The Vikings and the struggle for England
History · Key Stage 2 · The School
Raiders, then settlers
The raid on Lindisfarne in AD 793 opens the Viking age in Britain. Monasteries were targeted because they were rich and undefended, on the coast. But raiding turned into settling: within a century Scandinavians were farming, trading and governing here. York became a major Viking city, and Norse words — sky, egg, knife, they, husband — entered English and stayed.
Alfred and the Danelaw
By the 870s Viking armies had taken most of England. ALFRED of Wessex survived, regrouped, and won at Edington in 878. The settlement that followed divided the country: Alfred kept the south and west, and the Scandinavians held the north and east under their own law — the DANELAW. Alfred built fortified towns and promoted learning, and is the only English monarch called 'the Great'.
One kingdom, and then 1066
Alfred's successors pushed north until, under his grandson Æthelstan, one kingdom of England existed for the first time. It was never simple after that: Cnut, a Dane, ruled England from 1016. On the death of Edward the Confessor in 1066 there was no clear heir, and the argument over who should succeed him ended the Anglo-Saxon period entirely.
These everyday English words are Norse: sky, egg, knife, window, husband, law, anger, ugly, they, them, their. Notice the last three — a language does not borrow its PRONOUNS from raiders it merely fought. Borrowing at that depth means two populations living together, speaking to each other daily and intermarrying for generations. The vocabulary is evidence of settlement that the chronicles, written by the raided, barely mention.