bede would also have been familiar with more recent accounts such as Eddius Stephanuss Life of Wilfrid and he also drew on Josephuss Antiquities, and the works of Cassiodorus, and there was a copy of the Liber Pontificalis in Bedes monastery. Bede also had correspondents who supplied him with material, almost all of Bedes information regarding Augustine is taken from these letters, which includes the Libellus responsionum, as chapter 27 of book 1 is often known. Bede also mentions an Abbot Esi as a source for the affairs of the East Anglian church, the historian Walter Goffart argues that Bede based the structure of the Historia on three works, using them as the framework around which the three main sections of the work were structured. For the early part of the work, up until the Gregorian mission, the second section, detailing the Gregorian mission of Augustine of Canterbury was framed on the anonymous Life of Gregory the Great written at Whitby. The last section, detailing events after the Gregorian mission, Goffart asserts were modelled on Stephen of Ripons Life of Wilfrid, the History of the English Church and People has a clear polemical and didactic purpose. Bede sets out not just to tell the story of the English, in political terms he is a partisan of his native Northumbria, amplifying its role in English history over and above that of Mercia, its great southern rival
31.
Gregorian mission
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The Gregorian mission or Augustinian mission was sent by Pope Gregory the Great in 596 to convert Britains Anglo-Saxons. Headed by Augustine of Canterbury, by the death of the last missionary in 635 the mission had established Christianity in southern Britain, along with the Irish and Frankish missions it converted other parts of Britain as well and influenced the Hiberno-Scottish missions to Continental Europe. In the late 6th century Pope Gregory sent a group of missionaries to Kent to convert Æthelberht, King of Kent, whose wife, Bertha of Kent, was a Frankish princess and practising Christian. Augustine was the prior of Gregorys own monastery in Rome and Gregory prepared the way for the mission by soliciting aid from the Frankish rulers along Augustines route, in 597 the forty missionaries arrived in Kent and were permitted by Æthelberht to preach freely in his capital of Canterbury. Soon the missionaries wrote to Gregory telling him of their success, the exact date of Æthelberhts conversion is unknown but it occurred before 601. A second group of monks and clergy was dispatched in 601 bearing books, before Æthelberhts death in 616 a number of other bishoprics had been established but after that date, a pagan backlash set in and the see, or bishopric, of London was abandoned. Æthelberhts daughter, Æthelburg, married Edwin, the king of the Northumbrians, and by 627 Paulinus, the bishop who accompanied her north, had converted Edwin, when Edwin died, in about 633, his widow and Paulinus were forced to flee to Kent. By the 4th century the Roman province of Britannia was converted to Christianity and had produced its own heretic in Pelagius. Britain sent three bishops to the Synod of Arles in 314, and a Gaulish bishop went to the island in 396 to help settle disciplinary matters, lead baptismal basins and other artefacts bearing Christian symbols testify to a growing Christian presence at least until about 360. There is no evidence that these native Christians tried to convert the Anglo-Saxon newcomers, the Anglo-Saxon invasions coincided with the disappearance of most remnants of Roman civilisation in the areas held by the Anglo-Saxons, including the economic and religious structures. Whether this was a result of the Angles themselves, as the medieval writer Gildas argued. The archaeological evidence suggests much variation in the way that the tribes established themselves in Britain concurrently with the decline of urban Roman culture in Britain, the net effect was that when Augustine arrived in 597 the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms had little continuity with the preceding Roman civilisation. In the words of the historian John Blair, Augustine of Canterbury began his mission with an almost clean slate, most of the information available on the Gregorian mission comes from the medieval writer Bede, especially his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, or Ecclesiastical History of the English People. Other sources are biographies of Pope Gregory, including one written in Northern England around 700 as well as a 9th-century life by a Roman writer. Gregorys entry in the Liber Pontificalis is short and of little use, in addition, over 850 of Gregorys letters survive. A few later writings, such as letters from Boniface, an 8th-century Anglo-Saxon missionary, some of these letters, however, are only preserved in Bedes work. Bede represented the native British church as wicked and sinful, in order to explain why Britain was conquered by the Anglo-Saxons, he drew on the polemic of Gildas and developed it further in his own works. Although he found some native British clergy worthy of praise he nevertheless condemned them for their failure to convert the invaders and this bias may have resulted in his understating British missionary activity
32.
Chronicle
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A chronicle is a historical account of facts and events ranged in chronological order, as in a time line. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and local events and this is in contrast to a narrative or history, which sets selected events in a meaningful interpretive context and excludes those the author does not see as important. Some made use of materials, charters, letters, or the works of earlier chroniclers. Still others are tales of such unknown origins so as to hold mythical status, copyists also affected chronicles in creative copying, making corrections or in updating or continuing a chronicle with information not available to the original author. The reliability of a chronicle is an important determination for modern historians. In modern times various contemporary newspapers or other periodicals have adopted chronicle as part of their name, various fictional stories have also adopted chronicle as part of their title, to give an impression of epic proportion to their stories. A chronicle which traces world history is called a universal chronicle, scholars categorize the genre of chronicle into two subgroups, live chronicles, and dead chronicles. A dead chronicle is one where the author gathers his list of events up to the time of his writing, a live chronicle is where one or more authors add to a chronicle in a regular fashion, recording contemporary events shortly after they occur. Because of the immediacy of the information, historians tend to value live chronicles, such as annals, the earliest medieval chronicle to combine both retrospective and contemporary entries, is the Chronicle of Ireland, which spans the years 431 to 911. Chronicles are the predecessors of modern time lines rather than analytical histories, if the chronicles deal with events year by year, they are often called annals. Unlike the modern historian, most chroniclers tended to take their information as they found it, the point of view of most chroniclers is highly localised, to the extent that many anonymous chroniclers can be sited in individual abbeys. Later 16th century Scottish chronicles, written after the Reformation, shape history according to Catholic or Protestant viewpoints. It is impossible to say how many chronicles exist, as the many ambiguities in the definition of the make it impossible to draw clear distinctions of what should or should not be included. However, the Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle lists some 2,500 items written between 300 and 1500 AD
33.
Anglian collection
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The Anglian collection is a collection of Anglo-Saxon royal genealogies and regnal lists. These survive in four manuscripts, two of which now reside in the British Library, the remaining two belong to the libraries of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge and Rochester Cathedral, the latter now deposited with the Medway Archives. All manuscripts appear to derive for a source, now lost. Based on content and the pattern of divergence, Dumville dates its composition to 796 in Mercia, both the genealogies and the episcopal lists were part of this original compilation, and have passed in tandem, with the surviving manuscripts all several steps removed from this original. All the manuscripts include genealogies for the kingdoms of Deira, Bernicia, Mercia, Lindsey, Kent, three of them also contain a West Saxon genealogy, and regnal lists for Northumbria and Mercia. This may represent material omitted or lost from the rather than addition to the other three. The surviving manuscripts are listed below, in what is thought to be the chronological order of their composition. This is the oldest of the four surviving versions, and represents a branch of transmission than that leading to the other manuscripts. A single hand using Mercian script has recorded the genealogies and episcopal lists, the pages containing the Anglian collection have now been removed from their original volume and framed individually, and are catalogued as Vespasian B vi/1. The Parker version of the Anglian collection is part of a larger volume all written by the two scribes using an Anglo-Celtic hand, and including most notably Bedes Vita Sancti Cuthberti. This volume was composed in South West England, perhaps at Glastonbury and this identification would place its composition in Wessex in the period 934 ×937. Manuscript C, along with T and R have material not found in V and they all have Northumbrian and Mercian regnal lists and a pedigree for Wessex, all present well before the dates of the surviving manuscripts and perhaps in the original. The Mercia regnal list of C also contains two unique memoranda, the Anglian collecction version T forms part of a computational, geographical and astrological collection. The Wessex royal pedigree has been extended both more recently and earlier, giving a descent that traces the three sons of king Edgar back to Adam and it appears to have been added at Glastonbury before the manuscript went to Canterbury. The errors and other feature in T mark it as the source for a set of Anglo-Saxon genealogies that found their way to Iceland. The volume containing the R manuscript was composed at Rochester soon after 1122, though the same scribe wrote the entire codex, it appears to represent what were once two separate manuscripts, now bound together. The Anglian collection text is similar to that of T. The last shared updates between T and R seem to date from 990 at Canterbury, all the manuscripts include genealogies for the kingdoms of Deira, Bernicia, Mercia, Lindsey, Kent and East Anglia
34.
Pope Gregory I
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Pope Saint Gregory I, commonly known as Saint Gregory the Great, was pope of the Catholic Church from 3 September 590 to his death in 604. Gregory is famous for instigating the first recorded large-scale mission from Rome to convert a pagan people to Christianity, Gregory is also well known for his writings, which were more prolific than those of any of his predecessors as pope. He is also known as the Great Visionary of Modern Educational System, for his writings, the epithet Saint Gregory the Dialogist has been attached to him in Eastern Christianity because of his Dialogues. For this reason, English translations of Eastern texts will sometimes list him as Gregory Dialogos or the Latinized equivalent Dialogus. A senators son and himself the Prefect of Rome at 30, Gregory tried the monastery but soon returned to public life, ending his life. Although he was the first pope from a background, his prior political experiences may have helped him to be a talented administrator. Gregory regained papal authority in Spain and France, and sent missionaries to England, the realignment of barbarian allegiance to Rome from their Arian Christian alliances shaped medieval Europe. Gregory saw Franks, Lombards, and Visigoths align with Rome in religion, throughout the Middle Ages he was known as the Father of Christian Worship because of his exceptional efforts in revising the Roman worship of his day. His contributions to the development of the Divine Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts, Gregory is a Doctor of the Church and one of the Latin Fathers. He is considered a saint in the Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Anglican Communion, immediately after his death, Gregory was canonized by popular acclaim. The Protestant reformer John Calvin admired Gregory and declared in his Institutes that Gregory was the last good pope and he is the patron saint of musicians, singers, students, and teachers. The exact date of Gregorys birth is uncertain, but is estimated to be around the year 540. The medieval writer who provided this etymology did not hesitate to apply it to the life of Gregory, aelfric states, He was very diligent in Gods Commandments. Gregory was born into a wealthy patrician Roman family with connections to the church. Gregorys mother, Silvia, was well-born, and had a sister, Pateria. His mother and two aunts are honored by Catholic and Orthodox churches as saints. Gregorys great-great-grandfather had been Pope Felix III, the nominee of the Gothic king, Gregorys election to the throne of St Peter made his family the most distinguished clerical dynasty of the period. The family owned and resided in a villa suburbana on the Caelian Hill, the north of the street runs into the Colosseum, the south, the Circus Maximus
35.
Whitby Abbey
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Whitby Abbey is a ruined Benedictine abbey overlooking the North Sea on the East Cliff above Whitby in North Yorkshire, England. It was disestablished during the Dissolution of the Monasteries under the auspices of Henry VIII and it is a Grade I Listed building in the care of English Heritage and its site museum is housed in Cholmley House. The first monastery was founded in 657 AD by the Anglo-Saxon era King of Northumbria and he appointed Lady Hilda, abbess of Hartlepool Abbey and grand-niece of Edwin the first Christian king of Northumbria, as founding abbess. The name Streoneshalh is thought to signify Fort Bay or Tower Bay in reference to a supposed Roman settlement that existed on the site. This contention has never been proven though and alternative theories have been proposed, the double monastery of Celtic monks and nuns was home, to the great Northumbrian poet Cædmon. In 664 the Synod of Whitby - at which King Oswiu ruled that the Northumbrian church would adopt the Roman calculation of Easter, streoneshalch was laid waste by Danes in successive raids between 867 and 870 under Ingwar and Ubba and remained desolate for more than 200 years. The existence of Prestebi, meaning the habitation of priests in Old Norse, the old monastery given to Reinfrid comprised about 40 ruined monasteria vel oratoria similar to Irish monastic ruins with numerous chapels and cells. Reinfrid, a soldier of William the Conqueror, became a monk and travelled to Streoneshalh and he approached William de Percy who gave him the ruined monastery of St. Peter with two carucates of land, to found a new monastery. Serlo de Percy, the brother, joined Reinfrid at the new monastery which followed the Benedictine rule. The second monastery lasted until it was destroyed by Henry VIII in 1540 during the Dissolution of the Monasteries, though the abbey fell into ruin, it remained a prominent landmark for sailors and helped inspire Bram Stokers Dracula. The ruins are now owned and maintained by English Heritage, in December 1914, Whitby Abbey was shelled by German battlecruisers Von der Tann and Derfflinger who were aiming for the Coastguard Station on the end of the headland. Scarborough and Hartlepool were also attacked, the Abbey sustained considerable damage during the ten-minute attack. The BBC included before and after photographs as part of the First World War centenary, the first prior, Reinfrid, ruled for many years before being killed in an accident. He was buried at St Peter at Hackness and he was succeeded as prior by Serlo de Percy
36.
Angles
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The Angles were one of the main Germanic peoples who settled in Great Britain in the post-Roman period. They founded several of the kingdoms of Anglo-Saxon England, and their name is the root of the name England, the name comes from the district of Angeln, an area located on the Baltic shore of what is now Schleswig-Holstein. The name of the Angles may have been first recorded in Latinised form, as Anglii and it is thought to derive from the name of the area they originally inhabited, Angeln in modern German, Angel in Danish. This name has been hypothesised to originate from the Germanic root for narrow, meaning the Narrow, i. e. the Schlei estuary, the root would be angh, tight. Another theory is that the name meant hook, as in angling for fish, Julius Pokorny, Gregory the Great in an epistle simplified the Latinised name Anglii to Angli, the latter form developing into the preferred form of the word. The country remained Anglia in Latin, the earliest recorded mention of the Angles may be in chapter 40 of Tacituss Germania written around AD98. Tacitus describes the Anglii as one of the more remote Suebic tribes compared to the Semnones and Langobardi and he grouped the Angles with several other tribes in that region, the Reudigni, Aviones, Varini, Eudoses, Suarini and Nuitones. These were all living behind ramparts of rivers and woods and therefore inaccessible to attack, the Eudoses are the Jutes, these names probably refer to localities in Jutland or on the Baltic coast. The majority of scholars believe that the Anglii lived on the coasts of the Baltic Sea and these Suevi Angili would have been in Lower Saxony or near it, but they are not coastal. The three Suebic peoples are separated from the coastal Chauci, and Saxones, by a series of tribes including, Ptolemy describes the coast to the east of the Saxons as inhabited by the Farodini, a name not known from any other sources. Owing to the uncertainty of this passage, there has been speculation regarding the original home of the Anglii. The ethnic names of Frisians and Warines are also attested in these Saxon districts, a second possible solution is that these Angles of Ptolemy are not those of Schleswig at all. According to Julius Pokorny the Angri- in Angrivarii, the -angr in Hardanger and the Angl- in Anglii all come from the root meaning bend. In other words, the similarity of the names is strictly coincidental, on the other hand, Gudmund Schütte, in his analysis of Ptolemy, believes that the Angles have simply been moved by an error coming from Ptolemys use of imperfect sources. Bede states that the Anglii, before coming to Great Britain, dwelt in a land called Angulus, similar evidence is given by the Historia Brittonum. Danish tradition has preserved record of two governors of Schleswig, father and son, in their service, Frowinus and Wigo, from whom the royal family of Wessex claimed descent. During the 5th century, the Anglii invaded Great Britain, after which time their name does not recur on the continent except in the title of Suevi Angili. The Angles are the subject of a legend about Pope Gregory I, as the story would later be told by the Anglo-Saxon monk and historian Bede, Gregory was struck by the unusual appearance of the slaves and asked about their background
37.
Saxons
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The Saxons were a group of Germanic tribes first mentioned as living near the North Sea coast of what is now Germany, in the late Roman empire. They were soon mentioned as raiding and settling in many North Sea areas, as well as pushing south inland towards the Franks. Significant numbers settled in parts of Great Britain in the early Middle Ages. Many Saxons however remained in Germania, where they resisted the expanding Frankish Empire through the leadership of the semi-legendary Saxon hero, the Saxons earliest area of settlement is believed to have been Northern Albingia, an area approximately that of modern Holstein. This general area also included the probable homeland of the Angles, Saxons, along with the Angles and other continental Germanic tribes, participated in the Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain during and after the 5th century. The British-Celtic inhabitants of the isles tended to refer to all of these collectively as Saxons. It is unknown how many Saxons migrated from the Continent to Britain, the Saxons may have derived their name from seax, a kind of knife for which they were known. The seax has a symbolic impact in the English counties of Essex and Middlesex. Their names, along with those of Sussex and Wessex, contain a remnant of the word Saxon. The Elizabethan era play Edmund Ironside suggests the Saxon name derives from the Latin saxa, Their names discover what their natures are, More hard than stones, in the Celtic languages, the words designating English nationality derive from the Latin word Saxones. The most prominent example, a loanword in English, is the Scottish Gaelic Sassenach and it derives from the Scottish Gaelic Sasunnach meaning, originally, Saxon, from the Latin Saxones. Scots- or Scottish English-speakers in the 21st century usually use it as a term for an English person. The Oxford English Dictionary gives 1771 as the date of the earliest written use of the word in English. Sasanach, the Irish word for an Englishman, has the same derivation, as do the words used in Welsh to describe the English people, Cornish terms the English Sawsnek, from the same derivation. In the 16th century Cornish-speakers used the phrase Meea navidna cowza sawzneck to feign ignorance of the English language, England in Scottish Gaelic is Sasainn. Other examples include the Welsh Saesneg, Irish Sasana, Breton saoz, and Cornish Sowson, Sowsnek, the label Saxons was also applied to German settlers who migrated during the 13th century to southeastern Transylvania. From Transylvania, some Saxons migrated to neighbouring Moldavia, as the name of the town, Sas-cut, sascut is located in the part of Moldavia that is today part of Romania. The Finns and Estonians have changed their usage of the term Saxony over the centuries to denote now the country of Germany
38.
Jutes
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The Jutes, Iuti, or Iutæ were a Germanic people. According to Bede, the Jutes were one of the three most powerful Germanic peoples of their time in the Nordic Iron Age, the two being the Saxons and the Angles. The Jutes are believed to have originated from the Jutland Peninsula, in present times, the Jutlandic Peninsula consists of the mainland of Denmark and Southern Schleswig in Germany. North Frisia is also part of Germany, the Jutes invaded and settled in southern Britain in the late 4th century during the Age of Migrations, as part of a larger wave of Germanic settlement in the British Isles. Bede places the homeland of the Jutes on the side of the Angles relative to the Saxons. Tacitus portrays a people called the Eudoses living in the north of Jutland, the Jutes have also been identified with the Eotenas involved in the Frisian conflict with the Danes as described in the Finnesburg episode in the poem Beowulf. Others have interpreted the ēotenas as jotuns, meaning giants, or as a kenning for enemies, disagreeing with Bede, some historians identify the Jutes with the people called Eucii, who were evidently associated with the Saxons and dependents of the Franks in 536. The Eucii may have been identical to a tribe called the Euthiones. The Euthiones are mentioned in a poem by Venantius Fortunatus as being under the suzerainty of Chilperic I of the Franks. This identification would agree well with the location of the Jutes in Kent. Even if Jutes were present to the south of the Saxons in the Rhineland or near the Frisians, however, it is possible that the tribal names were confused in the above sources. In both Beowulf and Widsith, the Eotenas are clearly distinguished from the Geatas, there is also evidence that the Haestingas people who settled in the Hastings area of Sussex, in the 6th century, may also have been Jutish in origin. One recent scholar, Robin Bush, even argued that the Jutes of Hampshire, Bede clearly implies that this was so, in 686. However, Bushs theory has been the subject of debate amongst academics, including a counter-hypothesis, the culture of the Jutes of Kent shows more signs of Roman, Frankish, and Christian influence than that of the Angles or Saxons. The Quoit Brooch Style has been regarded as Jutish, from the 5th century
39.
Frisii
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The Frisii were among the migrating Germanic tribes that, following the breakup of Celtic Europe in the 4th century BC, settled along the North Sea. They came to control the area from roughly present-day Bremen to Brugge, in the 1st century BC, the Frisii halted a Roman advance and thus managed to maintain their independence. In the Germanic pre-Migration Period the Frisii and the related Chauci, Saxons, all of these peoples shared a common material culture, and so cannot be defined archaeologically. On the east they were bordered by the Ampsivarii who lived at the mouth of the Ems until AD58, at which time the Chauci expelled them. The Chauci to the east were eventually assimilated by their descendants the Saxons in the 3rd century. The lands of the Frisii were largely abandoned by c.400 due to Migration wars, climatic deterioration and they lay empty for one or two centuries, when changing environmental and political conditions made the region habitable again. At that time, settlers came to be known as Frisians repopulated the coastal regions. Medieval and later accounts of Frisians refer to these new Frisians rather than to the ancient Frisii, what little is known of the Frisii is provided by a few Roman accounts, most of them military. Pliny the Elder said their lands were forest-covered with tall trees growing up to the edge of the lakes and they lived by agriculture and raising cattle. In his Germania Tacitus would describe all the Germanic peoples of the region as having elected kings with limited powers, the people lived in spread-out settlements. Early Roman accounts of war and raiding do not mention the Frisii as participants, though the neighboring Canninefates, the earliest mention of the Frisii tells of Drusus 12 BC war against the Rhine Germans and the Chauci. The Romans did not attack them after devastating the lands of the Rhine Germans, the account says that the Frisii were won over, suggesting a Roman suzerainty was imposed. Accounts of wars therefore mention the Frisii on both sides of the conflict, though the actions of troops under treaty obligation were separate from the policies of the tribe. The Frisii were little more than occasional and incidental players in Roman accounts of history, as a consequence, references to them are disjoint and offer little useful information about them. When Drusus brought Roman forces through Frisii lands in 12 BC and won them over, by AD28 the Frisii had had enough. They hanged the Roman soldiers collecting the tax and forced the governor to flee to a Roman fort, the propraetor of Germania Inferior, Lucius Apronius, raised the siege and attacked the Frisii, but was defeated at the Battle of Baduhenna Wood after suffering heavy losses. For whatever reason, the Romans did not seek revenge and the matter was closed, the prestige of the Frisii among the neighboring Germanic tribes was raised considerably. After their experiences with the predatory Roman governor and Lucius Apronius, in AD47, a certain Gannascus of the Canninefates led the Frisii and the Chauci to rebel
40.
Bertha of Kent
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Saint Bertha or Saint Aldeberge was the queen of Kent whose influence led to the Christianization of Anglo-Saxon England. She was canonized as a saint for her role in its establishment during that period of English history, Bertha was a Frankish princess, the daughter of Charibert I and his wife Ingoberga, granddaughter of the reigning King Chlothar I and great-granddaughter of Clovis I and Saint Clotilde. Her father died in 567, her mother in 589, Bertha had been raised near Tours. Her marriage to pagan King Æthelberht of Kent was conditioned on her being allowed to practice her religion and she brought her chaplain, Liudhard, with her to England. Bertha restored a Christian church in Canterbury, which dated from Roman times and it was the private chapel of Queen Bertha before Augustine arrived from Rome. The present St Martins at Canterbury continues in the building as the oldest church in the English-speaking world and is part of the Canterbury World Heritage site. Augustine of Canterbury, whose Gregorian mission was sent by Pope Gregory I to preach the Gospel in England in 596, without her support, monastic settlements and the cathedral would likely have developed elsewhere. In 601, Pope Gregory addressed a letter to Bertha, in which he complimented her highly on her faith, Anglo-Saxon records indicate that Saint Bertha had two children, Eadbald of Kent, and Æthelburg of Kent. She is named in the genealogies of various of the accounts of the Kentish Royal Legend. The date of her death is disputed, the city of Canterbury celebrates Queen Bertha in many ways. The Bertha trail, consisting of 14 bronze plaques set in pavements, in 2006 bronze statues of Bertha and Ethelbert were installed on Lady Woottons Green as part of the Canterbury Commemoration Societys Ethelbert and Bertha project. There is a statue of Bertha inside St Martins church. Bertha 1 at Prosopography of Anglo-Saxon England
41.
Franks
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Some Franks raided Roman territory, while other Frankish tribes joined the Roman troops of Gaul. In later times, Franks became the rulers of the northern part of Roman Gaul. The Salian Franks lived on Roman-held soil between the Rhine, Scheldt, Meuse, and Somme rivers in what is now Northern France, Belgium, the kingdom was acknowledged by the Romans after 357 CE. Following the collapse of Rome in the West, the Frankish tribes were united under the Merovingians, who succeeded in conquering most of Gaul in the 6th century, which greatly increased their power. The Merovingian dynasty, descendants of the Salians, founded one of the Germanic monarchies that would absorb large parts of the Western Roman Empire, the Frankish state consolidated its hold over the majority of western Europe by the end of the 8th century, developing into the Carolingian Empire. This empire would gradually evolve into the state of France and the Holy Roman Empire, in the Middle Ages, the term Frank was used in the east as a synonym for western European, as the Franks were then rulers of most of Western Europe. The Franks in the east kept their Germanic language and became part of the Germans, Dutch, Flemings, the Franconian languages, which are called Frankisch in Dutch or Fränkisch in German, originated at least partly in the Old Frankish language of the Franks. Nowadays, the German and Dutch names for France are Frankreich and Frankrijk, respectively, the name Franci was originally socio-political. To the Romans, Celts, and Suebi, the Franks must have seemed alike, they looked the same and spoke the same language, so that Franci became the name by which the people were known. Within a few centuries it had eclipsed the names of the tribes, though the older names have survived in some place-names, such as Hesse. Following the precedents of Edward Gibbon and Jacob Grimm, the name of the Franks has been linked with the word frank in English and it has been suggested that the meaning of free was adopted because, after the conquest of Gaul, only Franks were free of taxation. It is traditionally assumed that Frank comes from the Germanic word for javelin, there is also another theory that suggests that Frank comes from the Latin word francisca meaning. Words in other Germanic languages meaning fierce, bold or insolent, eumenius addressed the Franks in the matter of the execution of Frankish prisoners in the circus at Trier by Constantine I in 306 and certain other measures, Ubi nunc est illa ferocia. Feroces was used often to describe the Franks, contemporary definitions of Frankish ethnicity vary both by period and point of view. According to their law and their custom, writing in 2009, Professor Christopher Wickham pointed out that the word Frankish quickly ceased to have an exclusive ethnic connotation. North of the River Loire everyone seems to have considered a Frank by the mid-7th century at the latest. Two early sources describe the origin of the Franks are a 7th-century work known as the Chronicle of Fredegar. Neither of these works are accepted by historians as trustworthy, compared with Gregory of Tourss Historia Francorum, the chronicle describes Priam as a Frankish king whose people migrated to Macedonia after the fall of Troy
42.
Charibert I
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Charibert I was the Merovingian King of Paris, the second-eldest son of Chlothar I and Ingund. His elder brother was Gunthar, who died sometime before their fathers death, in 556, Chlothar sent Charibert and his next youngest brother Gunthram against their stepmother Chunna and their younger stepbrother Chram who was in revolt. Chramn was hiding out on Black Mountain in the Limousin, negotiations failed and the two armies prepared for battle. A thunderstorm prevented any engagement and Chramn sent forged letters to his brothers, Charibert and Guntram immediately returned to Burgundy to secure their positions. After the actual death of Chlothar in 561, the Frankish kingdom was divided between his sons in a new configuration. Each son ruled a realm, which was not necessarily geographically coherent. Charibert received Neustria, Aquitaine, and Novempopulana with Paris as his capital and his chief cities were Rouen, Tours, Poitiers, Limoges, Bordeaux, Toulouse, Cahors, and Albi. Guntram received Burgundy, then Sigebert received Austrasia with his capital at Metz, Charibert married Ingoberga, of unknown parentage. By Merofleda, a daughter, and her sister Marcovefa, he had daughters. By Theodogilda, a daughter, Charibert had a son who died in infancy. His brutal behavior resulted in his excommunication, the first ever of a Merovingian king, Charibert was scarcely more than king at Paris when he married his daughter Bertha to Æthelberht, the pagan King of Kent. She took with her Bishop Liudhard as her private confessor and her influence in the Kentish court was instrumental in the success of St. Augustine of Canterburys mission in 597. Though Charibert was eloquent and learned in the law, he was one of the most dissolute of the early Merovingians and he was excommunicated, and his early death in 567 was brought on by his excesses. He was buried in Blavia castellum, a fort in the Tractatus Armoricani. At his death his brothers divided his realm between them, agreeing at first to hold Paris in common and his surviving queen, Theudechild, proposed a marriage with Guntram, though a council held at Paris in 557 had outlawed such matches as incestuous. Guntram decided to house her more safely, though unwillingly, in a nunnery at Arles, the main source for Chariberts life is Gregory of Tours History of the Franks, and from the English perspective Bedes Ecclesiastic History of the English People. Bachrach, Bernard S. Merovingian Military Organization, 481–751, minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press,1971. Historia Francorum Books I-IX at Medieval Sourcebook
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "East Anglia". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the 