King Alfred’s Lyre

In 865, the Great Army of the Vikings from across the North Sea had been swarming over England, intent on all-out conquest of a country by then better known for its science and art than for its military readiness. But as Charles Dickens tells us, in 878 King Alfred of Wessex turned the tables on his enemy, and not just with battlefield courage.

FIRST, as it was important to know how numerous those pestilent Danes were,* and how they were fortified, King Alfred, being a good musician, disguised himself as a glee-man or minstrel,* and went, with his harp, to the Danish camp.* He played and sang in the very tent of Guthrum the Danish leader, and entertained the Danes as they caroused. While he seemed to think of nothing but his music, he was watchful of their tents, their arms, their discipline, everything that he desired to know.

And right soon did this great king entertain them to a different tune; for, summoning all his true followers to meet him at an appointed place, where they received him with joyful shouts and tears, as the monarch whom many of them had given up for lost or dead, he put himself at their head, marched on the Danish camp, defeated the Danes with great slaughter, and besieged them for fourteen days to prevent their escape.*

Continue to Part 2

This was the Great Heathen Army of Ingwaer (?-873, on whom the semi-legendary King of Dublin Ivar the Boneless is based) and his brother Halfdan, which came to England in 865. The first Vikings were ruthless heathens bent on subduing a more civilised Christian society, yet that society ended up civilising them to the mutual benefit of each, as Dickens emphasises.

‘Glee’ comes from an Old English word gléo, which meant simply ‘entertainment’. Another name for a hearpe (harp) was a gleobeam, literally ‘a (piece of) tree for entertainment’. For more information, see The Sound of the Sutton Hoo Harp.

This story apparently goes back no further than the Chronicle of Ingulf (?-1109), Abbot of Crowland Abbey; Asser (?-909) does not mention it in his ‘Life of Alfred’. It quickly resurfaced in the Chronicle of William of Malmesbury (1095–1143), a monk at the Abbey where Alfred’s grandson, Athelstan, was buried in 939. It became a firm favourite, repeated in the influential ‘History of England’ by Italian scholar Polydore Vergil (published in 1534, though drafted by 1513) and in Holinshed’s Chronicles (1577, 1587), a key source for William Shakespeare’s historical plays.

Alfred’s victory came at Edington in Wiltshire in May 878; the ancient sources name it Ethandun and the identification with Edington is common but not certain. After the battle, Guthrum retreated to his fortress at Chippenham, taken from Alfred at Twelfth Night on January 6th that year; Alfred had been forced to take refuge at Athelney in the Somerset marshes, the setting for two classic tales, How Alfred Burnt the Cakes and King Alfred and the Beggar.

Précis

Variations: 1.increase the length of this precis to exactly 60 words. 2.reduce the length of this precis to exactly 50 words. 3.introduce one of the following words into the precis: besides, may, must, not, or, since, whereas, whether.

Précis

Word Games

Clay Lane

The Copy Book