HahahaHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
I have to write about the angle and saxon invasions in England, but first, I have to know who really were the angles and saxons!
The things I know are that they were germanic tribes... but from were! Were they germanic people that came directly from continental Europe (Germany) to England, or they went from Germany to Iceland and Norway (vikings), and THEN came to Great Britain? Were the foundators of the Heptarchy of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms from the North, or from the West? Or the Norse people came to Britain after the foundation, and started raiding and invading?
*SIGHT* please people!
Oooookay. Let's see if I can remember all this. The Vikings came later. The Germanic invasions began during the Roman occupation of Britain, but really took hold when King Vortigen invited the Germanic leaders Cedric and his brother, whose name I cannot remember, to help him in a war. they helped, then kicked him out, and took over the place.
Actually, I found much clearier this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/anglosaxons/invasion/index.shtml . And the conclusion would be, according to it, that they came form BOTH northern Germany and Scandinavia, divided into the tribes of Angles, Saxons, a few Jutes... (from which place each of them came I just don't wanna tell...), and later, during Viking Age, came from the north pagan invaders and attacked places like Lindisfarne, Ireland (I think)
Yeah, the first Viking appearance in modern-day Britian that I can recall was at the abbey in Lindisfarne. As I recall, that would be the part in the Anglo-Saxon chronicle....
...erm...
"In those days [during the rule of King Beorthric, an Anglo-Saxon king], three ships came for the first time.... Those were the first ships of Danish Men that came to the land of the Anglish"
By the way, as I recall, the Saxons weren't only a particular Germanic tribe. The Saxons were warriors who carried Saex, a type of knife. So there could be Anglo-Saxons, Jute-Saxons, and Saxon-Saxons. You might want to double check the accuracy on that one. I know that at some point the term was used to refer to anyone who carried a seax, but I don't know if that was always the case. It should have info on that in the second of the two books I link two a little later in this post.
Vikings came along a LONG time later. I'm going to be going home over the weekend, and I can grab my books with the info you'll want.
As it is, if you want info on the initial invasions, I'd suggest trying to get ahold of these two books -- preferably from a library, so you don;t have to deal with that insane cost -- and checking out the first few chapters in each:
Anglo-Saxon EnglandThe Stories of EnglishThe first one is a massive history of Anglo-Saxon England; the second is a history of the English languages. There's some really useful info in the Germanic invasions in the second one, and it's got a unique approach to the history, because it's all from a linguistic viewpoint. If you can find a copy of The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, (translated, of course, from the original Old English) that might have some useful stuff in the early bits, but I don't know.
Anyway, the first book of those two links has some excellent information on the invasions and the reasons for them. Agricultural, population density, historical momentum, et cetera. Since the Germanic people migrated out of the East, they were kinda on a roll.
As for the mythology... heh heh.
Pretty similar to the Norse. Different names (Wotan/Othinn; Donner/Thor, etc) but as I understand, it was basically the same thing as the early Norse myth. I actually know a lot less about AS-specific mythology than I would like. The Church sorta wiped a lot of that stuff out. Ironic that, in a lot of ways, it was the Church that saved the Old Norse mythologies....
If you need more info beyond just the invasions, you can get a great overview of some of the Anglo-Saxon literature, poetry, philosophy, et cetera in this book:
Poems and Prose from the Old English. I managed to find a used copy for a lot less than the Amazon price, so....
Thinking.
Another great source to check out would be the book
Old Norse poems; the most important non-skaldic verse not included in the Poetic Edda. It's not directly related in subject matter, but the introduction of the book has some very relevant material when it addressees The Migration of Nations. Very vivid images of the times which resulted in the Germanic Invasions. Of course, he's talking more about the effect it had on Viking literature in the future, but the point remains: a time "when nations rose and fell overnight," if I remember the quote correctly. Very powerful language there, if you want a few source quotes in your writing. Excellent for
describing the causes of the invasions once you've established what those causes were. Depending on how in-depth your paper is, of course....
I'll try to remember to grab my books when I go home, and post more info for you Monday. Good luck!
Topic: History help needed! (Read 1800 times)
