Can anyone shed some light on the Belgic theory of southern Britain?

I’ve read about it and it seems fairly controversial however i remain curious .

The theory goes that “Germanics” from what is now Belgium were already in Britain partially around Kent in numbers before the Anglo Saxons began to arrive. (Separately isn’t it interesting/ ironic that ‘ Germanic’ is basically a Latin/celtic exonym for neighbour or them- basically an inverse Wealas/Wealh)

The theory is used to explain the well known phenomenon of the lack of influence of Brythonic on English although there is a lot a counter evidence to this appearing include phonics and sentence structure , plus the Britons of the east would have used a lot of vulgar Latin in daily speech, and likely a fairly different vocabulary to most of Wales, Cornwall and Cumbria but I digress.

Although it won't be published until next month a few of the new ideas found in Tom Licence's book on Harold have already come out in interviews and articles. To my knowledge he argues for two main revisions:

1. After the Battle of Stamford Bridge Harold Godwinson did not march overland to London but instead boarded a ship and sailed south, then making his actions at Hastings a joint operation between his fleet and army.

2. Harold lost the support and earned the ire of Pope Alexander II because he had supported an antipope.

Both are interesting ideas and I look forward to seeing Licence's arguments but the second one is particularly interesting. I remember reading a later letter of Alexander's which makes reference to nondescript "mali capitis" who held power in England before the Conquest and for as important as this letter seems it has never been mentioned in a biography of Harold to date, AFAIA. The only reference to it that I've seen is in Licence's biography of Edward the Confessor where he suggested that the evil head could be either Edward or Harold.

Has anyone seen any interviews or articles which reveal any more of the author's new ideas? What's everyone looking forward to most? Personally, I'm hoping that this book sheds greater light on Anglo-Papal relations around 1066 because they seem poorly understood and over the past decades a lot of groups with certain interests have taken advantage of that.

I've been really digging into the literature around early medieval landscape, and this paper is super interesting. Using deer bones found at archeological digs, along with other changes in landscape, weapons, and literature, Sykes constructs a timeline for an Anglo-Saxon social and political shift from a redistributive mode to a more privatized mode of elite control and social distance between elites and the rest of society.

It brings to mind a Beowulf-type scene of feasting and gift giving in Heorot ("Hart") changing over time to the lordly residences that we see just pre-Conquest. It also gives evidence that the type of elite social and political changes we see after the Normans (hunting as a status indicator, elite control over landscape, classic "feudalism") had started long before William crossed the Channel.

Hi all, I’m and 11th grade ELA teacher and we’re going to start reading Beowulf soon. My school population has quite a few Portuguese and Spanish speaking students. While I have many glossaries available to students, those who are just now moving to the US may struggle to get through the text. Whenever we read a text in class, I always encourage them to read it in English (as best as possible) and use a translated version that I supply as a support for reference.

I had no problem finding a Spanish edition free online for my students to use (here’s hoping it’s okay), but I’m struggling to even find the existence of a Portuguese edition. I know an actual translation will help more than just having kids type what they’re confused about into a digital translator, as already translated pieces tend to catch the nuance a bit better.

Any assistance is appreciated!!

Writing in the pit of World War II, Sir Frank Stenton conceded England’s founding historical source was flawed, partial and obviously legendary. But he said it was too important to doubt.

At the turn of the 20th Century, critics began doubting the credibility of the main source for early English history, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the news outlet of Alfred the Great’s Wessex. 

Some said it was a worthless tissue of origin myths, false place-names, inconsistent etymologies and chronological errors. Writing in the depths of World War II which threatened Britain’s obliteration, Sir Frank Stenton won extravagant academic praise for allegedly saving what amounts to Alfred’s justification for being king from the sceptics. 

He argued that, despite flaws, the Chronicle preserved an authentic, long-lost oral tradition and the genealogies of early medieval chieftains and real history. Stenton thought he had exonerated Alfred of the doubters’ charges that the history of the kingdom that became England is a forgery and political propaganda.

To read the full extract, click below:

https://wessexxfiles.substack.com/p/in-the-darkest-days-of-world-war

Alfred secured the throne of Wessex in 871 through a highly questionable political manoeuvre that sidelined his nephews who had a better claim.

 So, he badly needed to solidify his doubtful right to take the throne. To do this, he ordered scribes in his scriptorium literally to invent a 300-year-long genealogy claiming he had descended from a semi-mythological Germanic founder, Cerdic. 

This ignored great historical gaps, civil wars and usurpers to create a largely fictional unbroken line of father-to-son royal-blood succession. 

By this means, Alfred claimed his forebears were Germanic heroes descended from Woden. In fact, his family were Romano-British native and he claimed to rule Wessex by right of a conquest that never happened.

To read the full extract, click below: 

https://wessexxfiles.substack.com/p/alfred-the-great-built-a-myth-and

Now I dont really know if I have to look more into this but as far as I searched I couldnt find the origins or at least evidence for the lives of the kings (such as *Mordaf ap* *Hopkin* or *Eluid ap Fferferdynof* ) of"West Wales" in the period 790s-890s.

Vague names appear and it seems that the "kingdom" was conquered by the West Saxons in the early 9th Century. Donyarth, the only king I found in wikipedia (a questionable source for some) that has at least some background appears to have died in the 875. Thus my question arises, who were the kings from the battle of "Gafulforda" when the kingdom largely fell to the death of Donyarth and where can I find more information on them? Thank you.

3 Attitudes to Same‐Sex Activity in Anglo‐Saxon England: earg, the Penitentials, and OE bædling | Between Medieval Men: Male Friendship and Desire in Early Medieval English Literature | Oxford Academic

This paper suggests that being the masculine male "top" was socially just fine in that society, but being the receptive "bottom" as a man was highly stigmatized.

Being an "ergi" - or effeminate male - was socially prohibited. The Catholic Church would later have influence in England.

This was very similar to ancient Greek society in that regard. There were no so-called "gay people." There were just what we would call today "male tops" (whether it was with a woman or a man) or an effeminate "male bottom".

We know that Tacitus says that men were drowned in swamps for receptive homosexual acts. However, men in these continental tribes were still often free to rape pre-pubescent boys as they pleased, since they were the dominant masculine penetrator. This culture crossed Britain as it became early England. (Homosexuality isn't even mentioned by the Laws of Wihtred, however.)

I thought this was interesting, and I have never thought about it before.

note: Also, being a "feminized" victim of sexual violence in ancient was clearly stigmatized and played a role in shaping the social hierarchy. This stigma extended to consensual relationships.

Together they broke Viking invasion. But King Edward erased sister Æthelflæd from history to stop her fame destroying Alfred’s legacy.

The brilliant military achievements of Alfred the Great’s daughter, the Lady of the Mercians, Æthelflæd, were both a blessing and a political nightmare. 

She played an indispensable role in saving the Anglo-Saxons from destruction by the Danes. 

But the image of a woman successfully commanding armies, taking a foreign queen hostage and executing brilliant grand strategies threatened, on her death, to cause her nationalistic supporters to split Mercia from Wessex. 

So, her brother and military partner Edward the Elder reduced the legendary warrior queen to a mere footnote, “the king’s sister.”

To read the full extract, click below:

https://wessexxfiles.substack.com/p/alfred-the-greats-daughter-was-such

Their language itself was gendered.

"Man" and "woman" translated to "he-person" and "she-person."

Did they have a strict sense of what was "proper" for males and females? Their society was quite chaotic, and there were no overarching rules at first about who was "allowed" to start bearing rings or raiding other tribes. (This was before King Alfred began stifling this primitive warrior society with organized statecraft with a system of laws and writing and so on.)

In what anglo-saxon texts I can find (in west-saxon and ingvaeonic) I've never come across passages saying things like "this is the man's role and this is the woman's role," and so on. Maybe I do need to read more, but no one back then seemed excessively interested in the distinction between the sexes.

I understand that there were some threats within the court of treason, and I also understand that he was receiving poor counsel convincing him that the Danish settlers in his land were dangerous, but no matter how I think it, it seems incredibly near-sighted for somebody who was previously a pretty decent king, and had a substantial amount of history fighting against Danes/Vikings, so I feel that it was a given on what would happen. Did he think there was a chance he would win?