The English name for the town derives from Old Norse: Sveinsey, meaning either “Sweyn’s island” or “Sweyn’s inlet” (see Swansea). The city of Swansea was founded by Sweyn Forkbeard, King of Denmark, who by 1013 was King of the Danes, Anglo-Saxons and Norwegians. The combined Anglo-Saxon and Welsh army eventually overtook the Vikings before defeating them at the Battle of Buttington. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle of 893, for example, refers to Vikings being pursued by a combined force of West Saxons and north Welsh along the River Severn. Although the Welsh had been longtime enemies of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia, their relationship with the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex was somewhat warmer. Nevertheless, following the successful Viking alliance with Britanny in 865, the Britons made their peace with the Danes, and a Viking/Welsh alliance in 878 defeated an Anglo-Saxon army from Mercia. The Vikings, however, were not able to set up a Viking state or control Wales, owing to the powerful forces of Welsh kings, and, unlike in Scotland, the aristocracy was relatively unharmed. Place names such as Skokholm, Skomer, and Swansea remain as evidence of the Norse settlement. The Vikings did, however, settle in small numbers in the south around St Davids, Haverfordwest, and the Gower. Wales was not colonized by the Vikings significantly as in eastern England. Shetland and Orkney were the last of these to be incorporated into Scotland in as late as 1468. Shetland, Orkney and the Hebrides came under Norse control, sometimes as fiefs under the King of Norway, and at other times as separate entities under variously the Kings of the Isles, the Earldom of Orkney and the later Kings of Mann and the Isles. The isles to the north and west of Scotland were heavily colonised by Norwegian Vikings. While there are few records from the earliest period, it is believed that Scandinavian presence in Scotland increased in the 830s. The monastery at Iona on the west coast was first raided in 794, and had to be abandoned some fifty years later after several devastating attacks.
VIKING CONQUEST DANISH LONGPHORT SERIES
The Viking presence continued through the reign of the Danish prince Cnut the Great (reigned as King of England: 1016–1035), after which a series of inheritance arguments weakened the hold on power of Cnut’s heirs. However, Alfred and his successors eventually drove back the Viking frontier and retook York.Ī new wave of Vikings appeared in England in 947, when Erik Bloodaxe captured York. Despite these treaties, conflict continued on and off.
These treaties formalized the boundaries of the English kingdoms and the Viking Danelaw territory, with provisions for peaceful relations between the English and the Vikings. There followed the Treaty of Wedmore the same year and the Treaty of Alfred and Guthrum in 886. Most of the English kingdoms, being in turmoil, could not stand against the Vikings, but King Alfred of Wessex defeated Guthrum’s army at the Battle of Edington in 878. Then in 876, Halfdan shared out Northumbrian land amongst his men, who “ploughed the land and supported themselves” this land was part of what became known as the Danelaw. In 875 the Great Heathen Army split into two bands, with Guthrum leading one back to Wessex, and Halfdan taking his followers north. In 871 the Great Heathen army was reinforced by what was known as the Great Summer Army, one of its leaders was Guthrum. The army crossed the Midlands into Northumbria and captured York (Jorvik). The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle described this force as the mycel hæþen here (Great Heathen Army) and went on to say that it was led by Ivar the Boneless and Halfdan Ragnarsson. In 865, a group of hitherto uncoordinated bands of predominantly Danish Vikings joined together to form a large army and landed in East Anglia. In 875, after enduring eight decades of repeated Viking raids, the monks fled Lindisfarne, carrying the relics of Saint Cuthbert with them.
According to the 12th-century Anglo-Norman chronicler Symeon of Durham, the raiders killed the resident monks or threw them into the sea to drown or carried them away as slaves – along with some of the church treasures.
The earliest recorded planned Viking raid, on 6 January 793, targeted the monastery on the island of Lindisfarne, off the north-east coast of Northumbria.
0 kommentar(er)
