1050 Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain

Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain

 

The Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain was the process of change of the language and culture of most of England, from Romano-British to Germanic. These Germanic-speakers, from diverse origins, eventually developed a common cultural identity as Anglo-Saxons. These changes occurred from the mid 5th to early 7th centuries, after the end of Roman power in Britain. The settlement was followed by the establishment of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the south and east of Britain, later followed by the rest of modern England.
Few contemporary sources deal with the anglicisation of lowland Britain. The available literary, archaeological, and genetic information has a number of interpretations about how settlement may have happened.^[a] The few literary sources tell of violence, with massacre and flight of the Romano-British population from a large-scale invasion by various Germanic peoples. In this view, much of England was cleared of its prior inhabitants, and the genes of English people would have been largely inherited from Anglo-Saxon migrants. A few writers have said that Germanic peoples and culture existed in eastern regions of Britain even in pre-Roman times.
Another view, probably the most widely-held today, is that the migrants were relatively few, centred on a warrior elite. They then dominated a process of acculturation to Germanic language and material culture. The genetic origins of Anglo-Saxon England would thus be largely derived from the native Romano-British population, which the uncertain results of genetic studies tend to support. Alternatively, the early settlers may have arrived in considerable numbers but represented a minority relative to the natives. If the incomers established themselves as a social elite, this could have allowed them enhanced reproductive success. In this case, the genes of later Anglo-Saxon England could have been largely derived from moderate numbers of Germanic migrants

 

By AD 400, the Roman provinces in Britain (all the territory to the south of Hadrian's Wall) were a peripheral part of the Roman Empire in the west, occasionally lost to rebellion or invasion, but until then always eventually recovered. That cycle of loss and recapture collapsed over the next decade. Eventually around 410, although Roman power remained a force to be reckoned with for a further three generations across much of Gaul, Britain slipped beyond direct imperial control into a phase which has generally been termed "sub-Roman".^[4]
The history of this period has traditionally been a narrative of decline and fall. However, evidence from Verulamium suggests that urban-type rebuilding,^[5] featuring piped water, was continuing late on in the 5th century, if not beyond. At Silchester, there are signs of sub-Roman occupation down to around AD 500,^[6] and at Wroxeter new Roman baths have been identified as Roman-type.^[7]
The writing of Patrick and Gildas (see below) demonstrates the survival in Britain of Latin literacy and Roman education, learning and law within elite society and Christianity, throughout the bulk of the 5th and 6th centuries. There are also signs in Gildas' works that the economy was thriving without Roman taxation, as he complains of luxuria and self-indulgence. This is the 5th century Britain into which the Anglo-Saxons appear