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Comment by keithwhor | Hacker News Reader

More of a reflection than a comment on the article itself: I have a sneaking suspicion the success of Assassin's Creed: Valhalla has had a positive impact on people's interest in this time period in England. Certainly got me to click.

Gorgeous game, lots of educational tidbits, highly recommended if you're looking for a little bit of escapism during the pandemic. :)

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> lots of educational tidbits

If you think that it is useful in this way you may be interested what was excluded. See https://acoup.blog/2020/11/20/miscellanea-my-thoughts-on-ass...

> To say that the game sanitizes this history is a profound understatement.

(...)

> In short, your raiding doesn’t so much as inconvenience the civilian population.

(...)

> You are a viking (one thing they do right: viking is a job description, meaning ‘raider,’ not an ethnic identity) who does not kill non-combatants. This is akin to the famous joke about the pirates who don’t steal anything.

> We should be clear about what is happening in England in c. 875 when the game takes place. After almost a century of repeated Norse and Danish viking raids on the English coast (which, to be clear, were not merely raids for physical goods; they were slave raids as trading in slaves (‘thralls’) was an important part of the Scandinavian economy), the arrival of what the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle calls the ‘Great Heathen Army’ (in 865) turned that into a war of conquest. The Norse and Danes overran the English kingdoms (save Wessex) and settled in the area, subjugating the population, taking the best farmland from its former owners and generally wrecking the place in the process. Our sources are very clear that this was not a particularly pleasant process for the existing population and the surviving English kingdom of Wessex responded to it with a series of reforms that radically militarized the kingdom.

The Netflix series The Last Kingdom seems to portray what you describe pretty well.

I was expecting to hate this show but I ended up enjoying it. Even more than what I my highest possible expectations gave me.

There's an episode in the Last Kingdom and in Vikings when we see the great pyres lit to communicate a raid was occurring. There's quite a few on the coast of North Eastern England where I grew up still present to this day.

Admittedly I some what doubt they're original .

>Admittedly I some what doubt they're original .

They've been left should Norway get any ideas again.

You mean you still have the pyres there?

The book series it is based on (Saxon Chronicles) does an even better job. It is fiction but Bernard Cornwell does his research. He has his characters talking about Englaland sooner than OP would suggest though; in the novels this was a term Alfred was using as he neared the end of his reign. The novels are told from the perspective of a colorful fictional character but are really the story of Alfred, his defense of Wessex and the making of England by he and his children.

I've always enjoyed reading BC's endnotes about the research he did for each book almost as much as the actual story. :D

Didn’t know it was a book, should be a fun read, thanks!

The book series by Bernard Cornwell is also excellent, if you enjoy that sort of thing. The books have a fairly well defined structure (one may even consider them formulaic), but he appears to have done a lot of detailed research into day-to-day life of that time, and happily shares it with the reader. Not quite Neal Stephenson level of digression, but not far off. I haven't read his Sharpe novels, but the Archer's Tale books and his version of King Arthur are similarly enjoyable.

And Anglo-Saxons did pretty much the same to Britons, Gaels and Picts some 300 years earlier. And Romans did the same before them. That's how things were done back then, and I've read a number historians now saying that Viking raiders were neither more cruel, nor more violent than the others by the standards of those times, just the history we know was written by the other side - and importantly by Christians, while Viking raiders were pagans, so it was important to depict them as wild devils - the same way as Roman historians depicted conquered people as "barbaric", while in fact often Romans were acting far more savage than Moesians, Goths, Dacians and others.

> That's how things were done back then

And by “back then” we mean prior to about 1920

Are you sure you don't mean 2120?

In 1939 an European country invaded another European countries with goal of murdering and enslaving population living there.

Years ago https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State_of_Iraq_and_the_... did similar thing in Iraq.

(there are many other examples, I am not going to list all of them)

In 1940 this was considered remarkable ... 50 years before that, not so much

> I've read a number historians now saying that Viking raiders were neither more cruel, nor more violent than the others by the standards of those times, just the history we know was written by the other side

Well, anglo saxon england wasn't a big fan of slavery, in fact the christian world in general wasn't and the church did a lot to combat it. And it was the vikings raiding anglo saxon england, not the other way around. So while you can always find historians to say, that all cultures are the same because of of various unconvincing whatboutery reasons, I think from our current understanding, between those two peoples at that moment in time, one side really was worse behaved.

Mass slavery of the Roman form wasn't "popular" among the West Germanic tribes because they had their own system of subjugation of a more feudal model, or at least something transitional between the classic Germanic class system (king, nobility karl/jarl, freemen, laymen) and what became feudalism.

Or rather, after their brutal occupation and displacement of the Romano-Britons they came to emulate the Franks (the most successful post-Roman polity in Europe) in the structure of their economy. Think Serfs rather than Slaves.

Slaves in the Roman system could be freed and become Roman citizens. In fact it was rather common after a generation or two. Peasants were peasants forever. Not saying one is more just than the other, but Christian influence in Europe certainly hadn't made for a more just system. Just a more theologically based one (God chose your King and Lord)

In early days many Britons were enslaved by invading Saxon forces, although slavery in Ancient/Early Middle Age times was in many ways different then what we usually expect based of what we know of slavery in US. It wasn't really based on race/ethnicity/religion as much as being out of luck and owing money, or being simply on the wrong side of the war. Slaves were often later (if they survive long enough) accepted into the society and over time they would become fully assimilated into the society - some would even rise to become very respected people.

You can find some interesting facts on this subject here: https://octavia.net/slavery-in-anglo-saxon-england/

Also, a further note, the Anglo-Saxons only became Christian a bit further on in the 7th and 8th century, quite a bit after their initial conquest of the Britons in the 5th and 6th centuries.

The Britons (later, "Welsh") themselves were already primarily Christian, due to Roman occupation. They saw the Saxon invasion as a catastrophe not just because of the cultural displacement, but because it was pagan. (cf. Gildas "De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae")

There's a difference, though - the Romans and Normans took over the government, but left the existing population largely intact. The Saxons and Danes moved in, displacing/killing/enslaving the existing population and replacing it with their own people.

It's not clear that the Romans behaved this way in Britain or not, but they certainly did not in Gaul. They acted there in a way that might be considered genocide today, with massacres and mass enslavement of the population, and within two or three centuries the Gaulish languages and most cultural practices were extinct.

In Britain this was not really accomplished because Roman presence was newer and relatively thin on the ground. Brittonic languages persisted, but there definitely was a strong cultural assimilation, and the upper classes were very focused on Latin speaking. Even at the time the West Germanic tribes invaded en masse the people there probably thought of themselves as equally British and Roman.

It seems to me that the "Welsh" ("others" in Germanic) and "British" identity were formed more as a product of the Saxon invasion, long after the Western Roman empire had left.

I think it's more about the population displacement. The Romans still didn't move large numbers of their population to Gaul, even if they butchered the Gauls. In Britain this certainly didn't happen, the Gaelic population remained, although the Romans did destroy the druids, famously cleansing the druidic religious centre on Anglesea by killing everyone and burning everything.

The language changed over decades as the upper classes became Romanised (and in the same way Normanised a thousand years later), with Latin/French becoming the courtly language and Gaelic/Saxon the commoner's language. Until finally English emerges as a bastardised combination of all of them.

Whereas in the Danelaw the invaders changed the language and culture in a single generation wherever they took over. Though it's interesting that on the Isle of Man the Viking raiders only killed the men, and settled down on the island with the Manx women, resulting in a Gaelic-speaking Danish culture. There are places in Scotland where this happened too. It's a different combination from the Danelaw, where the settlers brought their own women and the English were displaced completely.

"Britain" is a Romanised corruption of the pre-Roman Gaelic name for the island, "Prydwen". The British identity was already well established before the Romans. They became the "Romano-British" under Roman rule, still speaking Gaelic, and then the Welsh as they were displaced by the incoming Saxons (and still speaking Gaelic!). The Welsh identity is definitely a product of the Saxon invasion, as you say, including the massive still-smouldering resentment of the Saxons (they refer to England as "Lloegyr" which I was told by a Welsh historian means "lost lands" but that doesn't seem to be accurate).

Nit: Gaelic is the wrong word here. They spoke Brittonic. "Gaelic" is "Q Celtic", spoken exclusively at that point in Ireland (and then later by Irish settlers in the north of Britain which became the Scotts).

The Brittonic speakers later became the Welsh, Cornish, and (as emigres to the continent) the Breton.

Very different branches of the Celtic language tree. Not mutually intelligible. Brittonic has more in common with (extinct) Gaulish ("P celtic")

Also the Romans established a landholding system in Gaul that took its agricultural lands under Roman control, so in a sense they definitely had impact on the local population. The rich farmland of Gaul was one of the key reasons for the conquest in the first place.

Though service in the Roman military by Gauls themselves meant they could in turn have rights to access the land as Romans. A further method of Romanization though.

I wasn't going to that level of pedantry, but you're absolutely right :)

I've lived in Dublin, the Isle of Man, and Cardiff - really interesting hearing the language and the differences. I even tried learning Manx Gaelic, but didn't get very far.

I've always wondered how Welsh sounds to Scottish or Irish Gaelic speakers and vice versa. Seems like on paper at least they're a bit further apart than, say, Spanish and French, or Norwegian and German, but not as far apart as, say Russian and Lithuanian. Within the same Celtic language family but phonetically so different as to be difficult to recognize? The P/Q thing seems pretty drastic.

Both also seem to have crazy orthography, too, hard for an English speaker to figure out

I've seen a Welsh and Gaelic speaker try and work it out twice now. It sounds "familiar" but doesn't make any sense either way.

Manx and Irish Gaelic is just-about mutually understandable, though with difficulty. It's like a Londoner trying to understand a Glaswegian.

I gave up trying to learn Gaelic after learning that there are no words for "yes" or "no". To agree with someone you have to construct a positive sentence agreeing with them (e.g. "sure and so it is"). This suddenly made so many Irish-English colloquialisms make sense :)

>and within two or three centuries the Gaulish languages and most cultural practices were extinct.

Gaulish was alive and well during the 5th c. Latin really stuck with the Merovingians.

Interesting, just read more on this. The Jean Manco book ("Blood of the Celts") I had read on this topic seemed to err on an earlier side for the end of spoken Gaulish, but it sounds like some people people believe it may even have lasted into the 9th and 10th centuries (!). Some people even say there's evidence of contact with Breton, which would be neat (I wonder if there'd be some mutual intelligibility between those two, that late!)

* https://www.academia.edu/28555947/ON_THE_GAULISH_INFLUENCE_O...

Gaulish being around in the 9th or 10th centuries is a bit fanciful. As far as I know direct sightings end during the 5th century and circumstantial evidence ends during the 6th c., at the same time Christianity became truly ubiquitous even in remote areas and Latin was solidified as the only cultural language. It makes little sense for Gaulish to have survived much longer.

There's certainly a case to be made for some dialects of Breton having a Gaulish substrate (after all Gallo-Romance languages all have it and that mutation occurred around the time Bretons migrated into Gaul).

Yeah the paper I linked to above is pretty critical about the idea of late attestations of the language generally. Even seems to suggest nothing truly concrete beyond the 3rd century. So leaves it fairly ambivalent about whether there is truly Gaulish influence into Breton.

I find this stuff fascinating :-)

Neat matching of username to comment!

I don’t think op was trying to start a greatest victim/oppressor discussion.

He pointed out that Valhalla the game left a lot out, and probably isn’t very historically accurate when it comes to Viking conduct.

Yes, many games, TV-series as well as films ('the Dig') seem to pop up signaling a renewed interest in this period. As a Scandinavian it is with mixed pride and horror that the savage war-loving nature of our past is uncovered, which at the same time contributed to the early formation of many of the most influential kingdoms in history after the fall of the Roman Empire. Such as England (the Anglo-Saxons, and later the Vikings), Russia (the Rus), and Spain (the Visigoths). Not to mention the mark that the Normans made in early Europe.

This influence is a tribute to the power of war and plunder and the renewed interest in the time period is probably in part related to the current zeitgeist in which chauvinism and the rattling of swords is once more on the agenda. Given the immense firepower at our disposal currently we should perhaps better try and counter with stories about the benefits of peace, too.

As also a Scandinavian, I find that I have neither much pride nor horror. I guess I am fascinated by our history without wanting to emulate it. Similarly, I am an adamant pacifist, but I nevertheless love WWII histories, novels, and movies. I don't want there to be another world war, but I am still fascinated by the ones we've had.

I do empathize with your feelings. I think they are natural of course. I do however wonder if there ever really was a time when chauvinism and sabre-rattling were not on the agenda? Maybe not to the same degree, perhaps. I do think the "better angels of our nature" trend will continue over the very long term. There are always rough periods.

Ultimately, I agree fully with your prescription. Those of us who love peace should promote peace. I think we can do so while acknowledging and exploring the dark sides of history. You know, the learn from our mistakes adage and all that.

War can be a necessary evil. But even when needed it's still evil.

What often appeals about WWII is one side was clearly good, and one side clearly not, that moral clarity is often lacking today.

For me it was overhearing a few episodes of the British History Podcast [0] (not being a podcast person myself) which prompted a click. Highly recommended if you're into this time period; the podcast just reached Episode 365, in the mighty year 1050. If you ever believed that the Dark Ages were truly Dark, there are few better ways to disabuse yourself of that notion than listening to a few episodes....

[0] https://www.thebritishhistorypodcast.com/

I’m a history nerd in general but it was Tolkien describing how he wondered what the Anglo-Saxons would have thought of the Roman structures (and comparing it to the Hobbits viewing the First Age Elven structures) that originally piqued my interest in the Anglo-Saxons. But any game that sparks that interest in others is okay by me, even if I’ll likely never play it due to a low attention span when it comes to games other than the Legend of Zelda.

There's a poem written by an Anglo-Saxon about a Roman ruin (which Tolkien was aware of, and perhaps you are too!):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ruin

Someone here points out that there are a lot of significant ruins in The Lord of the Rings:

https://feudalendeavor.pressbooks.com/chapter/meldingofanglo...

It's just a fashionable theme these days. I'm not quite sure about the « educational content ». It seems to be beyond fantastical when it comes to ethnic interactions and religion. It's quite worrying seeing where people get their historical pointers from.

The series Vikings, as well.

Much of what's described in this article is represented in the series.

And “The Last Kingdom” on Netflix. Very interesting seeing the Saxon response to the Viking invasions.

Such an incredible series.

I'm in the middle of Vikings season 5 so I naturally clicked.

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