History of England - The Anglo-Saxon Invasion

The Anglo-Saxon Invasion

In the wake of the breakdown of Roman rule in Britain from the middle of the fourth century, present day England was progressively settled by Germanic groups. Collectively known as the "Anglo-Saxons", these were mainly Saxons from Northern Germany, and Angles and Jutes from the Jutland peninsula. The entire region was referred to as, "Hwicce" and settlements throughout the south were called Gewisse. The Battle of Deorham was a critical battle that established the Anglo-Saxon rule in 577. Saxon mercenaries from various tribes had been present in Britain since before the late Roman period, but the main influx of population is traditionally thought to have taken place from after they left in the fifth century. The precise nature of these invasions is not fully understood, the historical account being composed either hundreds of years after the events or not primarily concerned with historicity at all. The Monarchs of Mercia's lineage was determined to reach as far back as the early 500's.

The sequence of events of the fifth and sixth centuries is particularly difficult to access, peppered with a mixture of mythology, such as the characters of Hengist and Horsa, and legend, such as St Germanus's so-called "Alleluia Victory" against the Heathens, and half-remembered history, such as the exploits of Ambrosius Aurelianus and King Arthur. However, the belief that the Saxons simply wiped or drove out all the native Britons from England has been widely discredited by a number of archaeologists since the 2000s, and the likelihood of that model being severely questioned. At any rate, the Anglo-Saxons, including Saxonified Britons, progressively spread into England, by a combination of military conquest and cultural assimilation, until by the eighth century some kind of England really had emerged.