History With Ancient Allen

"I can do all things through [a]Christ who strengthens me" - Philippians 4:13

You have worth!!!!!!
It does not matter if others see it, it does not matter if you see it; God says it and that makes it so!
God created you for glorious purpose and that makes you more precious then any substance in the universe.

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Gloves off for filming at the archives How many of us have thought that white cotton gloves are a must for the safe handling of precious documents? What do you think when you see archival docume

Europe’s Oldest Book Was Found in the Tomb of a Saint Europe’s oldest book is soon to go on display in a new exhibition at London’s British Library. Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms: Art, Word, War will feature a number

"Post modern and revisionist academia insists historians remove myths and legends from the historical records; but any historian worth his salt knows it's just as important to pluck out historical facts and truths from those very myths and legends"

This is a paraphrase of a number of quotes from several historians I have read or listened to. They very much chaff at educational institutions, social development experts, and public policy makers push to streamline and draw history into a neat thin line of empirical fact and a single constant theme for each individual event and figures involved; and to catalogue historical writings into two neat and tightly groups, fact and fiction. On the surface the argument from the ivory tower elites is that if a work embellished are fabricated events and people, it must be discredited as a historical source and must be pasted on to the literature department. But the historian argues that so much more can be gleaned from such work; nuggets of facts and truths can be hidden within the tales of the fantastic. For example for a long time Beowulf was reallocated as just a piece of dark age fiction to be used by literature teachers and linguist trying to learn Old English; but modern historians have found so much more, it is one of the greatest sources we have that reveal Anglo-Saxon/Norse social structure and norms and certain characters within have been linked to actual individuals. But this argument goes deeper, it goes to how we view people and events, trying to give a more rounded feel and personality to them, instead of the flat simplistic 2 dimensional caricatures easily fit onto a page in a textbook. Example: we are all taught of Franklin as The wise and inventive statesman as kids, but further research reveals a man who was also drunkard and a infamous lych that would have any metoo-er clawing. But now go deeper, to the more nuanced examination of his works and of his contemporaries who were concerned for him; we find a man trying to fill large hole in his life, created by a love lost and an estrangement to a son who he lamented in his last days letting politics come between them. You see, he is not one thing, he is not even just two, he is a human like the rest. And I am not even going to go into our narrow narratives of events like the revolutionary war and civil war. The truth is, like modern life, the rest of history and the people living within it is much more complex. One cause of a war is not the only cause of a war. One man's freedom fighter is another man's insurgent. An authoritarian King, his also a father, a husband, a parishioner, and a patriot.

Pictures: (Left) William the Bastard, Duke of Normandy; later crowned William the Conquor, King of England (top right) Harold II Godwinson, last Saxon King of England (bottom right) Harold Hardrada, Viking King of Norway

Today marks the 952nd anniversary of the Battle of Stamford Bridge and the Saxon's pyrrhic victory there of. Now everyone knows of the history altering events that would happen shortly thereafter at Hastings (well anyone who is a student of history and it's effects on our modern world), but I contend that Stamford is the real fate changer for England and western civilization, more so than Hastings. Now before I get to my points of this contentious position let me give some of you who are not in the know a bare bones background for context. Beloved and pious King Edward had died, the builder of Westmister Abby would later be known as St Edward the Confessor (St. Edward Catholic Church), with multiple potential heirs to the throne; the most politically powerful of which were his brother-in-law Harold Godwinson, and two distant cousins, William Duke of Normany and Harold Hardrada King of Norway. Harold Godwinson, having the advantage actually being in country and the Godwin family being long time politically connected with the local Saxon nobility, took the throne without any consult or negotiations with the other two. Duke William and King Harold both openly contested Godwin's claim and both claimed they were the rightful rulers; Hardrada, claiming right by blood since his direct ancestor Knut had once held throne, and William producing a document signed by witnesses that stated that Edward had named him as the rightful heir. A three way war was inevitable. But, William was not as prepared and had duties to the French courts he had to attend to before he could set sail for England. Not so for the Viking King Harold Hardrada, who set of with speed and landed in the north of England in mid September of 1066. Godwinson mustered his forces to repel the invading Norse army. Godwinson knew he had to wipe out Hardrada quickly and decisively; if the Norse King, famed for being a brilliant tactition and war leader, gained a foothold in the Scandinavian sympathetic north and given time to formulate a campaign strategy, it would be 10x harder to dislodge him. The Norwegians had already defeated two northern earls' armies at Fulford by the time King Godwinson's army was in range of them With speed the Saxons closed the gap between themselves and the Norse forces, running into them at Stamford bridge. A bloody and hard fought battle saw the Norwegian army wiped out and it's King dead, but also took a hell of a heavy toll on Godwinson's army also. Only a few days had past when word came of Duke Williams army landing on the south coast. King Harold's councilers advised him to take the time to regroup, rest, and collect more men before meeting the Normans in battle; sure they will have probably taken the whole of the region of Sussex, maybe even Kent by then, but with the fresh army they could rally and recoup those lands. But the King, having just slain who he considered the greater of the 2 threats, the legendary Viking Hardrada, felt emboldened and felt he did not need to concede any ground to a mere Carolingean Duke (French noble). Harold had made two big underestimations: 1) the seize of the army William was able to bring across the channel and 2) William's people weren't your typical Carolingian French, they Normans, descended from Vikings themselves and considered the most consummate soldiers and most physically prowess of the French people's. And so on October 14 (😜my birthday), 1066, outside a little town called Hastings, the bulk of the Saxon army was defeated, King Harold Godwinson was slain, and the Age of the Normans was ushered in, the fate of the western world changed on that day....or was it?

And so we come my thoughts on events:

1.) And the most obvious is without Stamford, you wouldn't have Hastings. If Hadrada had either defeated Godwinson or given time to consolidate and dig in in North Umbria (northern England) the whole war would have extended a lot further and would have had a much different impact on history.

2.) I said in my summary that Stamford was a pyrrhic victory for the Saxons. A pyrrhic victory is a victory which costs more than gained. The best example for this every American school child should know is the Battle of Bunker Hill: on paper a victory for the redcoats, but at such at huge cost of casulaties and moral (both decreased for the Brits and increase for the rebels) that it negativly effected the British hopes of wiping out the rebellion quickly. Godwinson my have defeated Hardrada quickly and decisively, but at what cost when you know you are fighting a multifront war? The massive loss of soldiers and loss of his own humility and discretion as a result of Stamford directly contributed to his defeat and death at Hastings.

3.) King Harold Hardrada's death was effectively the end of the Viking Age. The Scandanavian countries would take a dramatic shift toward the Franco-Germanic style of monarchies after his death and with a few isolated exceptions out of Dublin and Iceland Viking pirate fleets would not raid again. And Hardrada was slowly chipping away at Sweden and Denmark hoping to revive Knut's dream of a Norse Sea empire stretching from Iceland to Finland; something many contemporaries and historically experts believe he could have accomplished.

4.) Hardrada's death effected the religious culture of Scandanavia. He was a Christian King, but he was beyond tolerant of those still practicing the worship of the Norse God's as he saw it a vital piece of their culture. And his brand of Christianity skewed more towards eastern Orthodox than Roman Catholicism. His death left room for Roman monks like Snori to influence Scandinavian nobles to push back on all other religious practices not acceptable to Rome.

Road to 1066: The Rise and Fall of the North Sea Empire (With VC3 Productions) 1066. Vikings, Normans, Anglo-Saxons. The Battle of Hastings. The climactic events in the 6th year of the 6th decade of the 11th century in England had their...

This is how a Medieval scriptorium looked like. Medieval scriptoria are the places where the bulk of Western civilisation and its ideas were created by Catholic Christian monks and scholars, and where these and several ancient classical writings were preserved and transmitted prior to the printing press was invented.

(Photo is a virtual reconstruction.)

The city of Dante Alighieri - Florence, Italy

Archaeologists believe they have found the biblical city of Bethsaida Israeli authorities report that during excavations in the Golan Heights, Southern Syria, experts found the remains of a brick gate that was once part of the ancient ...

430-Year-Old Mystery Of The Lost Colony Of Roanoke May Finally Be Solved Thanks To This Stone This stone tells a dark tale of war, suffering, and murder — but is it legitimate or an astounding forgery?

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