12-18-2010, 02:51 PM
Re-defining the Saxon Shore fortifications as centers of commerce and trade is typical of the bankruptcy of modern scholarship. It ranks with the attempted brain-washing I got in Oslo some years ago when the local tour guide maintained that the Vikings were just merchants and all that raiding business a myth. No, there's ample evidence of the Germanic threat to Britain before and after the departure of the legions. The Saxon Shore were late, not early, Roman constructions.
But the other half of the question is more difficult: Were the Germans conquers or just the new elite? The written evidence only reports major battles--and then often local affairs--once every twenty or thirty years during the two or more centuries of the Saxon "invasion." Perhaps it's a little--or a lot--of both. The Germans established homes in this more hospitable environment and gradually pushed the frontier of their authority westward--by force occasionally, but also by intermarriage and cultural assimilation--until they found themselves under pressure from the Danes. Then came the Normans. They also didn't depopulate the land, as evidenced by the Doomsday Book. They became the new ruling class.
But wasn't that the pattern among much of the post-Roman west? The conquers brought their entire communities but they didn't necessarily kill off all the previous inhabitants. Often they established a warrior elite who ruled a population of largely the original inhabitants in Iberia and north Africa and even Gaul and Italy. The later exploits of the various hordes from Asia was not necessarily the pattern of the earlier invaders.
But the other half of the question is more difficult: Were the Germans conquers or just the new elite? The written evidence only reports major battles--and then often local affairs--once every twenty or thirty years during the two or more centuries of the Saxon "invasion." Perhaps it's a little--or a lot--of both. The Germans established homes in this more hospitable environment and gradually pushed the frontier of their authority westward--by force occasionally, but also by intermarriage and cultural assimilation--until they found themselves under pressure from the Danes. Then came the Normans. They also didn't depopulate the land, as evidenced by the Doomsday Book. They became the new ruling class.
But wasn't that the pattern among much of the post-Roman west? The conquers brought their entire communities but they didn't necessarily kill off all the previous inhabitants. Often they established a warrior elite who ruled a population of largely the original inhabitants in Iberia and north Africa and even Gaul and Italy. The later exploits of the various hordes from Asia was not necessarily the pattern of the earlier invaders.
"Fugit irreparabile tempus" (Irrecoverable time glides away) Virgil
Ron Andrea
Ron Andrea
