If the period between the departure of the Romans from Britain (c.410) and the Norman Conquest (1066) is generally referred to as the Dark Ages, then the period from the departure of the Romans to the ascendancy of the Northumbrian kingdom at c.550-600 is certainly the darkest. In the north west of Britain, this amounts to an nearly complete blackout. The Dark ages were a period of tension, firstly between the native British (Celtic) factions (tribes, nations or whatever), and secondly between the Britons and a succession of invaders (Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Danes and Vikings.) For the first 150 years after the Romans left in 409, the tensions of the northern British were predominantly inter-tribal, whilst the southern British were increasingly under severe pressure from external invaders. Historical records are relatively few, for whilst the later native Britons (and the Welsh in particular) kept fairly extensive records in the form of ballads, the invaders kept few or no records until nearer the end of the period. Added to this dearth of primary documentary, historical evidence, the archaeological information is also scarce because the invaders generally abandonned the Roman cities and built in wood and perishable materials rather than stone. Knowledge of this era is very substantially inferior to that of the Roman period. Primary sources of the developments occurring in specifically in the north west between the Mersy and the Clyde are non-existent.
The area covered by present day [Lancashire] and the [Craven] region of the West Riding of Yorkshire was clearly an important region in Roman times. There was the city of [Bremetonacum] (Ribchester) and its associated port on the river [Bellisama] (Ribble), just at about the limit of tidal flow. There was the fort at [Elsack] guarding the approach to the Aire gap through the [Pennines] on the road to [York], the fort at [Lancaster] on the [Lune] estuary which was important enought to be re-strengthened late in the Roman period. The Roman road system had a major junction near present-day Ribchester, with branches off the [main north-south road] to the Roman setlement at [Kirham], the alternate [north road] through [Catterall] to Lancaster, and the road through the [Aire Gap] eastwards to York. A few miles north of the fort at [Elslack] was the large Roman villa at [Gargrave] and the extensive Roman (and pre-Roman) farming region (still traceable) in [Wharfedale] in the [Grassington] area. Further east along the Roman road were the setlements in lower Wharfedale such as that at [Ilkley].
At the time of the [Norman Conquest], the area was known to be in a very depressed state as the result of the [Viking raids] in the tenth and eleventh centuries, and the [Domesday] survey records a very low population density. Nevertheless ,the area rebounded very quickly to become the home lands of the [House of Lancaster], providing Kings of England by 13.. The Normans built the great castles of [Lancaster] (home of the House of Lancaster and commanding the road to the north and the Lune estuary) and [Skipton] (Home of the [Cliffords] and commanding the [Aire Gap]. The House of Lancaster were later to build [Greenhalgh Castle] at [Bonds] near Catterall, commanding the narrow gap on the north-south road between the marshes of [Pilling] on the west and the [Forest of Bowland] marking the start of the [Pennines] on the east.)
In between these periods of affluence, in the Dark Ages, there are virtually no historical records. There was the [great battle] recorded in the [Anglo-Saxon Chronicle] fought at [Whalley] in 798 when [Wada] was the great local chieftain, and when [Alric] was slain. There was the discovery of the greatest Viking treasure hoard ever found, at [Cuerdale], on the south bank of the Ribble, near [Preston] in 182., and dated to the early tenth century. There is the recorded purchase of the whole of [Amounderness] (roughly comensurate with the [Fylde]) by [King Athelstan] in 92. from the [Danes].
And that is just about the sum total of six centuries of history and archaeology, unless one were to include the disputed possibility of the battle of [Brunanburgh] (the city on the river Brun) being fought on the Brun at or near Burnley in an approach to the Aire gap, where [Athelstan's victory] over the combined Danish, Viking, Irish and Pictish forces sealed the unification of the whole of the Island of Britain for the first time. The British defeat at the [battle of Catraeth] in 598, which marked the start of the downfall and retreat of the British kingdoms in the north before the invading [Anglian] settlers has been located at [Catterick] to the east of the Pennines. This battle, is recorded in [Y Gododdin] as a British attempt to regain control of [Catraeth] which had earlier been subject to Urien of Rheged. Historians have dismissed the claim of [Rheged] to [Catterick] as extremely unlikely. There is just the barest possibility that [Catraeth] was not [Catterick] in the east, but [Catrehala] in the west on the borders of the [Fylde], and that the [Danes] from the north east had penetrated the [Aire Gap] to establish a presence west of the [Pennines] as a stepping stone to later successful raids on [Lancashire] south of the [Ribble], [Chester] and [Gwynedd] in North Wales.
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It is almost inconceivable that an area so important both before and after the Dark Ages could be uninhabited or without any history in between these two periods. The region lay between the well established British kingdom of Elmet in the south (covering the area of Yorkshire south of Wharfedale) and the rather more ephemeral British Kingdom of Rheged in the north (centred on the Eden valley south of Carlisle.) This area, which has been called the kingdom of Craven, lay at the western end of the Aire Gap, the easiest way through the Pennines from their start south of the White Peak area of Derbyshire, to the Tyne-Tees gap on the borders of Scotland. The only records existing for this area in the Dark Ages are in Celtic heroic poem-ballads.
However, although what follows is not 'real' history, it is all that can be achieved by the imaginative reconstruction of events in the north from the existing Celtic sources in the form of poems and ballads celebrating the achivements of heroic Celtic warrior chieftains in the fight against the invaders from the east.
It is a period of great interest and importance in determining the peoples and the social structure of the emerging nation. The invaders brought with them non-Christian religion with which replaced native Christianity for a while in newly settled areas. Although the invaders later accepted Christianity from the Celtic Irish, this was soon dominated by Rome, and was at variance with the local Celtic Christianity, and created further tensions during the consoldation of the English nation. The local (Celtic) peoples in the south resisted strongly for a hundred years, sometimes halting and occasionally driving back the invaders, but then progressively gave way, retreating primarily into Wales.
In the north, and particularly in the north west, the only external enemies at first were the Irish from the west, the Picts from the north and possibly the Welsh from the south. The external pressures were not sufficiently strong to override local political conflicts. The Irish concentrated mainly on the the Argyll area (with the establishment of the kingdom of Dal Riada) and in north west Wales (the establishment of Gwynedd.) There is some evidence of Irish raids on the Lancashire coast, and salleys up the Mersey and the Ribble, but the Irish were apparently satisfied with the settlement of the Isle of Man off the Lancastrian coast, and there is no evidence for Irish settlements in Lancashire. The military activities of the Irish thus were not sufficiently pressing to divert the Britons in the north west from their own inter-tribal squabbles.
For the first two hundred years or so of post-Roman Britain, the general political picture in the north is one of internal inter-tribal disputes between native British tribes. In the south, local inter-tribal disputes were held in abeyance by pressures from the east and south by Germanic invaders, and from the west by the Irish. However, at least one military expedition against the Picts in the north is recorded. It was not until the time of Athelstan (c. 930) that the country was united as a single (but non-British) nation.
In this survey we are mainly concerned with the north west area of Britain, and Lancashire in particular, where records are at their vaguest and weakest:
"Concerning the central Pennines there is no literary evidence. Whether the Setantii of the Fylde, for example, survived as a kingdom into the sixth century we have no way of knowing. ... The best candidate for a Dark Age kingdom is the British name Craven. Although no dynastic information has survived, this name was attached to a wide area during the later Middle Ages, stretching [east] from the Ribble valley and Dentdale across the Yorkshire Dales. The core of it was a wapentake in Domesday Book, to which outlying manors in Cartmel were attached, implying that Craven may once have stretched as far [west] as Lancashire north of the sands." (N. J. Higham, "The Kingdom of Northumbria", Gloucester, U.K., Alan Sutton, 1993,p.83)
King Alfred had created Lonkeshire (from the capital Lancaster on the Lune) whn he divided the country into counties (*** date 9.. ***), it may perhaps be seen as a perpetuation of the Craven kingdom, that Domesday does not include Lancashire as a separate county. The area south of the Ribble was included in Cheshire, and the area north of the Ribble in the West Riding of the new county Yorkshire created by the Conqueror.
To the Romans, the land between the Mersey and the Lune had been known as the land of the Setantii, and was part of Britannia Inferior, the militarized buffer zone between the Romanized Britannia Superior of the south and the unconquered Scots and Picts north of Hadrian's Wall. Indeed, the boundary of the area under control of the Wall Command, which crossed the country from east to west defining a narrow strip along the line of the wall, turns south at Carlisle and heads east again to enclose the entire Craven area. (N. J. Higham, op. cit., p. 48)
It was during the Roman period that Christianity was first introduced into Britain. In 383 Magnus Maximus who had married Elen Lwddog, the daughter of a British chieftain, declared himself Empror and marched on Rome, taking Elen with him. Magnus was finally defeated in 388, and Elen returned to Britain as a Christian. A daughter of Magnus and Elen was to marry [Vortigern, see below.]
For the first two hundred years of Roman rule, the Empire had seen the Scots and Picts of the north as the dominant threat, but after c.250, there were raids from the (non-Christian) Irish, who had settled the Isle of Man, Dyfed (St. Davids), Gwynedd (N. Wales), possibly Cornwall, and had raided the south coast as far as the Isle of Wight, and an increasing number of raids by Saxons on the east and south coasts. The Irish (Scots) from northern Ireland were also settling in Argyll, creating the kingdom of Dal Riada, and pressuring the Picts from the west. The piratical activities of the Saxons lead the Romans to create a series of military forts stretching from the Wash south and round to Selsey Bill, known as the Saxon Shore. The military forts of Carlisle and Lancaster were also strengthened in a manner similar to the Saxon Shore forts to resist the Irish. By the end of the Roman period, the country was already under pressure from all directions when the pirate raids of the Saxons began to turn into settlemnt endeavours. There is also some evidence for the beginning of Danish settlements in the north-east at this time.
One interesting feature, pointing to a strong Celtic presence in the north west is the apparent diminution of the threat from the Picts and Scots in the North towards the end of the Roman occupation. There was a major ant-Roman insurrection in 367, when the Picts broke through the defensive system at Hadrian's Wall, and swept south, raiding down almost as far as the south coast, but not causing too much havoc in the north west. The insurrection was controlled by the Romans (or the Picts returned north saisfied with their spoils) and there is no evidence of any further serious attempt on the Hadrian's Wall boundary, despite the complete withdrawal of the Romans in the late fourth and early fifth centuries. Hadrian's Wall did undergo some re-furbishment after the events of 367, but also seems to have all political significance after 400. Any real threat from the Danish invaders on the north east cost did not arise until c.600, and for two hundred years or so, the northern Britons were left to concentrate on their own inter tribal rivalries. The situation in the south was very different, The threat from Germanic peoples, first as raiders and pirates had been a major concern of the later Roman setlements in the south, and shortly after the departure of the Romans, the raids began to turn into settlement efforts (c. 410-440.)
It is well established that the English did not achive any real supremacy in the north until around the end of the sixth century, and all the evidence appears to point to a very rapid re-establishment of strong British rule in the area between the Mersey-Humber in the south and the Forth-Clyde in the north around the end of the fourth century, which persisted for almost two hundred years. The English who settled on the north east coast had a very formidable task in carving their kingdom out of strong British, not Pictish or Scottish, territory, a fight which finally approached completion only with the battle of Catraeth in 597 (*** ?? ***). Possibly the establishment of a strong Irish settlement in Argyll, the kingdom of Dal Riada, helped to draw Pictish aggression away from the Hadrian's Wall area.
The pressures on the southern Britsh kingdoms, together with the loss of an extensive marketing system and an established bureaucratic control system, were the inheritance of the native Celtic peoples on the departure of the Romans early in the fifth century, and in 410-420 we see the re-emergence of Celtic Britain from under Roman rule. The 'big city' approach of the Romanized British faded slowly, and there were many clear re-furbishments of much older native British hill forts. At this time Britain consisted of a number of self-governing, Romanized civitates (city states) - [Gildas], writing about 560 says twenty eight of them - and numerous rural areas occupied by tribes ruled by Celtic chieftains in the traditional Celtic way. In the south, the civitates dominated, in the north the rural tribal areas - a pattern determined largely by Roman setlement. These rural tribal leaders and the city magnates elected an 'overlord', based in London, who ruled with the aid of a council of 300 representatives (300 had mystical significance to the Celts, and may well not be thr true number.) The name of the first 'overlord' is not known, but his title, 'Vawr-tighern' became used as a personal name - Vortigern.
Although we know very little about the re-emergent Britrish kingdoms of the north in the perion c.400-600, it is clear that the most powerful Celtic kingdom in the north in the succeeding seventh century was the kingdom of Strathcklyde, centered on Dumbarton, and there is evidence that this was not a new kingdom, even in the mid fifth century. A letter of about 450, from Patrick, in Ireland, to Coroticus (or Ceredig) king of Strathclyde exists in which Patrick complains about the treatment of young Christian men from Ireland at the hands of a roving band of British Celts, nominally under the control of Coroticus. The kingdom of the Gododdin surely existed to the east of Strathclyde, and to the south there was Rheged, centered on the Eden valley south of Carlisle. Further to the south, the existence of the kingdom of Elmet, centered on the area east and south of present day Leeds, is firmly established. between Rheged and Elmet, thre very possibly existed yet another Celtic kingdom covering the Craven area and extending westwards to the Lancashire coast.
By 446 the British were reduced to an appeal for help was addressed to Aetius, the Roman commander of forces in Europe.
"The barbarians drive us back to the sea, the sea drives us back to the barbarians; between these two kinds of death we are either slaughtered or drowned ..."
However, the Romans were themselves very hard pressed at home and in Europe, and the only response to the appeal for help was a visit by two ecclesiasticals, Germanus of Auxerre and Severus of Triers in 447, but little military help came of this visit. Indeed the Bishops seem to have been more concerned about Pelagian heresy within the Celtic Christian church.
[link to the Pelagius - Augustine conflict] Finally 'Vortigern' (who was strong enough to maintain his overlord position for thirty years) appealed to a group of Gemanic people to come to his aid, as mercenaries, in the struggles against the Saxon invaders in the south, and the Picts and Scots in the north. In return for their help he promised them lands to settle in, and supplies to live by. Traditionally he gave them the Isle of Thanet in Kent, but there is little evidence to support this.
In 449, the mercenaries arrived with their families, lead by two brothers, Hengist and Horsa. Bede claims they were Jutes from Jutland, but Stenton has argued strongly that they were Franks from the Rhineland. The Jutes and the Franks were closely related (in a tribal sense) to the Saxon raiders, and the language and dialect of the south east of Britain, particularly Kent, stems from Jutish and Frankish. There is some archaeological evidence that Angles had already begun to settle in the north and east in the coastal areas of Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, and their language was the origin of the midland and northern dialects. All three invaders contributed to the standard Old English (popularly known as Anglo-Saxon). [See Mario Pei, p.33]
For about a year, the mercenaries kept to the bargain with Vortigern and fought against the Saxon invaders in the east and south, and faced the Picts in the North, and might even have opposed the Irish in the west. After a year, a dispute between Vortigern and Hengist about payments due to the mercenaries, caused Hengist to ally with the Angle and Saxon invaders and turn on Vortigern.
[Nennius] claims that Vortigern was tricked into marrying the daughter of Hengist and promising her half his kingdom. What happened to Severa, daughter of Elen is not clear.
The invaders, lead by Hengist concentrated their attack on the cities (easy to identify and rich in loot), but never managed to take London. Vortimer, the son of Vortigern, held the mercenaries back in Kent for ten years before they 'treacherously' killed the British contingent at a treaty meeting in 465, after which Vortigern ceded all his lands to Hengist. the raiders now broke out of Thanet and started spreading over south east Britain.
Vortigern is thus castigated by [Bede? or Nennius] as 'the great traitor' who was responsible for the success of the invading Saxons.
A new British leader now emerges, his latinized name is is given as Ambrosius Aureolanus,but he was Emrys to the British. Ambrosius is credited with holding the invaders in check until 473 when the Celts suffered a major defeat in Kent. In 488 Hengist disappears and is succeeded by his son Aesc. At the same time Ambrosius also disappears. Ambrosius ahs been claimed as the historic Arthur, but there is liitle to support this view. Perhaps a better solution is that he was the 'southern half' of the Arthur whose widely ranging battles are recorded by Nennius, and Badon at least is better attributed to Ambrosious than Arthur. Howver, this leaves us with a mismatch of dates between the battles of Arthur and the those of Ambrosius: the death of Arthur at Camlann is dated to c.545, but Ambrosius was fighting the Saxons up to 473.
At this stage we have the Angles established in the East (East Anglia), the Saxons north of the Thames, and the Jutes (or Franks) settled in Kent. Together with the Danes and the Norman French they called themseves the Aenglisc, but the native Celts referred to them all collectively as Saxons.
The next invasion came from a Saxon tribe in South Jutland, led by Aelle who landed on the south coast and after a 14 year struggle established by 491 a strong South Saxon community. Aelle is not heard of again, but [Bede] describes him as the first 'Bretenanwealda', lord of Britain.
In 495, Cerdic, another Saxon, landed near Southampton and began to settle northward, founding the West Saxon kingdom which was later to become dominant. In 508, Cerdic and his grandson Cynric defeated the Celts in battle, and wone again in 514, with his nephews Stuf and Wihtgar.
At the opening of the sixth century, the British Celts in the south were very definitely under strong pressures from all directions and retreating before the invaders. The scene is set for the emergence of Arthur as a national hero to oppose the invaders.
English (Celtic) writing records the next generation, c. 515-540, as a major resurgence of Celtic power. During this period the British defeated the invaders on all sides in a succession of battles which resulted in the halting of the Saxon advances for somewhere between 30 and 60 years. Not surprisingly this major reversal could only be achieved by a great hero, and Celtic sources provide one in Arthur. It is ironic that the legend of ASrtur was later adopted so completely by the English (and spread throughout the continent), and that by the time of Malory (1485), Arthur had become a King of the English, and the native Celts were forgotten.
The name Arthur could be either Roman or Celtic, we have:
The Roman Artorius Justus served in Britain in the third century Artur, son of Nemed in Irish records Art Aenfer - High King of Ireland 220-250 Artos Viros - a Celtic deity (Pre-Christian) - the Bear man Arth Gwyr - Welsh Artio - Gail
There are two key texts to the story of Arthur as a historical character: the ["History of the Britons"] by Nennius and the ["Annals of Wales: the Annales Cambriae"] by an anonymous group of monkish authors. Both have been said to contain material originating in the fifth and sixth centuries, but our major source is the Harleian MS. 3859 in the British Library. This dates from the early 1100's, and is a miscelleany of sources including both Nennius and the Annales Cambriae bound together.
Historians rightly back off the story of Arthur, the documentary evidence is too clouded with the heroic ballads of the Celtic tradition, and the totally inadmissable later romances. [Stenton] and [Hunter Blair] barely give him a mention. [Nennius] and the [Annales Cambriae] are the prime sources, but both were written much later (early ninth century.) The account of Arthur's battles by Nennius is brief but contains a few pointers:
"Then Arthur fought against them [the Anglo-Saxons] in those days with the kings of the Britons, but he himself was the leader of battles. The first battle was at the mouth of the river Glein. the second, third, fourth and fifth on another river called Dubglas in the district of Linnius. The sixth battle on the river Bassus. The seventh battle was in the Caledonian forest, that is Cat Coit Celidon. The eighth battle was in Fort Guinnion in which Arthur carried the image of St, Masry, forever virgin, on his shoulders and that day the pagans were turned to flight and a great slaughter was made on them through the virtue of out Lord Jesus Christ and through the virtue his mother St. Mary the Virgin. The ninth battle took place in the City of the legion. The tenth battle he fought on the shore of the river which is called Tribruit. The eleventh battle took place on the mountain called Agned. The twelfth battle was on badon Hill, in which nine hudred and sixty men fell in one day from one attack by Arthur, and no one overthrew them but himself alone. And in these battles he was the victor."
Nennius is supported by an apparently casual or 'throw-away' reference to Arthur in [Y Gododdin] by the Welsh poet Aneurin, and by numerous references (without mentioning Arthur by name) to the major battle [Mount Badon].
One recent atttempt to identify the status of Arthur is the account of Peter Beresford Ellis in "Celt and Saxon" is at least consistent and superficially very attractive: Arthur is a southern Celtish war leader, possibly of Elmet, whose successes in battle lead to his adoption as an overall war leader for the Celtish nations. Arthur moves rapidly around the country defeating first the East Anglians, then the Picts and Scots, next the Irish at Chester, followed by a return to Scoland, and finally winning the major victory over the Saxons at Badon in the south. The only objection to this picture is the logistics of moving and supporting a large, multi-national army around the country.
Beresford Ellis sets the stage: Nennius clearly identifes Arthur as a military leader who was acceptable to the chieftains of several Celtic tribes in Britain in the early years of the sixth century when they were under intense pressure from all directions, and gradually being squeezed out of their lands. Such acceptance could surely only have been achieved by success in battle. The battle fronts existing were from the Picts in the north, the Irish in the west, the South Saxons, the West saxons, The Jutes in Kent, the east Anglians, and the Anglians north of the Humber.
Nennius records a series of twelve major battles fought by the British, led by Arthur, against the 'Saxons' (i.e. all or any of the invaders.) The descriptions are short and, in particular, the dates, the locations of the battles, and the opponents of the British ar difficult to identify. It is barely possibble to regard the battles of Arthur in a true historical light, but it does seem established, firstly, that early in the sixth century the British were under heavy pressure from the invaders, from all directions, and that they were losing battles against the invaders, and secondly, that by c.530-540 the pressure had eased very considerably and the British had achieved a major victory over the Saxons, and as a result remained relatiively free of trouble for something like a generation (c.30 years.) Some action in the early sixth century had clearly reversed the fortunes of war. Beresford Ellis, and others before him, have identified this reversal of fortunes as arising from the victories of Arthur as recorded by Nennius. The side comment by Aneurin in Y Gododdin *** need a date here*** that the defeated leader of the British at Catraeth in 593 'was not Arthur' lends some support to the timing of Arthur's battles and to the existence of a major and successful war leader of that name among the British in earlier times.
The first battle was fought on the banks of the River Glein. There are (at least) two River Glen possibilities: one in Northumbria and one in Lincolnshire. At the time, the East Anglians were pushing the boundaries of the British kingdom [Elmet], adjacent to East Anglia, and Beresford Ellis uses this to indicate that the Lincolnshire Glen was the River Glein of Nennius, and the opponents of the British the East Anglians. This appears very reasonable, although there were, probably, small Anglian settlements emerging in Northunbria, there is no evidence that they posed a serious threat early in the sixth century. Ellis also puts forward the reasonable speculation that Arthur might have been a war leader of Elmet who sufficiently impressed other British chieftains with his victory on the Glein, that they were prepared to accept him as an overall war leader of all the British tribes and kingdoms in the struggle against the invaders.
The site of the next four battles is given by Nennius as on the banks of, or near, the River Dubglas in the region of Linnius. There are several River Douglas's to choose from. Whitaker in his History of Manchester, HOM, *** date ***(not the T.D. Whitaker of the History of Whalley) as a patriotic Lancastrian identifies the site of these four battles as on the River Douglas in Lancashire south of the Ribble, near Wigan. In evidence he puts forward the find of a mound of old horse shoes and many human bones when the canal at Wigan was dug *** need some more detail here *** - valid evidence for a major battle in this region at some time. [Kay] and others later pointed out the existence of many Celtic names in this area (even Welsh Whittle for example.) Whitaker identifies the 'region of Linnius' as indicating a region close to a lake or mere. Martin Mere which dominates that area of southern Lancahire is the obvious candidate. If we accept the role of Artur as fighting the Saxons, then perhaps the strongest argument against the Lancashire Douglas is the lack of anyone to fight. Southern Lancashire was in the heart of British territory and not obviously under any major threat (but see the location by Ellis of the ninth battle at Chester, below.)
Beresford Ellis, however, argues that these four battles were located in the Lincolnshire area, and that Linnius is a version of Lindsey, the area around the River Witham. He then identifies the river Douglas with the Witham on the grounds that it is the only suitably major river in the Lindsey area. Not the strongest of grounds, and this identification places four more battles very close to the first one. A major victory in the first battle was unlikely to be followed by a series of four more battles against the same enemy in the same area. Nevertheless, there is someone to fight in Lindsey, and this identification looks stronger than the case for the Lancashire Douglas.
Other interpretions have placed the Douglas in Scotland or Cornwall.
The sixth battle is located by Nennius on the River Bassus. Location of the Bassus is still open, but there is a Basa's Ford across a river in Nottingham, which is favored by Ellis. Alternatively, we suggest the 'Bassus' could be Nennius' corruption of the 'Bellisama' of the Romans (the River Ribble), a very suitable place for the Irish to land. Bellisama is at least closer to Bassus than Douglas is to Witham!
With the seventh battle we are closer to a real location. Nennius says the battle was fought in the Silva Calledonia, the wood of Scotland (British: Cat Coit Celidon). Clearly Arthur had moved north to oppose the Picts and Scots.
The eighth battle at Guinnion is unidenfiable, but could be southern Scotland.
With the ninth battle we are again on relatively firm ground, this was fought 'in the city of the legion', Castra Legionum, which is Chester. Arthur had moved south again to clear the Irish invaders out of the City of Chester. Note the fighting was 'in the city', not near it. Presumably the Irish had sailed up the Mersey or the Dee to take Chester (moving south and trying again after their defeat by Arthur in a battle on the Bellisama?)
With the tenth battle Arthur is back in southern Scotland again on the River Tribuit or Tribruit. A welsh poem also describes this battle and mentions Bedwyr as fight for Arthur (the Bedvere of the later romances?)
The eleventh battle Arthur fought at a hill called Agned. In th British Museum MS. containing the Annales Cambriae, Agned is also named Bregomion, whilst in another version in the Vatican Library it is referred to as Breguoin. This has been identified with Bremenium, a Roman fort in the Cheviot Hills at High Rochester.
And finally, for the twelfth battle there was major victory in the south at Mount Badon in 516-518, where Arthur defeated the West Saxons. Badon which is referred to by several independent sources was apparently sufficiently important to stop the advance of the invaders for something like 30 years. Badon has ben identified with either Liddington Casle, a British defensive hill site dated to the sixth century, with the village of Badbury (Celtic: Baddon-byrig) at its foot, or (rather less likely) with Solsbury hill, near Batheaston in Somerset.. The siting of the battle at a defensive hill site suggests that Artur was beseiged by the West Saxons, but eventually (after 3 days of fighting) gained the victory over the beseigers.
Finally, the [Annales Cambriae] record the battle of Camlann in which Arthur (and Medraut) were killed in 537-539. Camlann has been variously identified with Camboglamma, a fort on Hadrian's Wall at Birdoswald in Cumberland (*** Cumbria ? check new boundaries ***), with the River Cam in Somerset, and with the River Camel in Cornwall. Camlann is not mentioned in the [Anglo-Saxon Chronicle], therefore it may well have against the Picts or Scots (favouring Camboglanna), or aginst Irish settlers in the West Country, favouring Somerset or possibly Cornwall. Lacking further evidence, anywhere with 'cam' in the name is a possible site.
If we follow Beresford Ellis, we have Arthur running around Britain with his armies, fighting every enemy of the Britons.
What can we make of this reconstruction of Nennius' story? In summary, we are fairly sure of the date - end of the fifth and early sixth centuries - we have probably three definite locations of sites - the forest of Scotland (i.e. the forested area north of Carlisle), High Rochester in the Cheviot Hills, and Chester, the City of the Legions - while Arthur's presence at Mount Badon has been seriously questioned. We know a strong British country emerged with 20-30 years of Arthur's time (Rheged, centered on Carlisle and the Eden Valley, which was perhaps contiguous with Elmet in the south, or more likely with another British kingdom, Craven, between them. All these are associated with the north and north west of Britain, and all are clearly out of reach of any Anglo-Saxon settlements at that time. If we exclude Arthur from Badon, the only evidence for Arthur opposing the Saxon settlement moves in the south is the word of Nennius.
Excluding Badon, the remainder of Arthur's exploits are very reasonably located in or around the north west of what is now England. Any southern battles we could very reasonably infer were fought by Ambrosius Aurelianus, who disappeared so suddenly from the records. We must then assume that Nennius was conflating the victories of two British war leaders, Arthur in the north, and Ambrosius in the south. Separating them again, we might be inclined to accept Michael Wood's suggestion in ["In Search of the Dark Ages"
"Is it possible that Arthur existed as a chieftain and war leader in the Solway region, not fighting heroic warfare against the Anglo-Saxon invaders, but engaged in a desperate dog-fight between rival Britiish dynasties, battling it out in the sub-Roman twilight."
Following up on this interpretation, we might identify the battle in the forest of Scotland as a dispute between Rheged and the more northerly kingdom of Strathclyde, the battle at High Rochester as a territorial dispute with the Gododdin, the battle at Chester as a follow-up to the repulse of the Irish at the Bassus (Bellisama or Ribble). And perhaps we ought to re-assess the case made by Whitaker for locating the four battles on the Douglas near Wigan - as disputes between Rheged (or Craven) and Elmet. Or possibly this could have been the absorption of Craven into Rheged. Certainly within a few years of the Arthurian battles, Rheged emerged as a major British power, and at the battle of Catraeth in 598 Rheged was supported by both Strathclyde and Elmet in a last ditch attempt to prevent the annexation of the north west by the new, Anglian, kingdom of Northunbria. Arthur then emerges as a Celtic war leader who was responsible for the rise to power of the kingdom of Rheged.
The final battle of Camlann, in which Arthur and Mordred died might now bear re-examination. That there was a battle at Camlann is well established. The Roman fort at Birdoswald on Hadrian's wall near Carlisle was called Camboglanna. Perhaps this was indeed the end of Arthur.
But if Arthur was responsible for the rise of Rheged, where are the records. Old heros and founders are very important in the Celtish tradition. Surely Urien, or the poet Aneirin who sang his praise at Catraeth in Y Gododdin, would have stressed the lineage between Urien and Arthur? Perhaps this is exactly what Aneurin was doing when he refers to the the defeated British leader as 'he was not Arthur'.
A few last words.
Many of Arthur's acivities and sites have been associated with the West Country from Somerset through to Cornwall, mainly on the evidence of place-names. There appears to be little in favour of his location in that area, and possibly it is best explainmed in terms of the later acretions, as the story of Arthur became European property. The popular identification of Arthur's Camelot with the British camp at South Cadbury in Somerset is untenable, the name Camelot originated in France in the twelfth century.
W.A. Cummins, putting much greater reliance on the later ["History of the Kings of Brotain"] by Geoffrey of Monmouth, has attempted to push the legend of Arthur much farther back in time, to long before the coming of the Romans, to the period of [Stonehenge].
The kingdom of Northumbria traced its origins back to Ida in c.450, but the toriginal settlers in the north east of Britain were hard pushed to maintain an existence for the first hundred years or so. It is not until c.550 that Anglian settlements became a serious power and started to expand north and west into British territory. The territorial disputes came to a head towards the end of the sixth century, when the Gododdin from south east Scotland retaliated by beseiging the major Northumbrian settlements at [Lindisfarne] and [Bamburgh].
The siege of Bamburgh was soon followed by a concerted attack by a number of allied British kingdoms on the Northumbrians, where the Britons suffered a major defeat and the Northumbrians expanded to the west. The story of the Battle of Catraeth was recorded by Aneurin in the poem ['Y Gododdin']. An alliance of British nations from Strathclyde, north of Rheged, the Gododdin in south east Scotland and Elmet in southern Yorkshire were lead by Urien of Rheged to attack the settlement of Catraeth, where they were soundly defeated. The purpose of the raid of Catreath is given as the attempt to regain territory which had been taken by the Northumbrians. Catreath is generally identified with the old Roman city and fort of Catterick on the River Swale in Yorkshire [Stenton]. Catterick (as Catarcorum, the city of the rapids) was clearly an important site in Roman times, it commanded the narrow gap between the North Yorkshire Moors on the East and the Pennines on the West, and was also an important junction of Roman Roads where the pass over Stainmore to the west joined the main Roman road to Edinburgh. Its strategic significance must have been both obvious and important to Northumbrians and British at the end of the sixth century. It is unfortunate that no archaeological evidence has been found for either a major Northumbrian (or British) city, or for any major battle in the area.
There is literary reference that the kingdom of Rheged once included Catraeth, but it has been thought unlikely that the kingdom of Rheged crossed the Pennines to the east. It is, however, extremely probable that Rheged included Catrehala to the south of Lancaster, and the literary reference to Catraeth in Rheged may be a mistaken reference to Catrehala.
Catrehala to the west of the Pennines, and in southern Rheged was strategically in a very similar position to Catterick on the east. Catrehala too commanded an important gap on the road to the north, between the marshes (Pilling Moss) and the steeply rising Pennines to the east. It too commanded a major junction of Roman roads, the road to the north through Lancaster, and the road throught the Pennines following the Ribble-Aire gap (a much easier, low level crossing that the pass of Stainmore.) The attack on Catreath by Rheged, was an attempt to regain a region lost to the Northumbrians, and included warriors from Elmet to the south of the Ribble. Catrehala, too has its major Roman outpost at Ribchester. Just as at Catterick, no archaeological evidence has been found for either a major Northumbrian (or British) city, or for any major battle in the area.
It is conceivable that the Northumbrians had forced their way westward through the Aire gap and now commanded the old Roman road to the north at the gap of Catrhala. This would have effectively split the northern Celtic kingdoms from Elmet and the Welsh Celtic kingdoms south of the Mersey.
The Northumbrian success at the Battle at Catraeth was followed quickly by a successful Northumrian attack on Chester and North Wales. Northumria now included not only Bernicia in the north, but also Deira and York in the south. The defeat of Elmet, and its incorporation into Northumbria soon followed, Northumbria was at the height of its powers, and the northern British kingdoms were either defeated or in retreat.
Towards the end of the eighth century, The kingom of Northumbria, suffered from major internal disputes, and also came under attack from Danish settlers from [ ...]. The sack of the monastic esblishment at Lindisfarne was quickly followed by attacks on Jarrow and Monkwearmouth. The Danes quickly established a foothold, settled and moved westwards across the Pennines. The [Anglo Saxon Chronicle] records a battle in 798 close to Whalley when a chieftain or war leader named Alric was killed.
" 798 ... there was a great battle on Northumbrian land in the spring on 4 Nones April at Whalley and there Alric, son of Heardbearhtes, was killed and many others with him."
The story is repeated by Simeon of Durham, and it was clearly an event of importance to the developing Ango-Saxon nations. Simeon adds the information that the battle occurred in the reign od Eardwulf 'in the region that is called by the English Billangahoth (Langho) near Walalege (Whalley) and that the fight was lead by 'Wada Dux'. Wada is apparently a local, as his name apperas in several place names near Whalley. The victory went to the Danes, and presumably Alric was their leader in this battle.
"798 Conjuratione facta ab interfectoribus Ethelredi regis, Wada Dux in illa cunjuatione cum eis bellum inivit contra Eardwpphum regem in loco qui appellatur ab Anglis Billangahoth juxta Walalege, et, ex utraque parte plurisimus interfectis, Wada Duz cum suis in fugam versus est et Eardwlfus rex victoriam regaliter sumpsit ab inimicis."
Langho is a village, close to Whalley and the junction of the Calder and the Ribble. Close to the junction, near Hacking Hall, is a large conical tumulus called the Loe Hill, 120 yards in circumference. Thomas Dunham Whitaker dug into this tumulus in 1815 and found it to be an artificial mound, but because of its size did not penetrate to the centre. Whitaker suggests that this is a monument to, or the tomb of Alric.. There is hill named Wadhow four miles up the Ribble, whicvh he suggests might have been Wada's camp before the battle, nearby is the town of Wada, Waddington, Edisforth (the Nobleman's Ford) and Wiswall (the Hero's Well.)
It appears that the invading Danes had penetrated the Aire Gap as far as Whalley where they met and defeated resistance from the local Northumbrians, but their leader Alric was killed.
Of this encounter, Whitaker writes:
"Considered as an obscure village in a remote province, this testimony is honourable to Whalley. Few even of our large provincial towns, excepting those which lay claim to Roman antiquity, have any earlier record than the great register of Domesday; but our story reaches nearly three centuries backward into the Saxon era, is connected in its origin with an important national event, and attested by no private register, but by the annals of the Northumbrian kingdom."
The ninth century was a period of consolidation of West Saxon power, and is dominated by the emergence of Mercia in what was becoming England. Danish settlement dominated the north, the Celts had withdrawn into Wales, held safe behind Offa's Dyke, and the British kingdoms north of Hadrian's Wall were keeping the Picts under control. The West Saxons gradually gained control of most of the island south of the Humber, and the main source of conflict was between Mercia in the south and Danish Northumbria in the north, the dividing line fluctuating between the Humber and the Trent. The British kingdoms of Elmet and Rheged were gone, absorbed into Danish Northumbria, there was Danish presence in East Anglia, but this was not a major threat to the Saxons of Mercia.
The end of the ninth century saw the rise of a new external threat. The Vikings from norway sailed around the north of Scotland, settling the Orkney and Shetland Islands on the way, and raided Ireland, establishing a strong foothold in the Dublin area. From this base they raided the west coast of England, threatening both the Danes in the north and the Saxons in the south.