The Anglo-Saxons, ed. James Campbell.

Discussion Questions

Part One: Chapters 1-3.

1. How long were the Romans in Britain? what sort of structures—social as well as
physical—did they bring with them? When and how did they leave, and what did they
leave behind?

2. Campbell compares Roman Britain to “British India”: in what ways are the two
situations similar? what significant differences can you imagine between ancient imperial
Rome and modern colonial empires?

3. When did germanic tribes come to Britain? Why? What sorts of interactions did they
have with the native British population?

4. What sorts of evidence exist for Britain in the period 400-600? what sorts of problems
can you imagine in the use of archaeological evidence to reconstruct cultures and
historical events?

5. Who was Gildas? Why did he write On the Fall of Britain? Who was his audience, and
what was his purpose? How does this affect our reading of his work as a historical
document?

6. What kinds of considerations would have gone into the decision of an Anglo-Saxon
king to convert to Christianity? What positive and negative factors do you think he would
have weighed? What did Christianity offer?

7. What do the surviving law codes of the early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms tell us about their
social and political structures?

8. What three bodies of water surround England? How did each serve as a connection
between the island and some other place? What relations did the early Anglo-Saxon
kingdoms have with their neighbors across these bodies of water?
Part Two: Chapters 4-6.

1. Who was Bede? When and where did he live? What did he write? What does his life
and work tell us – directly or indirectly – about the Northumbrian kingdom of the early
Eighth Century?

2. What were the major kingdoms in England in the Eighth and Ninth Centuries? What
sources can we use to reconstruct their history and culture?

3. Discuss the forces that affected the development of monastic life in Anglo-Saxon
England. How were monasteries formed? who supported them? who controlled them?
What is an Eigenkirche?

4. What forces—spiritual or economic, political or personal—shaped the lives of saints

such as Hilda, Cuthbert, and Wilfrid?

5. Discuss the relations between the Anglo-Saxons and the Franks in the Eighth and
Ninth centuries.

6. Find a copy of the Rule of Saint Benedict. From it, try to reconstruct a typical day in
the life of a medieval monk.

7. Why would an Anglo-Saxon king issue a written code of law? Which kings did so?
what do the laws tell us about life in their kingdoms?

8. Why do we know so little about the eighth-century kingdom of the Mercians? What
evidence exists to reconstruct its history? What inferences can we draw from this
evidence? What is Offa’s Dyke, and why was it built?

9. How were Anglo-Saxon kings selected? how did they establish their legitimacy? how
did they consolidate their rule?

10. Who were the Vikings? why did they venture to England? what effects—both
positive and negative—did they have on the English?

11. “Alfred could not take English national solidarity for granted. He had to create it, and
even Alfred did not always succeed” (p. 134). Discuss.

12. What was the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle? Gregory’s Pastoral Rule? What do they say
about the political and social purposes of Alfred’s literacy campaign?
Part Three, Chapters 7-9.

1. Discuss the continental origins of the monastic reform during the reign of Edgar. What
were the monasteries like before the reform? Answer the question, “what principles did a
reformed community stand for?” (p. 182).

2. What is the ‘Danelaw’ and what is its history?

3. Was late Anglo-Saxon England a ‘feudal’ society? what was the role of ealdormen in
the reign of Athelstan?

4. What “evidence of division and disloyalty among the English nobility” (p. 198) can
you find in the reign of Æthelred?

5. Sketch the careers of Ælfric and Wulfstan, and contrast their lives and interests.

6. What was the impact of the reign of Cnut on English social and political life?

7. What was the role of Emma in the struggles for royal succession from 1000-1036?

8. The reputation of Edward the Confessor has changed quite a bit in the past century.
Why have historians have such diverse opinions of him?

9. How did Anglo-Saxon kings raise money? keep records? grant land?

10. Assess, briefly, the consequences of the Norman Conquest of 1066. Is there any
evidence for continuity of Anglo-Saxon political and social institutions after the
Conquest?