From the Fury of the Northmen,
Good Lord Deliver Us[1]
Micah CarlsonMiddle English News
The 9th century was not a very happy time for those Anglo-Saxons inhabiting the island we call England. For starters, their old neighbors (and probably relatives) from Denmark and the Scandinavian peninsula had decided (as the Anglo-Saxons themselves had decided about 350 years prior) that England looked like a nice place to settle. Unfortunately, these Vikings, as they are often called, did not want to share (again, very much like the Anglo-Saxons of three centuries before). In CE 850 a Danish fleet of 350 ships descended upon the English island and began a campaign of “widespread plundering in all parts of the country...” (Baugh & Cable 92). The savagery of these Viking hordes was nonpareil. By 874 they had killed most of the English kings, turning at least two of them (the kings of East Anglia and Northumbria) into the much-feared blood eagle. Michael Carr explains “this grisly ritual” in graphic detail as he illustrates that “pagan priests would hold down the still-living victim, cut him open and spread the ribs and lungs like the wings of an eagle as a sacrifice to the chief Norse god, Odin.” (62).
The one English kingdom that the Vikings were unable to fully destroy was Wessex. Wessex was ruled by king Alfred, later known as “Alfred the Great”, who inherited the throne in CE 871 when his king and elder brother Aethelred died. Although Alfred's father and grandfather had spent their lives expanding the influence of Wessex across England, the second half of Alfred's lifetime was spent “less on the expansion than the survival of Wessex because of the increasingly dangerous attacks” of the Vikings (Foster 48). Alfred had fought alongside his older brother Aethelred as his first lieutenant, and although they managed to fight the Danes valiantly—even winning a very important battle at Ashdown—they did not succeed in keeping the Viking horde out of Wessex.
The Danes had quietly marched into the heart of Wessex, setting up a strong fortification just 14 miles from Reading. Before Aethelred and Alfred were able to intercept this scheme, the Vikings had already entrenched themselves into the terrain in a defensive position. Aethelred tried to attack this fortification in order to depose these invaders, but the Vikings won easily and the Wessex army was badly wounded. After another Viking victory at Meretum “word reached the West Saxons that a second Danish army had arrived from Europe and was refortifying Reading. At that critical juncture, King Aethelred died, leaving the throne to his brother...Alfred, then just 21.” (Carr 65).
Not only were there now two Viking armies roaming the countryside near Wessex, but Alfred also had to contend with Aethelred's two sons over the royal succession, fight to unite a battered and disheartened Wessex army, and all the while struggle “against a lingering illness contracted at his wedding in 868.” (Carr 65). After what must have been no small amount of consideration, Alfred decided to take up the throne in spite of the sea of troubles that threatened to engulf him. Foster tells us that “One of Alfred's first acts as king was to buy his enemies' departure” (48). While the Vikings did agree to leave Wessex alone for a time (and for a fee), Alfred knew the agreement would not last and set out immediately to rebuild towns, entrench fortifications, and raise a new army.
The Danes did return, after laying waste to, or otherwise conquering, the other three most powerful kingdoms of England (East Anglia, Northumbria, and Mercia). The only Old English-speaking kingdom which had not been destroyed or conquered was Wessex: the kingdom to which the greedy eyes of the Vikings would now return. A group of Vikings again infiltrated Wessex in late 875 CE and entrenched themselves in Dorsetshire. Over the next few years more Viking hordes had infiltrated Wessex, shattering the kingdom and completely subjecting it to Danish rule. Alfred escaped, however, and “hid in the Somerset marshes with a few loyal men, a fugitive in his own realm.” (Carr 67). The English language held on to survival by a hair, and that hair was a deposed king with some honorable peasants in a swamp.
Unbeknown to the Danes Alfred fortified the Somerset marshes by building strongholds between the Parret and Tone rivers, using the natural barrier of the rivers to his advantage. He built a bridge which allowed his men to access quickly the forests beyond in order to hunt for food. He used the local Wessex farmers to keep tabs on the movement of Viking armies, and he is even alleged to have entered the Danish camp himself in order to spy on their army, entering and leaving without even being noticed by the Vikings (Carr 67). Alfred hid out in these marshes for one winter, building up his forces and fortifying his position, and in the spring of 878, he was ready for action.
During this spring, Alfred marched on a Viking camp at Edington, beating the Danes back 15 miles, all the way to their fortification at Chippenham, where he besieged the fortress until the Danes were forced to make a decision: they could starve to death at Chippenham or they could agree to sign a treaty with Wessex. The Vikings chose the treaty. This treaty, known as the Treaty of Wedmore, divided the English island in two: “To the East, between the Rivers Thames and Tees, lay Danish territory known as the Danelaw. The remaining Anglo-Saxon kingdoms unified under King Alfred.” (British Heritage 65). Alfred had succeeded in what may rightly be called the greatest military comeback in English history while, at the same time, unifying England into a single nation.
In the history of the English language King Alfred is often reputed as the man who first chartered the creation of an Old-English alphabet, translated many great works of literature into Old-English, and began the first quasi-annual historical record of England: the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Of course, all of this is true. However, it would be a shame to forget, in this ocean of obvious influence that King Alfred had on the English language, this one small fact: “More than any other single individual, Alfred created the country we know as England.” (British Heritage 65). The nation that we call England was, at one time, reduced to a fugitive king and his closest associates hiding out in a swamp. Had that king been found, had Alfred been turned into just one more blood-eagle, the English language would surely not exist as we speak it today, perhaps not at all.