The first raid of Norse seafarers is commonly remembered as the attack on the monastery of Lindisfarne, the windswept religious capital of the Kingdom of Northumbria, in 793 C.E. However, Dorset can claim the dubious honour of the first 'viking' raid, as according to most manuscripts of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, in 787 C.E., 3 ships from Hordaland, referring to the petty kingdom which comprises the area of modern-day Hordaland and the city of Bergen, arrived on the coast. They were met by the local reeve, who asked them to take their grievances to the king's town (i.e. Winchester), but the Norsemen killed him on the spot. The Chronicle makes clear that this was the first Norse foray onto Anglo-Saxon territory.
Another source, the Chronicon Aethelweardi, a variant manuscript of the ASC, comes from the late 10th century but adds a few important details. The reeve was apparently called Beaduheard, and the fatal clash was in fact on the Isle of Portland, then home to a Saxon church, probably dedicated to St. Andrew as the later Norman church is (see above picture). Portland was also a defensive strongpoint, not only due to its topography but the fact that an an old Iron Age hillfort lay on Werne Hill, from which all naval activity could be monitored and prepared for. While the Chronicon Aethelweardi is somewhat unreliable, it challenges the idea that the Saxons were, until Alfred the Great, helpless towards the northern threat. For instance, it claims that Beaduheard, as soon as he saw the incoming fleet, rushed to the harbour's defence with a retinue of warriors, contradicting the claim made by most versions of the ASC that the reeve 'knew not what they were', and was killed as a result.
The Chronicon's reason for Beaduheard's death is not that he was struck down by surprise, but that he spoke to them 'in an authoritative tone.' One interpretation of this is that, having heard accounts of other raiding parties and knowing of their pagan beliefs, commanded them to abandon their weapons and seek a summons with the king, which they naturally refused. More likely, though, is that Beaduheard simply caught word of the raiding fleets from the reports of terrified families and the local clergymen, and decided to send a small retinue to investigate, cautious but not entirely certain whether to trust those reports.
Still, both the ASC and Chronicon account broaden the extent of Viking voyages in their earliest period. Norsemen had already begun raiding along the Frisian coast, and had assisted their old Saxon co-religionists against Charlemagne in the early 780s, but if the ASC is correct then their ships may have sailed along the English coastline before this. Their landing on Portland might have been an attempt to find richer sites; perhaps stories of Exeter's wealth or the prosperity of Southampton brought them there. The mention of the raid being the first Danish attack, despite the fleet hailing from Hordaland, then a Norwegian kingdom, could suggest that the fleet's crew consisted of adventurers from across the Norse world, a coordinated expedition planned long in advance. Taken literally, the ASC account also implies that the earliest Norse raid was not just about fortune, they 'sought out the land of the English race', for their families or their kinsmen to seek new lands, not just to plunder but to farm, build and trade goods.
To summarise, from the written evidence alone it is clear that the traditional picture of the horizons of Anglo-Saxon England at the start of the 'viking period', dominated by monks confined to barren cells and peasants fearing God's wrath with every change in the weather, is flawed. If the interpretations proposed here hold any truth to them, then a fleet of Danish-Norwegian Vikings, already knowing the nature of English channel and its weaknesses, landed and slew a Saxon reeve who was already aware of the threat they posed and made demands upon them. While the brief sentences in the ASC and Aethelweard's 10th-century revision provide little detail, about Dorset at the time or of anything else, the fact that the sentences were written show how important it was for the event to be recorded, not only for contemporaries but also for later generations.
No comments:
Post a Comment