Background
After Athelstan's defeat of the Vikings at York in 937, his campaigns against the Welsh kings (who were forced to submit to him at Hereford in 937), and his subsequent successful invasion of Alba in 934, the power of Wessex was clearly on the ascent and forming a considerable threat to neighboring kingdoms. Though they had all been enemies in living memory, the threat of Athelstan was enough to bring together an alliance between the king of Dublin, Olaf Guthfrithsson, the Scottish King Constantine II, and Owen of Strathclyde. Livingston points out that to come together "they had agreed to set aside whatever political, cultural, historical, and even religious differences they might have had in order to achieve one common purpose: to destroy Athelstan."
After defeating a rival Norse king whose name is recorded in Old Irish documents as Amlaíb Cenncairech at Limerick in August 937, Olaf Guthfrithsson crossed the Irish Sea with his army to join the forces of Constantine and Owen, suggesting that the Battle of Brunanburh probably occurred in early October of that year.
Livingston theorizes that the invading allied armies entered England in two waves: Constantine and Owen came from the north, possibly engaging in some early skirmishes with forces loyal to Athelstan as they followed the Roman road across the Lancashire Plains between Carlisle and Manchester, with Olaf's forces joining with him en route. It is possible, Livingston speculates, that the eventual battlesite at Brunanburh was then chosen in an agreement with Athelstan: "there would be one fight, and to the victor went England."
Read more about this topic: Battle Of Brunanburh
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