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Roman Britain
In 55 B.C. Julius Caesar, then
general of the Roman armies in
Gaul, decided that it would be a
good move to try a little summer
invasion of Britain.
The Celts in Gaul had been receiving aid
from their close relations in southern
England. British Celts may even have
fought with related tribes in Gaul against
the Romans. Certainly J. C. complained
that defeated Gauls would slip away to
Britain to regroup. Tackling the British
Celts made sense in the battle to secure
Gaul for Rome.
Caesar's invasion proved successful
but inconclusive. Landing in present
day Kent, he did battle with several
tribes that summer, and did very well.
The following summer he returned for
more, easily defeating the first real
historical British figure we know of,
King Cassivellaunus
The British "kings" at this time
were really no more than tribal
chiefs. There was no such thing
as a unified "Britain", and there
was no such thing as a unified
Celtic army to meet the Roman
advance.
Julius Caesar left after two
summers fighting, exacting a
promise of tribute from the
defeated tribes,
One important social change that
occurred at this time was that kingship
became hereditary, rather than a post
awarded to the best war leader. This
change was to have disastrous
consequences; several princes fled to
Rome to appeal for help in succession
disputes. Rome was happy to use this as
a convenient excuse for invasion.
In 43 A.D. Claudius became Emperor of
Rome. Needing a victory to secure his
weak position, he decided to revive the
dream of expanding the Empire to the
British
Isles.
The
pretext
was
conveniently provided by Caratacus,
king of the Catavellauni tribe. Caratacus
invaded the territories of the Atrebates,
whose king, Verica, fled to Rome and
appealed for help. Claudius was happy
to
respond.
Four Roman legions landed in Kent in AD 43. The
two sons of Cymbeline attempted to hold them at
the Medway but were defeated. The Britons then
retreated beyond the Thames, at which point the
Romans called a halt in their pursuit.
A few weeks later the emperor Claudius reached
the southern bank of the Thames, in the region of
what is now London, with fresh troops and even a
few elephants. He then led the advance on
Caractacus' capital at Camulodunum, or
Colchester.
After the rapid defeat of Caractacus,
chieftain of the Belgae in southeast
Britain, other Celtic tribes quickly came to
terms with the Romans. Some accepted
defeat. But others, such as the Iceni in
East Anglia, already had friendly relations
with the Romans. Rome left such
chieftains in power, as allies.
The result was that in the short space
of four years the whole of southern
Britain was safely under Roman
control. In AD 47 Roman troops were
able to build a raised road, with a ditch
on either side, defining the northern
edge of this safe territory. Known as
the Fosse Way, it stretches from
Lincoln
to
south
Devon.
The plan at first was to limit the
conquest to the lowlands of
modern England, so a border was
established by 47 A.D. along the
route of the Fosse Way, the great
Roman road running from Exeter
to Lincoln. It was a nice idea, but
the Romans had little choice but
to deal the troublesome tribes.
Caratacus and his warriors were defeated
in a battle near Snowdonia in 51 A.D., and
Caratacus himself fled north to the territory
of the Brigantes. The Brigantian Queen,
Cartimandua, hopeful of staying on good
terms with the Romans and keeping her
own territories, promptly handed him over
to the invaders. He was sent to Rome and
publicly displayed as a prisoner.
In 60 A.D., while Roman troops were
busy in the final battle with the Druids
on Anglesey Island (Wales), trouble
arose in East Anglia. The Iceni tribe,
centred in the modern Norfolk, had
reached an accommodation with the
Romans, keeping their own territory in
exchange for not making a fuss.
The Iceni king, Prasutagas, decided
that it would be prudent to make his
will assigning half of his personal
property to the Roman emperor. When
he died the Roman officials decided to
interpret his will as a submission to the
Roman state, so they moved to
appropriate all of the Iceni lands and
disarm the tribe.
Prasutagas's widow, Boudicca (or
Boadicea as she is sometimes known)
protested. The Romans had her flogged
and her daughters were raped. This high
handed treatment of an ostensible ally
had predictable results. Queen Boudicca
raised the Iceni and the neighbouring
Trinivantes tribe in revolt against Roman
rule.
Boudicca's treatment of her
enemies was fierce and she must
have given the Romans a terrific
scare. One legion was so terrified
that they refused to move against
her. She was eventually defeated
at an unknown site by a much
smaller force of Roman troops.
The upshot of the Boudiccan revolt
was that Iceni territory was ravaged
and much of the province was put
under military rule. There is a
tendency to think of Boudicca as a
great patriotic leader of the British,
perhaps the first national heroine.
The first Roman capital of the new
province of Britannia was at Colchester.
It did not take the Romans long,
however, to realize the strategic
importance of the Thames river as a
communication and transport highway.
A small existing settlement was built up
to become a trade and administrative
centre. The Romans called it Londinium.
Today it is known as London.
Certain Celtic tribes, in return
for not being overrun, agreed to
ally themselves to Rome.
Treaties with tribes in the north
and in East Anglia created
buffers on the frontiers while
the
process
of
quelling
resistance
continued.
Part of this process took the form of
eradicating the Druids. By the
standards of their time the Romans
could be tolerant of the religions of
the
peoples
they
conquered.
However, the Druids represented not
just a religious hierarchy, but real
political and administrative authority
among the Celts.
And the Romans seemed to have been
genuinely
horrified
by
what
they
considered the grisly and uncivilized
practices of the Druids. In Gaul, Caesar
had recorded the druidic wicker giants
packed with men and set alight. The
Roman historian Tacitus accused the
Welsh Druids of “staining their altars with
the blood of prisoners and consulting their
gods by using human entrails”.
The Romans thought that they were
bringing the benefits of civilization to
the people they conquered. They saw
themselves as on a mission to expand
the Empire and bring the Roman way
of life to all the poor tribes bereft of its
benefits.
On the whole the Celtic chieftains of
Britain adapted willingly to Roman
customs and comforts. They learned to
live in villas, they spoke Latin, they
benefited from trading links with the
empire (British wheat and wool were
much in demand), and they became
Roman citizens. The tribal centres
developed into thriving Roman towns,
around the forum (market place) and
basilica (town hall).
Britannia had much in common
with other provinces of the empire.
It had its great villas, and it was
significant that one of the grandest
- a palace at Fishbourne with
superb mosaic floors, discovered
in 1960 - is believed to have
belonged not to a Roman governor
but to a Celtic chieftain.
Little progress was made in
pacifying Wales until the arrival in
Britain of Agricola. Agricola rapidly
succeeded in conquering the Welsh
tribes, even in Anglesey. To
consolidate his gains he stationed
the 20th legion in an encampment
on the river Dee. Castra Devana
('camp on the Dee') became one of
the
most
important
Roman
strongholds in Britain. Its modern
name, deriving from 'Castra', is
Chester.
In AD 78-9 Agricola brought the north of
England under Roman control. In 80 he
establishes a line of defensive outposts
across Scotland's narrowest point,
between the Clyde and the Forth. In the
following three years he pressed
steadily further north into the wilds of
Caledonia (the Roman word for
Scotland, from the name of its leading
tribe).
The Legacy of the Romans
The main Latin elements are still visible in
place names:
castra (-chester, -caster, -ceister) a Roman
town, fort
colonia (-coln) a settlement
porta (-port) a gate
portus (-port) a harbour
strata (Strat-, -street) a Roman Road
The calendar the British use today is
more than 2,000 years old. It was started
by Julius Caesar, a Roman ruler. It is
based on the movement of the earth
around the sun, and so is called the
'solar calendar.' The solar calendar has
365 days a year, and 366 days every leap
year, or every fourth year. The names of
our months are taken from the names of
Roman gods and rulers. The month 'July'
is named after Julius Caesar himself.
The old tribal settlements in Britain were
stragling, often temporary, enclosures of
wicker and timber that held fluctuating
numbers of people and cattle. Gradually
they
were
replaced
by
planned,
geometrically regular towns that were a
visible stamp of Roman organization and
power. The new Roman towns were not
just places to live, work and trade, but
symbols of the imperial ideals of unity
and stability. Many of these planned
towns still exist today.
Bathing was an essential social and
fitness activity for the members of the
Roman establishment and so large
bathing structures were quickly built
at military and administrative centres
such as Exeter and York. Gradually,
substantial bathing complexes also
arose
in
civilian
towns
The
monumental spa at Bath or Aqua Sulis
even became the centre of pilgrimages
because of the reputed healing powers
of its waters.
The Roman administration needed a network of
roads to connect its new towns and army posts and
to speed the flow of both trade goods and troops.
The most vital priority was the movement of troops
and supplies from the channel ports to the military
centres at London, Colchester, and the front-line
legionary forts. The first frontier was set up along a
road extending from Exeter to Lincoln, running
through Bath, Gloucester, and Leicester. This was
known as the Fosse Way, the first great Roman road
in Britain. The Fosse Way has been largely adapted
by modern highways.
The next military push established a new
frontier between Lincoln and York, Wroxeter
and Chester, and Gloucester and Caerleon.
After these "front-line" roads had been
established. The Romans turned their
attention to expanding the network of minor
roads within their new possessions, to better
aid the flow of trade.
How did the Romans build their
famous roads? The roads were
literally highways, raised up on a
cambered bank of material dug from
roadside ditches. In general there were
3 layers. The first layer of large stones
was covered by a second layer of
smaller stones, then a top layer of
gravel or small stones. Each layer
varied in depth from 2-12 inches.
Hadrian's Wall is a stone and
timber fortification built by the
Roman Empire across the width of
what is now northern England. It
was begun in AD 122, during the
rule of emperor Hadrian.
Opinions differ, but the growing consensus
is that the Wall was built as a readily
defended fortification which clearly defined
the northern frontier (lat. limes) of the
Roman Empire in Britain (Britannia). The
wall was the most heavily fortified border in
the Empire. In addition to its role as a
military fortification, it is thought that many
of the gates through the wall would have
served as customs posts to allow trade and
levy taxation.
Hadrian's Wall was 80 Roman miles (73.5
statute miles or 117 kilometres) long, its
width and height dependent on the
construction materials which were available
nearby. East of River Irthing the wall was
made from squared stone and measured
3 metres (9.7 ft) wide and five to six metres
(16–20 ft) high, while west of the river the
wall was made from turf and measured
6 metres (20 ft) wide and 3.5 metres (11.5 ft)
high.
Map showing the location of Hadrian's Wall
Hadrian's wall near Housesteads
Hadrian's Wall was built following a visit by
Roman Emperor Hadrian (AD 76–138) in
AD 122. Hadrian was experiencing military
difficulties in Roman Britain, so he was keen
to impose order. The construction of such an
impressive wall was, however, probably also
a symbol of Roman power, both in occupied
Britain and in Rome.
Although such defences would not have held
back any concerted invasion effort, they did
physically mark the edge of Roman territory
and went some way to providing a degree of
control over who crossed the border and
where. The wall was constructed primarily to
prevent entrance by small bands of raiders or
unwanted immigration from the north, not as a
fighting line for a major invasion. The wall
would have made cattle-raiding across the
frontier extremely difficult.
In the years after Hadrian's death in 138, the
new emperor, Antoninus Pius essentially
abandoned the wall, leaving it occupied in a
support role, and began building a new wall
called the Antonine Wall, about 160
kilometres (100 mi) north, in what later
became known as the Scottish Lowlands
through the short strip running West South
West to East North East from coast to coast
sometimes referred to as the Central Belt or
Central Lowlands. This turf wall ran 40
Roman miles (about 37.8 mi (60.8 km)) and
had significantly more forts than Hadrian's
Wall.
A significant portion of the wall still
exists, particularly the mid-section. It
is the most popular tourist attraction
in Northern England, where it is often
known simply as the Roman Wall. It
was made a UNESCO World Heritage
Site in 1987.
The history of Roman Britain ended in
the early 5th century AD.
ANGLO-SAXON BRITAIN
Anglo Saxon Invasion. The years
between the collapse of the Roman
government in Britain in the early
years of the fifth century and the
arrival of St Augustine at the end of
the sixth were a period of significant
change. The early Anglo-Saxons
invaded and settled Sub-Roman
Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries AD,
during the European "migration
period".
King Arthur is a legendary British
leader who, according to medieval
histories and romances, led the
defence of Britain against Saxon
invaders in the early sixth century. The
details of Arthur's story are mainly
composed of folklore and literary
invention, and his historical existence
is debated and disputed by modern
historians.
During the time of the Anglo-Saxon
invasion, the physical character of the
people
and
their
language
and
institutions were completely altered. A
Germanic people replaced the Celtic
British, or at least became a significant
part of the population of lowland Britain.
Germanic dialects replaced Latin or
Celtic and loose knit and feuding
hereditary kingships replaced the more
centrally governed Roman provinces.
The Celtic people used the name
"Saxon" generically to describe
all of the Germanic people they
met. While this likely indicates a
heavy proportion of Saxons in the
early raids and settlement, many
other tribes were involved.
Significantly, Britain came to be
called England after the Angles
rather than Saxons.
Descendants of three Germanic tribes:
•The Angles, who may have come from Angeln (in
modern Germany), and Bede wrote that their
whole nation came to Britain, leaving their former
land empty. The name 'England' (Anglo-Saxon
'Engla land' or 'Ængla land' originates from this
tribe.)
•The Saxons, from Lower Saxony (in modern
Germany; German: Niedersachsen)
•The Jutes, from the Jutland peninsula (in
modern Denmark)
The term "Anglo-Saxon" is from
writings going back to the time
of King Alfred the Great, who
seems to have frequently used
the title rex Anglorum Saxonum
or rex Angul-Saxonum (king of
the English Saxons).
Outside Anglophone countries, both
in Europe and in the rest of the
world, the term "Anglo-Saxon" and
its direct translations are used to
refer to the Anglophone peoples and
societies of Britain, the United
States, and other countries such as
Australia, Canada and New Zealand.
The Anglo-Saxon tribes were not
united before the 7th century, with
seven main kingdoms, known
collectively as the Anglo-Saxon
Heptarchy.
The term heptarchy arose on
the basis that the seven
kingdoms of Northumbria,
Mercia, Kent, East Anglia,
Essex, Sussex and Wessex
which were the main polities
of south Britain.
Germanic
pagan
society
was
structured hierarchically, under a tribal
chieftain or cyning ("king") who at the
same time acted as military leader,
high judge and high priest. The tribe
was bound together by a code of
customary proper behaviour or sidu
regulating the contracts (ǽ) and
conflicts between the
individual
families or sibbs within the tribe. The
aristocratic society arrayed below the
king included the ranks of ealdorman,
thegn, heah-gerefa and gerefa.
Anglo-Saxon Life. The richer lords lived on
estates, with a main rectangular hall surrounded
by outlying buildings for various living, working,
and storage purposes. Inside the hall a lord might
mark his prestige by expensive wall hangings or
even paintings. The hall was the scene of feasts
for the lord's followers, and a lord was expected
to be a lavish host.
Anglo-Saxon Administration. The land
was divided into shires, mainly
according to the territory of the first
tribes. The shire was divided into
hundreds. To look after the king's
interests (see that all the taxes were
collected) and administer justice,
were the ealdormen and shire-reeves
(sheriffs).
Anglo
Saxon
Religion.
The
indigenous
pre-Christian
belief
system of the Anglo-Saxons was a
form of Germanic paganism and
therefore closely related to the Old
Norse religion, as well as other
Germanic pre-Christian cultures.
The Anglo-Saxons worshipped gods
of nature and held springs, wells,
rocks, and trees in reverence.
Religion was not a source of
spiritual revelation, it was a
means of ensuring success in
material things. For example,
you might pray to a particular
goddess
for
a
successful
harvest, or for victory in battle.
Numerous elements of the pre-Christian culture
of the Anglo-Saxon people survive Examples
arethe English language names for days of the
week:
•Woden, the Anglo-Saxon equivalent of Odin,
Woden, the war god: Wednesday
•Þunor, the Anglo-Saxon equivalent of Thor, the
thunder godr: Thursday
•*Fríge, the Anglo-Saxon equivalent of Frigga,
the goddess of the home: Friday
•Tiw, the Anglo-Saxon equivalent of Tyr, the dark
god: Tuesday
Anglo-Saxon Burial
Anglo-Saxon Britain 600-900 AD
King Offa. Roughly speaking, the
7th century was the age of
Northumbrian ascendance, with
Mercia in second place. In the 8th
century these roles reversed. The
most powerful and well known of
the Mercian kings was Offa, who
ruled from 758-796.
The Danes. The Danes found rich
plunder in the undefended monastic
settlements on Lindisfarne Island and
Jarrow, in Northumbria, but they were
not out solely for plunder. The Danish
raids were partly a response to
population pressures in their homeland,
so they wanted new lands to settle.
Raids were evolving into permanent
Danish settlements; in 867, the Vikings
seized York and established their own
kingdom in the southern part of
Northumbria. The Vikings overcame two
other major Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, East
Anglia and Mercia, and their kings were
either tortured to death or fled.
In May 878, Alfred's army defeated the Danes
at the battle of Edington.
In 886, Alfred negotiated a partition treaty
with the Danes, in which a frontier was
demarcated along the Roman Watling Street
and northern and eastern England came
under the jurisdiction of the Danes - an area
known as 'Danelaw'.
Alfred ‘The Great’ (reigned 871-899)
Alfred's triumph. Alfred came out of the
Athelney marshes and surprised the Danes
under Guthrum at Edington, in Wiltshire.
After a thorough victory for Alfred,
Guthrum was chased back to his base at
Chippenham, where he was besieged for
two
weeks.
Eventually
Guthrum
surrendered, and agreed to retreat from
Wessex. In Somerset, some weeks later,
giving what is known as the Peace of
Wedmore. The Danes retreated to East
Anglia,
and
Alfred
got
on
with
consolidating his gains.
Alfred began a policy encouraging the
formation of fortified towns, or burhs,
throughout his lands. In exchange for free
plots of land within the towns, settlers
provided a defense force. The burhs were
also encouraged to become centres of
commerce and local government. To
maintain the burhs, and the standing army,
he set up a taxation system.
Alfred wrested London from Danish
control and reached the agreement
by which England was divided into
two zones; the south and west,
where Saxon law would apply, and
the north and east, where Danish
law ruled. This second territory
became known as the Danelaw.
Alfred's Legacy. Alfred's concept of
kingship
extended
beyond
the
administration of the tribal kingdom of
Wessex into a broader context. A religiously
devout and pragmatic man who learnt Latin
in his late thirties, he recognised that the
general deterioration in learning and
religion caused by the Vikings' destruction
of monasteries (the centres of the
rudimentary
education
network)
had
serious implications for rulership.
To
improve
literacy,
Alfred
arranged, and took part in, the
translation (by scholars from
Mercia) from Latin into Anglo-Saxon
of a handful of books he thought it
'most needful for men to know, and
to bring it to pass ... if we have the
peace, that all the youth now in
England ... may be devoted to
learning'.
Alfred is remembered as a literate
king, he or his court commissioned
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, these were
written in Old English, rather than
in Latin (as with other European
annals).
The
Anglo-Saxon
Chronicle (which was copied and
supplemented up to 1154) is a
patriotic history of the English .
Like other West Saxon kings,
Alfred established a legal code; he
assembled the laws of Offa and
other predecessors, and of the
kingdoms of Mercia and Kent,
adding his own administrative
regulations to form a definitive
body of Anglo-Saxon law.
By stopping the Viking advance
and consolidating his territorial
gains, Alfred had started the
process by which his successors
eventually extended their power
over the other Anglo-Saxon kings;
the ultimate unification of AngloSaxon England was to be led by
Wessex.
From the depths of despair in 877, Alfred
brought Anglo-Saxon England into a golden
age of social stability and artistic
accomplishment. He was one of the first
kings who seems to have looked beyond his
own personal glory to a vision of the future
well-being of the nation he ruled. He has
every right to be remembered as Alfred "The
Great".
Language. Old English, sometimes called
Anglo-Saxon, was the language spoken under
Alfred the Great and continued to be the
common language of England until after the
Norman Conquest of 1066 when, under the
influence of the Anglo-Norman language
spoken by the Norman ruling class, it changed
into Middle English roughly between 1150–
1500.
Beowulf is an Old English heroic epic
poem of unknown authorship, dating as
recorded
in
the
Nowell
Codex
manuscript from between the 8th and
the early 11th century, set in Denmark
and Sweden. Commonly cited as one of
the most important works of AngloSaxon literature, Beowulf has been the
subject of much scholarly study,
theory, speculation, discourse, and, at
3182 lines, has been noted for its
length.
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is a collection
of annals in Old English chronicling the
history of the Anglo-Saxons. The annals
were initially created late in the 9th
century, probably in Wessex, during the
reign of Alfred the Great. Multiple
manuscript copies were made and
distributed
to
monasteries
across
England
and
were
independently
updated. In one case, the chronicle was
still being actively updated in 1154.
From Alfred to the Norman
Conquest (899-1066)
On Alfred's death in 899 AD his
son Edward the Elder, succeeded
him. Alfred's son Edward and
grandsons Æthelstan, Edmund I
and Eadred continued the policy
of resistance against the Vikings.
By the 980s the kings of Wessex had a
powerful grip on the coinage of the realm.
The system controlling the currency
around the country was extremely
sophisticated, this enabled the king to
raise large sums of money if needed The
ability to raise large sums of money was
needed after the battle of Maldon, as
Æthelred decided rather than fight, he
would pay ransom to the Danes in a
system known as Danegeld
In 1015 Cnut launched a new
campaign
against
England.
Edmund, fell out with his father
Æthelred and struck out on his own.
Some of the English leaders
decided to support Cnut rather than
Æthelred, so ultimately Æthelred,
reconciled with Edmund retreated to
London. Before there was an
engagement with the Danish army,
Æthelred died and was replaced by
Edmund as king.
The Danish army encircled and besieged
London, however Edmund was able to
escape and raise an army of loyalists.
Edmund’s army routed the Danes, but the
success was short-lived, as at the battle of
Ashingdon, the Danes were victorious and
a lot of the English leaders were killed.
However Cnut and Edmund agreed to split
the kingdom in two, with Edmund ruling
Wessex and Cnut the rest. The following
year (1017 AD) Edmund died in mysterious
circumstances and the English council
(witan) confirmed Cnut king of all England.
ANGLO-SAXON CHRISTIANITY
Christianity first arrived in the north-east of
England during the Roman period. The
religion was illegal until 312 AD, when the
Roman Emperor Constantine became a
Christian. The early Christian author
Tertullian, in the third century, wrote that
"Christianity could even be found in Britain."
The Roman Emperor Constantine (306-337
AD), granted official tolerance to Christianity
with the Edict of Milan in 313 AD. Then in the
reign of Emperor Theodosius "the Great"
(378-395 AD), Christianity was made the
official religion of the Roman Empire.
In the north-east
of England
Christianity appears to have been
most common on military sites. A
tombstone on Hadrian’s Wall may
have belonged to a Christian.
Christianity came to the pagan
Anglo-Saxons
from
two
directions. The Celtic Church,
pushed back into Wales,
Cornwall,
and
particularly
Ireland, made inroads in the
north from an early base on
Lindisfarne Island.
The Irish Sea acted as a centre from
which a new culture developed among
the Celtic peoples, and Christianity
acted centrally in this process. What
emerged, religiously, was a form of
Insular Christianity, with certain distinct
traditions and practices. The religion
spread to Ireland at this time, though the
island had never been part of the Roman
Empire,
establishing
a
unique
organization around monasteries.
Celtic Christianity
The highly successful 5th century
mission to Ireland of Saint Patrick (the
"Apostle to the Irish") very small
enclosures where a group of Christians
(often of both sexes, and including the
married), committed to service in
various roles lived together and
ministered to the population of a tribal
territory or "kingdom".
A
Christian
Ireland
set
about
evangelising the rest of the British Isles
so Columba was sent to found the
religious community in Iona, off the west
coast of Scotland. Then Aidan was sent
from Iona to set up his church in
Northumbria at Lindisfarne between
635- 651 AD. Thus Northumbria was
converted by the the Celtic (Irish)
church.
Roman Christianity
Æthelberht of Kent's wife Bertha,
daughter of Charibert, one of the
Merovingian kings of the Franks, had
brought a chaplain (Liudhard) with her.
Bertha had restored a church from
Roman times to the east of Canterbury
and dedicated it to Saint Martin of
Tours, the patronal saint for the
Merovingian royal family.
Æthelberht permitted the missionaries
to settle and preach in his town of
Canterbury. By the end of the year he
himself had converted, and Augustine
received consecration as a bishop at
Arles. At Christmas 10,000 of the
king's subjects underwent baptism.
Oswald - King and Saint
Oswald took the throne. He had
grown up in exile in Scotland, an area
that was more firmly Christian and
had been converted by monks from
Ireland. He defeated a Welsh army in
a battle at Heaven Fields, where as a
sign of his Christianity he put up a
large wooden cross before the battle.
Perhaps copying the island site of
Iona, he created a monastery for this
new bishop on the Island of
Lindisfarne. It was also close to
Oswald’s main palace at Bamburgh.
Lindisfarne
became
the
most
important
monastery
in
Northumberland, and many important
monks and priests were connected to
it.
In the years after the foundation of
the abbey at Lindisfarne, the kings
of Northumberland and important
nobles gave the church land and
several other monasteries were
established. Churches were also
built at important royal sites.
The Golden Age of
Northumbria
Lindisfarne was particularly known
for its production of beautifully
illustrated books. The best known
of these are the Durham Gospels
and the Lindisfarne Gospels.
However, the Golden Age of
Northumberland came to an end with
the beginning of Viking raids from
the late eighth century. Some of the
most
important
monasteries
vulnerable by attack by these seaborn raiders. The monastery of
Lindisfarne was removed entirely to
Norham to avoid Viking aggression.
It eventually moved again and was
re-sited at Chester-le-Street in the
late ninth century.
The transition of the Anglo-Saxons from
paganism to Christianity took place
gradually, over the course of the 7th
century, influenced on one side by
Celtic Christianity and the Irish mission,
on the other by Roman Catholicism. The
Anglo-Saxon nobility were nearly all
converted within a century, but
paganism among the rural population,
as in other Germanic lands, did not so
much die out as gradually blend into
folklore.
As elsewhere, Christianization in
Britain involved the adoption of
pagan folk culture into a Christian
context, including the conversion of
sacrificial sites and pagan feast
days.
The Celtic church was ascetic, fervent,
based on monastic life, and more loosely
organized. The Roman church was more
conscious of structure, discipline, and
moderation. They also celebrated Easter
on different days.
The church was a very important force
in society; the only truly national entity
tying together the different Anglo-Saxon
kingdoms. The early monasteries of
Northumberland were vital centres of
learning and the arts until they were
scourged by the Viking raids of the 9th
century.
The best-preserved example of an
Anglo-Saxon church can be seen at
Escomb, where the church is little
altered since it was built in the
seventh or eighth century.
The Venerable Bede. Anglo-Saxon
England's most famous writer, the
monk Bede, lived most of his life at the
monastery of Jarrow, in Northumbria.
Nearby, the monastery of Lindisfarne
is famous for its glorious illustrated
bible, an 8th century masterpiece of
Celtic- inspired art, which is now in the
British Library.
Church education. Churches were
almost the only forum for education.
Under the auspices of Alfred the Great
church schools were encouraged, and
many Latin works were translated into
English.
Synod of Whitby (664)
There was friction between the
followers of the Roman rites and the
Irish rites, particularly over the date
when Easter fell and the way monks
cut their hair. Due to the differences in
calculating the date of Easter, this
Christian feast was observed on
different
days
by
the
two
denominations.
So in 664 AD a
conference was held at Whitby Abbey
(known as the Whitby Synod)
The spokesman of the dominant
faction was St. Wilfrid, who had been
much impressed by the power and
lavish life style of the Roman Church in
comparison with the austerity and
subservience to local rulers of the
Celtic Church. Using subsidiary
arguments about Easter and the
tonsure, Wilfrid established the model
of the Church as not ultimately
answerable to the local king but to the
Archbishop and to the Pope.
Wilfrid's argument won the
day and Coleman and his
party returned to Ireland in
their bitter disappointment.
And so the Roman rites
were adopted by the English
church.
Importance of the early medieval
Church. Since the Church enjoyed an
almost complete monopoly on literacy
at this period, it undertook many more
functions than we would expect today.
The Church functioned as a civil
service, drafting legal documents, the
education and social services.
The Exchequer was run by the Church.
On occasion Bishops would even
provide military and political leadership.
Trial by ordeal was carried out by
monks. The Church had a priest in every
village, which also enabled them to
function as a mass medium. The Church
was a huge landowner in its own right.