Impact of Vikings on Life in Box Alan Payne and Jonathan Parkhouse, June 2021
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We have seen how Scandinavian incursion disrupted life in England after AD 793. Initially, the attacks affected coastal communities, then areas where the Vikings settled, particularly in the north of England.
This article looks at Viking influence in our area. People in Box were greatly affected after AD 1000 when regional levies and higher taxation local community were required for defence and to pay tributes to assuage Viking demands. But we have also seen that there were were no sharp divisions between Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian ethnicities. As Viking settlement became more common, our English language and culture absorbed new ideas from the North Sea cultures. Right: King Æthelred_-_MS_Royal_14_B_VI (courtesy Wikipedia) |
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Under Viking Attack
A prolonged wave of Viking attacks on Saxon England started soon after the year 980, some of which encroached into the heart of Wiltshire and Somerset. We might imagine that local people joined together ready to defend their homes. At times, large Wiltshire estates appear to have been taken into direct royal ownership and, at others, granted by the king to one of his loyal supporters in 1000s, who became ealdormen and earls, such as Athelstan Half King and Ælfhere of Mercia in the 1000s.[1]
The main Viking attacks came mostly by sea and river incursion. More ships were needed to defend England and in 1003 Archbishop Ælfric left a ship for the people of Wilshire (and another for Kent) in his will. The St Brice’s Day Massacre of Danes in Oxford in 1003 provoked further attack by Sweyn of Denmark, seeking to avenge his sister’s death. Sweyn captured Exeter in 1003, destroyed parts of Wilton, and then moved to Wallingford in 1006.[2] The fighting was so close that in 1006 the monks at Malmesbury Abbey removed everything of value except the shrine of St Aldhelm and had to sell some of their land to pay their share of geld.[3]
The murder of his half-brother Edward the Martyr, left Æthelred II in sole control of the royal house in 978. Often called Æthelred the Unready (Unwise) his rule until 1013 was a period of repeated Viking incursion. Attacks increased after the 990s with different Viking groups involved: Hiberno-Norse invaders raided North Devon, Cornwall in 981 and Watchet, Somerset, in 988; the south coast was attacked by Scandinavian ships in 980 and 988; and the Christian King Olaf Trygvasson of Norway led other incursions.[4] The response in 991 or 994 was to pay tribute to the Vikings and to seek their help against others. Æthelred raised a tax called shipsoke when Thorkell the Tall of Sweden landed in Kent in 1009 with a new fleet and the entire country undertook 3 days of prayer and fasting to seek God’s help. Massive tributes were paid to the Vikings in 1011-12.[5] In 1013 Sweyn returned and, moving south-west down from the Humber, took tribute payments at Winchester and Bath, where the western thegn submitted to him. King Æthelred abdicated and fled to Normandy, later returning after Sweyn’s death to rule for another two years. Æthelred’s reign lasted 37 years, the longest of any Saxon king, but the country was clearly in disarray.
Under severe threat from Viking incursion, these thegns were no longer sufficient in terms of military prowess or numbers. King Cnut began the practice of recruiting a standing bodyguard of warriors, many from Scandinavia, called huscarls (housecarls). They were full-time warriors, paid in specie, whose service owed no relation to the land they had been granted by the king or to any services they owed the king.
A prolonged wave of Viking attacks on Saxon England started soon after the year 980, some of which encroached into the heart of Wiltshire and Somerset. We might imagine that local people joined together ready to defend their homes. At times, large Wiltshire estates appear to have been taken into direct royal ownership and, at others, granted by the king to one of his loyal supporters in 1000s, who became ealdormen and earls, such as Athelstan Half King and Ælfhere of Mercia in the 1000s.[1]
The main Viking attacks came mostly by sea and river incursion. More ships were needed to defend England and in 1003 Archbishop Ælfric left a ship for the people of Wilshire (and another for Kent) in his will. The St Brice’s Day Massacre of Danes in Oxford in 1003 provoked further attack by Sweyn of Denmark, seeking to avenge his sister’s death. Sweyn captured Exeter in 1003, destroyed parts of Wilton, and then moved to Wallingford in 1006.[2] The fighting was so close that in 1006 the monks at Malmesbury Abbey removed everything of value except the shrine of St Aldhelm and had to sell some of their land to pay their share of geld.[3]
The murder of his half-brother Edward the Martyr, left Æthelred II in sole control of the royal house in 978. Often called Æthelred the Unready (Unwise) his rule until 1013 was a period of repeated Viking incursion. Attacks increased after the 990s with different Viking groups involved: Hiberno-Norse invaders raided North Devon, Cornwall in 981 and Watchet, Somerset, in 988; the south coast was attacked by Scandinavian ships in 980 and 988; and the Christian King Olaf Trygvasson of Norway led other incursions.[4] The response in 991 or 994 was to pay tribute to the Vikings and to seek their help against others. Æthelred raised a tax called shipsoke when Thorkell the Tall of Sweden landed in Kent in 1009 with a new fleet and the entire country undertook 3 days of prayer and fasting to seek God’s help. Massive tributes were paid to the Vikings in 1011-12.[5] In 1013 Sweyn returned and, moving south-west down from the Humber, took tribute payments at Winchester and Bath, where the western thegn submitted to him. King Æthelred abdicated and fled to Normandy, later returning after Sweyn’s death to rule for another two years. Æthelred’s reign lasted 37 years, the longest of any Saxon king, but the country was clearly in disarray.
Under severe threat from Viking incursion, these thegns were no longer sufficient in terms of military prowess or numbers. King Cnut began the practice of recruiting a standing bodyguard of warriors, many from Scandinavia, called huscarls (housecarls). They were full-time warriors, paid in specie, whose service owed no relation to the land they had been granted by the king or to any services they owed the king.
Local Viking Incursions
There is no direct evidence of Viking activities in Box but we can see what happened in surrounding areas. The Bradford charter of 1001 was an attempt to provide a refuge for the nuns at Shaftesbury and their relics in the event of a Viking attack at Shaftesbury.[6] In 1003 the ealdorman Ælfric led an army of men from Wiltshire and Hampshire against Sweyn of Denmark and his Viking army. Outnumbered, Aelfric refused to fight and Sweyn plundered Wilton and Salisbury.[7] Locally, Thingley (þing meaning a meeting place) and Neston (Næss meaning a headland or promontory) have both been claimed to have Viking connections.[8]
There is no direct evidence of Viking activities in Box but we can see what happened in surrounding areas. The Bradford charter of 1001 was an attempt to provide a refuge for the nuns at Shaftesbury and their relics in the event of a Viking attack at Shaftesbury.[6] In 1003 the ealdorman Ælfric led an army of men from Wiltshire and Hampshire against Sweyn of Denmark and his Viking army. Outnumbered, Aelfric refused to fight and Sweyn plundered Wilton and Salisbury.[7] Locally, Thingley (þing meaning a meeting place) and Neston (Næss meaning a headland or promontory) have both been claimed to have Viking connections.[8]
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In 1012 a massive national danegeld (ransom levy) of £48,000 was paid to Scandinavian forces, followed by fierce fighting in our region. In 1013 the Danish king, Sweyn received the submission of the ealdorman of western England at Bath.[9] After his death a year later, his son Cnut (sometimes called Canute) sailed up the River Frome, destroying the monastery at Bradford and ravaging throughout Wiltshire in 1015.
The allegiance of areas in England split following Æthelred’s death in 1016. East Wessex (presumably including Box) supported Cnut and west Wessex chose Edmund Ironside. In the Treaty of Alney 1016, the country was divided with Wessex going to Edmund Ironside and Cnut taking Mercia. Ironside died later that year and Cnut became king of all England.[10] |
Family Succession House of Wessex 975-978 Edward the Martyr 978-1013 Æthelred II the Unready 1013-14 Sweyn Forkbeard of Denmark 1014-16 Æthelred II the Unready restored 1016 Edmund Ironside died at Glastonbury House of Denmark 1016-35 Cnut the Great, son of Sweyn Forkbeard 1035-40 Harold Harefoot, son of Cnut 1040-42 Harthacnut, son of Cnut 1042-66 Edward the Confessor, son of Æthelred 1066 Harold |
"Canute attempting to turn back the waves" in Cassell's Illustrated History of England, 1865
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Cnut the Great, King of England 1016-35 When Cnut took control, Wulfstan, archbishop of York, was relieved to have a strong and secure ruler and helped him write the so-called Cnut Law-Code, itself the longest of any early medieval king of England. Many of us were taught at school that Cnut foolishly tried to turn back the waves and obviously failed. The explanation was probably more that this was an ironic gesture to demonstrate to his court that kings were fallible. Cnut was the most important ruler of his time - Cnut the Great, son of Sweyn Forkbeard and grandson of Harald Bluetooth, who founded a dynasty which controlled a massive North Sea empire including Norway and Denmark and who built and restored churches and visited the Pope in 1027. Many of the existing Anglo-Saxon ealdormen had been killed or were dispossessed by Cnut and he promoted new families like Godwine, later created Earl of Wessex in 1018. Godwine himself was of mixed Saxon and Viking ancestry. His father was Wulfnoth, a south Saxon thegn, and his mother was Cnut’s sister-in-law Glytha. |
The Godwine family became all-powerful under Cnut, owning huge tracts of Wiltshire, Somerset, Hampshire and Devon. They often acquired land by grants of book land and the splitting up of existing lay and church estates, whereby they controlled the shire courts. Their importance was so much that Edward the Confessor owed the English crown to Earl Godwine in 1042 and the king later married Godwine’s daughter Edith. On Earl Godwine’s death, his son Harold became Earl of Wessex, the same person we know as King Harold defeated by William the Conqueror in 1066.
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Cnut ruled England between 1016-1035, almost the same length of time as William I, and was succeeded by his sons, Harold Harefoot (1035-1040) and Harthacnut (1040-042). On Harthacnut's death, his half-brother Edward the Confessor (1042–1066) became king. Edward was the son of Æthelred the Unready and the Viking Emma of Normandy, one-time wife of Cnut the Great, and had lived in exile for many years mainly in Normandy. It was his death that led to the invasion of another group of Vikings from Normandy under William the Conqueror.
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Coin of King Cnut the Great (Wikipedia)
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The picture which emerges from the early 1000s is one of political, military and civil disruption in the face of Viking assault.
The residents of Box would have been aware of attacks in surrounding areas and would have supplied men for the local fyrd (part-time shire militia). As a fertile valley it seems likely that they were called upon to pay their share of tribute funds either in specie, in provisions for the army or, more likely, both. Some historians have argued that each side had its own intentions in these conflicts.[11] Anglo-Saxon kings wanted a virtuous, warrior bloodbath, the Viking army wanted to get home with their booty and local residents wanted to get on with their normal life.
Many royal estates were created in the Confessor’s reign after 1042, possibly to strengthen the army by taking food rent in the form of the farm of one night rather than assessing tax based upon a certain number of hides.[12] There were other attempts to regularise the army and anyone holding five hides of book land was liable to military service. We can see reorganisation and administrative change all around and it is possible that Box was affected by this but we have no actual proof.
The residents of Box would have been aware of attacks in surrounding areas and would have supplied men for the local fyrd (part-time shire militia). As a fertile valley it seems likely that they were called upon to pay their share of tribute funds either in specie, in provisions for the army or, more likely, both. Some historians have argued that each side had its own intentions in these conflicts.[11] Anglo-Saxon kings wanted a virtuous, warrior bloodbath, the Viking army wanted to get home with their booty and local residents wanted to get on with their normal life.
Many royal estates were created in the Confessor’s reign after 1042, possibly to strengthen the army by taking food rent in the form of the farm of one night rather than assessing tax based upon a certain number of hides.[12] There were other attempts to regularise the army and anyone holding five hides of book land was liable to military service. We can see reorganisation and administrative change all around and it is possible that Box was affected by this but we have no actual proof.
Conclusion
So, we come back to the headline proposition: what was the reaction in Box to Viking incursion? As we see above, we shouldn’t regard ethnicity as a significant factor of ethnic differentiation because there was much integration of Viking and Saxon races. In other words, residents would have been affected by the local disruption rather than the ethnicity of the instigators or whoever was ruling the country. Any community existing in our area would have experienced the effects of Viking invasion at the local level even though we can offer little in the way of a definite answer other than a general conclusion that Box residents would have been required to provide men for the local fyrd and would have seen tax increases to fund local levies to pay ransoms.
Did Viking armies come to Box? The best we can offer is that the Vikings may well have used the old Roman road or the medieval ridgeway track next to it when Sweyn Forkbeard passed through Wallingford towards Bath in 1013, where "all bowed to Sweyn and gave hostages … and all the nation accepted him as king".[13]
So, we come back to the headline proposition: what was the reaction in Box to Viking incursion? As we see above, we shouldn’t regard ethnicity as a significant factor of ethnic differentiation because there was much integration of Viking and Saxon races. In other words, residents would have been affected by the local disruption rather than the ethnicity of the instigators or whoever was ruling the country. Any community existing in our area would have experienced the effects of Viking invasion at the local level even though we can offer little in the way of a definite answer other than a general conclusion that Box residents would have been required to provide men for the local fyrd and would have seen tax increases to fund local levies to pay ransoms.
Did Viking armies come to Box? The best we can offer is that the Vikings may well have used the old Roman road or the medieval ridgeway track next to it when Sweyn Forkbeard passed through Wallingford towards Bath in 1013, where "all bowed to Sweyn and gave hostages … and all the nation accepted him as king".[13]
References
[1] Pamela M Slocombe, Medieval Houses in Wiltshire, 1992, Alan Sutton Publishing Ltd, p. 11 refers to a pattern of royal grants to supporters and later repatriation to the crown
[2] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, 1995, Leicester University Press, p.139
[3] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.140-1
[4] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.136
[5] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.137
[6] NJ Higham, The Death of Anglo-Saxon England, 1997, Sutton Publishing Ltd, p18
[7] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.101 and Victoria County History of Wiltshire, Vol II, p.15
[8] JEB Gover Allen Mawer and FM Stenton, The Place-names of Wiltshire, 1970, Cambridge University Press suggest that it is as likely to be Old English as much as Old Norse
[9] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.101
[10] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.138
[11] Thomas JT Williams, The Place of Slaughter: Exploring the West Saxon Battlescape, recorded in Danes in Wessex: The Scandinavian Impact on Southern England c 800- c1100 (editors Ryan Lavelle and Simon Roffey), 2016, Oxbow Books, p.42
[12] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.101
[13] Barry Cunliffe, Wessex to AD1000, 1993, Longman Group, p.332 and 330
[1] Pamela M Slocombe, Medieval Houses in Wiltshire, 1992, Alan Sutton Publishing Ltd, p. 11 refers to a pattern of royal grants to supporters and later repatriation to the crown
[2] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, 1995, Leicester University Press, p.139
[3] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.140-1
[4] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.136
[5] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.137
[6] NJ Higham, The Death of Anglo-Saxon England, 1997, Sutton Publishing Ltd, p18
[7] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.101 and Victoria County History of Wiltshire, Vol II, p.15
[8] JEB Gover Allen Mawer and FM Stenton, The Place-names of Wiltshire, 1970, Cambridge University Press suggest that it is as likely to be Old English as much as Old Norse
[9] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.101
[10] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.138
[11] Thomas JT Williams, The Place of Slaughter: Exploring the West Saxon Battlescape, recorded in Danes in Wessex: The Scandinavian Impact on Southern England c 800- c1100 (editors Ryan Lavelle and Simon Roffey), 2016, Oxbow Books, p.42
[12] Barbara Yorke, Wessex in the Early Middle Ages, p.101
[13] Barry Cunliffe, Wessex to AD1000, 1993, Longman Group, p.332 and 330