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English Link/ resources online 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 Anglo-Saxons
Bede, writing in the early 8th century in his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, (I.15) suggests that: the people
of the more northern kingdoms (East Anglia, Mercia, Northumbria) belonged
to the Angles, who derive their name from the peninsula of Angeln in Schleswig-Holstein,
presently located in northern Germany The term Angli Saxones seems to have first come into use by Latin writers on the continent, nearly a century before Alfred's time, in the writings of Paul the Deacon, historian of the Lombards. There can be little doubt, however, that there it was used to distinguish the inhabitants of Britain from the Old Saxons of the continent.
It is still a matter of debate as to whether the term "Anglo-Saxon" can be used as a synonym for ethnic or racial groups who lived in England. On one hand there is the argument that says that there were further influxes of people into England such as the Danes, Normans, and Celts who migrated to England from the other parts of the British Isles, so the term is no longer valid. The other side of this argument is to say these people were relatively small in number and, particularly in the case of Danes and the Normans, were of similar ethnic origins as the Anglo-Saxons themselves, and so became immersed into the Anglo-Saxon "tribe". In popular usage in Canada and the United States, the term "Anglo-Saxon" (as in "White Anglo-Saxon Protestant" or "WASP") has evolved into a politicized term with little connection to its academic definition. Until about 1960 the term was mostly used and popularized by Irish Catholics and French-Canadians. Since 1960 it has had more general usage, but exactly who it designates has become a matter of individual opinions and context, ranging from people of English descent to any North American of European origin who fits a certain socio-economic and/or ethnic profile. "Anglo-Saxon" is still used by linguists to mean the original West Germanic component of the English language, often called Old English, as opposed to the especially large addition of Old Danish (eastern England), Old Norwegian (from Vikings of the Viken who settled on the West Coast of England), and many loanwords the language has obtained, especially from Romance languages. For over a hundred years, the French have used "Anglo-Saxon" to refer to the Anglophone societies of Britain and the United States, and sometimes (rarely) including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. It supposedly describes their intellectual traditions and national character, as opposed to "Celtic," "Gallic", "Lusitanic" or "Hispanic". It is a wide-ranging term, taking in the English-speaking world's language, culture, technology, wealth, influence, markets and economy.
Earlier interpretations saw large numbers of Anglo-Saxon settlers arrive, essentially killing or displacing the British people living in southern and eastern Britain at the time. A minority of the Romano-British fled to Brittany and Galicia in northern Spain. Britain was perceived in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as the home of liberty, and it was believed that this love of liberty arrived with the Anglo-Saxons, who were held to have been essentially free. Arguments for this were based primarily on the literary evidence. The (probably) early sixth-century monk Gildas, in his De Excidio Britanniae, told of the English defeating the British as a punishment from God. A similar narrative appeared in Bede’s Historia Ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, written in the early eighth century, which drew heavily on Gildas. Later Anglo-Saxon and British (Welsh) documents followed this tradition of cataclysm, focussing on differences between the English and the Welsh. Such an interpretation finds support in the linguistic and place-name evidence. Linguistically, few p-Celtic words find their way into old English, though some have argued for greater input than was previously thought. The apparent rarity of obviously Brythonic place-names has been used to downplay continuity, but such names may be difficult to identify rather than absent.[1] A genetic study by a team at UCL that included samples from those living in modern England, Wales, Friesland and the Basque Country, and based on the analysis of Y-chromosomes gives some support to the theory that there was a substantial migration to central and eastern England. [2] More recently the focus has shifted towards continuity, trying to place Britain in the context of European Late Antiquity. Some of this argument is based on scale. The population of Britain in 400 is unknowable, but is estimated, based on land usage, to have been around 4 million. It is considered unlikely that such a large population was significantly killed or displaced between the fifth and sixth centuries, although examinations of land usage do suggest that the population dropped significantly in this time.[3] Much of the argument for continuity is based on archaeological evidence, such as investigations of graves and settlements, which suggest that the British population was not killed or displaced, but rather came to adopt Anglo-Saxon culture. Some major Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, such as Bernicia, Deira, Kent and Lindsey, have names that stem from existing political structures. In the laws of king Ine, a late seventh- and early eighth- century king of Wessex, there were Welsh communities living within Wessex who had specific stipulations regarding their legal position. A more complete genetic analysis by the same UCL department as above, again based on Y-chromosome analysis, has also added weight to this view. [4] Ultimately it is unlikely, at least with the current evidence, that this matter will be resolved. Over the course of the Anglo-Saxon period Welshmen living in Wessex, such as those outlined in Ine’s law code, came to be regarded as Anglo-Saxons; no mention of separate stipulations for Welsh communities is provided in Alfred’s ninth-century code, for instance, although he does append Ine’s code to his. It is worth bearing in mind that the extent of Anglo-Saxon migration would have differed considerably across Britain.
Early Anglo-Saxon buildings in Britain were generally simple, constructed mainly using timber with thatch for roofing. Preferring not to settle in the old Roman cities, the Anglo-Saxons built small towns near their centres of agriculture. In each town, a main hall was in the centre, surrounded by the huts of the townspeople. There are few remains of Anglo-Saxon architecture, with no secular work remaining above ground. At least fifty churches are of Anglo-Saxon origin, with many more claiming to be, although in some cases the Anglo-Saxon part is small and much-altered. All surviving churches, except one timber church, are built of stone or brick, and in some cases show evidence of re-used Roman work. The architectural character of Anglo-Saxon ecclesiastical buildings range from Coptic influenced architecture in the early period; basilica influenced Romanesque architecture; and in the later Anglo-Saxon period, an architecture characterised by pilaster-strips, blank arcading, baluster shafts and triangular headed openings.
Anglo-Saxon art is mainly known today through illuminated manuscripts. It includes the Benedictional of St. Æthelwold manuscript, which drew on Hiberno-Saxon art, Carolingian art and Byzantine art for style and iconography. A "Winchester style" developed that combined both northern ornamental traditions with Mediterranean figural traditions, and can be seen in the Leofric Missal (Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Bodl, 579). The Harley Psalter was a knockoff of the Carolingian Utrecht Psalter —all of which underscore the larger trend of an Anglo-Saxon culture coming into increasing contact with, and under the influence of, a wider Latin Mediæval Europe. Manuscripts were not the only Anglo-Saxon art form, although they are the most numerous to have survived. Perhaps the best known piece of Anglo-Saxon art is the Bayeux Tapestry which was commissioned by a Norman patron from English artists working in the traditional Anglo-Saxon style. Anglo-Saxon artists also worked in fresco, ivory, stone carving, metalwork (see Fuller brooch for example) and enamel, but few of these pieces have survived.
Anglo-Saxon is far closer to early Germanic than Middle English, i.e., it is less latinized, and retains many morphological features (nominal and verbal inflection) that were lost during the 12th to 14th centuries. The languge today which is closest to Old English is Frisian, which is spoken by a few hundred thousand people in the northern part of the Netherlands and Germany. Before literacy in the vernacular "Old English" or Latin became widespread, the Runic alphabet, called the futhorc (also known as futhark), was used for inscriptions. When literacy became more prevalent a form of Latin script was used with a few letters derived from the futhork; 'eth', 'wynn', and 'thorn'. The letters regularly used in printed and edited texts of OE are the following: a æ
b c d ð e f g h i l m n o p r s t þ u w x y
The most famous works from this period include the poem Beowulf, which has achieved national epic status in Britain. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is a collection of important early English history. Cædmon's Hymn from the 7th century is the oldest surviving written text in English.
Christianity (both Celtic and Roman) replaced the indigenous religion of the Saxons in England around the 8th and 9th centuries AD. The Synod of Whitby settled the choice for Roman Christianity. As the new clerics became the chroniclers, the old religion was systematically lost before it was recorded and today our knowledge of it is largely based on surviving texts, etymological links and archaeological finds. One of the few recorded references is that a Kentish King would only meet the missionary St. Augustine in the open air, where he would be under the protection of the sky god, Woden. Written Christian prohibitions on acts of paganism are one of our main sources of information on pre-Christian beliefs. Remnants of the Anglo-Saxon gods remain in the English language names for days of the week: Tiw, the
Anglo-Saxon equivalent of Tyr, the god of war: Tuesday States
in Medieval Britain East Anglia
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