Saxon Invasion

The Saxons were a confederation of Germanic tribes on the North German Plain. They settled in large parts of Great Britain in the early Middle Ages and formed part of the merged group of Anglo-Saxons who eventually organised the first united Kingdom of England. Many Saxons however remained in Germany, where they resisted the expanding Frankish Empire through the leadership of the semi-legendary Saxon hero, Widukind.

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 these groups collectively as Saxons. It is unknown how many Saxons migrated from the continent to Britain, though estimates for the total number of Anglo-Saxon settlers are around 200,000. During the Middle Ages, because of international Hanseatic trading routes and contingent migration, Saxons mixed with and had strong influences upon the languages and cultures of the North Germanic, Baltic peoples, Finnic peoples, Polabian Slavs and Pomeranian West Slavic people.

Saxons, along with Angles, Frisians and Jutes, invaded or migrated to the island of Great Britain (Britannia) around the time of the collapse of Roman authority in the west. Saxon raiders had been harassing the eastern and southern shores of Britannia for centuries before, prompting the construction of a string of coastal forts called the Litora Saxonica or Saxon Shore. Before the end of Roman rule in Britannia, many Saxons and other folk had been permitted to settle in these areas as farmers.

Saxon Wars

The Saxon Wars were the campaigns and insurrections of the more than thirty years from 772, when Charlemagne first entered Saxony with the intent to conquer, to 804, when the last rebellion of disaffected tribesmen was crushed. After a bloody struggle that lasted thirty years (772-804), the Saxons were finally brought under Frankish supremacy by the great Frankish ruler, Charlemagne. The earliest date at which it can be proved that Charlemagne had the conquest of the Saxon districts in view is 776. Charlemagne was also able to win them to Christianity, the Saxons being the last German tribe that still held persistently to belief in the Germanic gods. At different times the Saxon wars of Charlemagne have been called "religious wars."

In all, eighteen battles were fought in what is now northwestern Germany. They resulted in the incorporation of Saxony into the Frankish realm and their conversion from Germanic paganism to Germanic Christianity.The period of Anglo-Saxon warfare spans the 5th Century AD to the 11th in England. Its technology and tactics resemble those of other European cultural areas of the Early Middle Ages, although the Anglo-Saxons, unlike the Continental Germanic tribes such as the Franks and the Goths, do not appear to have regularly fought on horseback.

The Saxons were divided into four subgroups in four regions. Nearest to the ancient Frankish kingdom of Austrasia was Westphalia, and farthest away was Eastphalia. In between these two kingdoms was that of Engria (or Engern) and north of these three, at the base of the Jutland peninsula, was Nordalbingia.

Anglo-Saxon Period

The Anglo-Saxon period includes the creation of an English nation, with many of the aspects that survive today including regional government of shires and hundreds; the re-establishment of Christianity; a flowering in literature and language; and the establishment of charters and law.The term Anglo-Saxon is also popularly used for the language, in scholarly use more usually called Old English, that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons in England and eastern Scotland between at least the mid-5th century and the mid-12th century.

The history of the Anglo-Saxons is the history of a cultural identity, and how this developed from divergent groups, grew with the adoption of Christianity, was used in the establishment of various kingdoms, and, in the face of a threat from Danish settlers, re-established itself as one identity until after the Norman Conquest

Anglo-Saxon kingship had its origins in war-leadership. Anglo-Saxon leaders, some of whom may well have had forefathers who had been brought to Britain to provide military protection for the Romano-British, were able to seize the initiative and to establish kingdoms for themselves and their successors.

The Viking and Saxon Invasion was manipulated by off planet forces to remove the remaining inhabitants of Britain that had knowledge about Atlantian history and the Atlantian Cataclysm, these war campaigns were used to either kill off the DNA bloodlines or drive out those human beings that had retained Templar knowledge of the earth.

Slave/Serf Society

The main division in Anglo-Saxon society was between slave and free. Both groups were hierarchically structured, with several classes of freemen and many types of slaves. These varied at different times and in different areas, but the most prominent ranks within free society were the king, the nobleman or thegn, and the ordinary freeman or ceorl. They were differentiated primarily by the value of their wergild or 'man price', which was not only the amount payable in compensation for homicide, but was also used as the basis for other legal formulations such as the value of the oath that they could swear in a court of law. Slaves had no wergild (man price), as offences against them were taken to be offences against their owners, but the earliest laws set out a detailed scale of penalties depending both on the type of slave and the rank of owner.

Viking Raids

The wealth of the monasteries and the success of Anglo-Saxon society attracted the attention of people from continental Europe, mostly Danes and Norwegians. Due to the plundering raids that followed, the raiders attracted the name Viking – from the Old Norse víkingr meaning an expedition – which soon became used for the raiding activity or piracy reported in western Europe In 793, Lindisfarne was raided and while this was not the first raid of its type it was the most prominent. A year later Jarrow, the monastery where Bede wrote, was attacked; in 795 Iona; and in 804 the nunnery at Lyminge Kent was granted refuge inside the walls of Canterbury. Sometime around 800, a Reeve from Portland in Wessex was killed when he mistook some raiders for ordinary traders.

Viking raids continued until in 850, then the Chronicle says: "The heathen for the first time remained over the winter". The fleet does not appear to have stayed long in England, but it started a trend which others subsequently followed. In particular, the army which arrived in 865 remained over many winters, and part of it later settled what became known as the Danelaw. This was the "Great Army", a term used by the Chronicle in England and by Adrevald of Fleury on the Continent. The invaders were able not only to exploit the feuds between and within the various kingdoms, but to appoint puppet kings, Ceolwulf in Mercia in 873, 'a foolish king's thane' (ASC), and perhaps others in Northumbria in 867 and East Anglia in 870. The third phase was an era of settlement, however the 'Great Army' went wherever it could find the richest pickings, crossing the Channel when faced with resolute opposition, as in England in 878, or with famine, as on the Continent in 892. By this stage the Vikings were assuming ever increasing importance as catalysts of social and political change. They constituted the common enemy, making the English the more conscious of a national identity which overrode deeper distinctions; they could be perceived as an instrument of divine punishment for the people's sins, raising awareness of a collective Christian identity; and by 'conquering' the kingdoms of the East Angles, the Northumbrians and the Mercians they created a vacuum in the leadership of the English people.

Cornwall

In 722, according to the Welsh Annals the Cornish gained a victory at the Battle of Hehil. The battle was probably against the neighbouring Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Wessex led by King Ine. The battle may have been in the Camel estuary area, perhaps near modern day Padstow. This battle, plus the continual harrying of Wessex, by their Danish allies, allowed the Cornish to remain independent for the next hundred years with their eastern border on the River Exe-River Taw line until 838. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle reported that heathen men (the Danes) raided Charmouth, Dorset in 833 AD, then in 997 AD they destroyed the Dartmoor town of Lydford, and from 1001 AD to 1003 AD they occupied the old Roman city of Exeter. The Cornish were subjugated by Æthelstan and the border finally set at the River Tamar in 936. However, the Cornish remained semi-autonomous until their annexation into England after the Norman Conquest.

Timeline of Conflict

The Timeline of conflict in Anglo-Saxon Britain is concerned with the period of history from just before the departure of the Roman Army, in the 4th century, to just after the Norman Conquest in the 11th century. Constructing a chronology of the early Anglo-Saxon period, and how the Anglo-Saxons took over land in Britain from Celtic-speaking or Latin-speaking Romano-Britons, is highly complex. An outline of some events recorded in Bede's Ecclesiastical History, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the Welsh Annals (Annales Cambriae), and Brut y Tywysogion is listed here:

HGS Manual

Sachon Invasion is listed in the HGS Manual under the Fragments clearing under Fragment Influences (RRO) Historical Timeline Trigger Events.

See Also

Galactic Wars

Law of One