Alfred the Great, King of England

         Long before Charles Dickens, long before A Tale of Two Cities, it was the best the times, it was the worst of times across the isle of Britain. It was the best of times in 410 A.D. when the Roman conquerors left England, and the new immigrants from, Germany, Denmark, and northern Holland could establish farms, form communities, and elect leaders. These people, called the Anglo-Saxons, established five separate kingdoms--Northumbria, Mercia, Wessex, Kent, and East Anglia--each shire with a king, a small army, and a fleet of sailing ships for trade and defense. For 400 years these Anglo-Saxons established the foundation for the culture, language, and religion of the British Isles. Their conversion from barbarianism to Christianity made it the best of times, not just for the English but for the people of Western Europe as well. 

          It became the worst of times when, beginning in the 830s, the heathen Vikings, called Danes, invaded England and began menacing attacks on the villages all across England. The Anglo-Saxons had to develop a professional standing army with weapons and warriors as a part of Anglo-Saxon life. For hundreds of years the Vikings were unrelentless in their attacks on the people of England. They pillaged churches and monasteries, destroyed farms and entire villages, and forced the people to submit to their authority. Wessex, and all of England, was in a state of subjugation. However, the English and Vikings came to a crossroad when, in 871 A.D. at the young age of 22 and upon the death of his brother, Etheired, Alfred inherited one of the five kingdoms Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and began his reign as the king of Wessex. As a paragon of bravery and perseverance, Alfred and his soldiers, who had fought and lost many battles against the Danes, plotted a counterattack. In 878, at Edington in Wiltshire, Alfred was joined by loyal forces from three other shire towns. United, they fought fiercely and courageously against the “Great Army” of the heathen Vikings and were victorious. 

          “This battle in 878 was the turning point not only of English history, but also of early Western European history...Alfred had saved the Kingdom of England and given new hope for the survival of all Christian civilization in Western Europe. Alfred had stood alone in Europe and unaided had vanquished those who elsewhere were considered unvanquishable. He had saved Wessex and in so doing he had saved England, and in saving England, he had saved Western Europe from becoming a heathen power. A little island had given birth to a great man.”

Alfred was gaining the reputation that would later give him the title “Alfred the Great.” 

          It was once again the best of times as the Anglo-Saxons, under Alfred’s leadership, turned from war to peace. An orderly government, restoration of Christianity as the guiding moral force, and the creation of the building blocks necessary for a civilization to grow and succeed became the priorities of King Arthur. Foremost among his priorities was education. Alfred’s first edict was his proclamation to establish an educational system for the benefit all his subjects. Next he decreed English as the official language of the kingdom. The great books of the time, all written in Latin, were translated into the vernacular, many by King Alfred himself. He established a court school for the education of the country’s leaders, invited scholars to reside in England, and began the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. It was a history of the Anglo-Saxon people written to fill his subjects with patriotism, pride, and loyalty, but mainly to celebrate King Alfred, now King of all England. 

          King Alfred recognized that education alone would not, could not, turn England into a great civilization. A system of laws and their administration was needed. Therefore, he gathered and collated the governing rules from the five kingdoms of England to form a body of Anglo-Saxon law. In all these undertakings, he sought the advice and approval of an administrative council of noble and church leaders that he had formulated. To further unify the five kingdoms under Wessex leadership, Alfred coined a monetary system, one which named him “King of the English.” 

          Alfred is the only English king to be called “The Great,” and indeed he had earned the title. He was a valiant warrior who defeated a foe that for hundreds of years seemed invincible. He unified the diverse Anglo-Saxon tribes into a people known as “The English.” He made peace, not only with the Vikings but also with the surrounding kingships and countries, through treaties and trade. He established a system of laws protecting the rights of the common people centuries before the famous Magna Carta. He also promulgated the idea that a great society have an educated citizenry. Much of England today stands upon the shoulders of King Alfred of Wessex, known to all people thereafter as King Alfred the Great. (823)

The Venerable Bede, the Father of English History

Venerable Bede was born in 672 AD in Northumbria, a medieval kingdom of Anglos in northeast England.

He was a scholar, teacher, and the most prolific writer during the 7th and 8th centuries and is known as the “Father of English History.” The title “Venerable,” meaning honorable or worthy of veneration, was added to his name only two centuries after his death. At that time in history boys of superior intelligence were often sent away from home to be educated, so at the early age of seven, Bede entered St. Peter's Monastery at Monkwearmouth where he was entrusted to Abbot Benedict for his tutelage. 

He took his studies seriously and was soon able to read the Bible in both Latin and Greek and became very influential in the church through his Latin writings. Because he believed that even the “unlearned” should have the scriptures available to them in their own language, he also translated the Gospel of John into Old English.

Bede believed education to be an important part of every boy’s life; therefore, many of the early books he wrote were intended to be used in the classroom. Always striving for accuracy, he was known to labor night and day, explaining his unrelentless behavior this way: “I don't want my boys to read a lie or to work to no purpose after I am gone.” 

He compiled a book on metrics titled, De Arte Metrica; he wrote an appendix called De Schematibus et Tropis describing rhetorical figures and illustrating them with Biblical examples; and he recorded a book on the accepted knowledge of planets and eclipses called De Natura Rerum.

In the writings for his students, he included examples from Christian poets instead of Latin authors to make the reading more appropriate for boys being educated to serve the church.

Bede was also interested in ecclesiastical arithmetic and wrote Bede’s On the Reckoning of Time in 725 AD, a book explaining the rules used for calculating the Christian holidays and the accuracy of those dates. The Irish and Roman churches had different methods for ascertaining the date for Easter, so the churches were in constant debate about the exact time for its celebration. Frequently, the two churches celebrated Easter on different days, which to Bede was a shocking sign of disunity. Bede attempted to rectify this disparity by adding a chapter in his book explaining how early Christians had designed the calendar. Today his book is considered a reliable source for studying the pre-Christian English calendar. Bede was also responsible for the use of BC and AD when recording dates.

Of the more than 600 books Bede wrote, his most notable work is Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum, written in 731 AD. 

It is a book about the history of England, beginning in 55 BC with Julius Caesar and continuing through the 8th century. It is the first account written about Anglo-Saxon England. The book contains geographical descriptions, and overviews of political events, as well as the outcomes of battles and invasions, all woven into a coherent narrative. However, the main reason Bede wrote this book was to describe the Christian Church in England, its founding and subsequent growth. When the writing was completed, Bede said, “With God’s help, I, Bede … have assembled these facts about the history of the Church in Britain … so far as I have been able to ascertain them from ancient writings, from the tradition of our forebears, and from my own personal knowledge.” Scholars in the following centuries have been gratified for his commitment to researching and writing this tome on England.

Students of both secular and religious history are indebted to Bede for his determination to accurately record much of the information known to man in the 8th century. His hundreds of books provide a window into understanding a period in history and the people of that time. Bede certainly earned the title “Venerable.” (659)