by Lucy E. Zahnle

Created on: September 07, 2009

The first glimmerings of English arrived in the ancient Celtic British Isles with the invasions of three Germanic tribes, the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes. Their language would have been unrecognizable as English, but as they interacted with each other and the Celts they were trying to supplant, they were taking the first steps toward modern English.

Latin and Greek influences, in addition to any that might have lingered from the Roman occupation, were added to the language mix when St. Augustine and his followers arrived to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity. Interestingly, those Greek and Roman influences can be traced back to Sanskrit as many Latin words such as 'mater' and 'pater' have their roots in Sanskrit.

Starting as small raids for plunder around 750 AD and ending in conquest and settlement, the Viking Invasions influenced both the lives and cultures of the peoples of Britain. The Norsemen began to raid the British Isles in earnest in 793 A.D. with the sacking of monasteries in Jarrow and Lindisfarne in two successive seasons. By the middle of the ninth century, half of Great Britain had fallen under Norse rule. The Vikings called their holdings the Danelaw.

Of course, not everyone in Great Britain was content with this state of affairs. The Anglo-Saxon, Alfred the Great, King of Wessex, felt particularly hard pressed by the Norse. Although he fought a long and difficult struggle against the Viking invaders from the North, they seemed invincible.

Alfred met both his lowest and highest points in his fight against the Norse in the same year - 878 A.D. In the earlier part of that year, he retreated in defeat with a small band of followers, taking refuge in the marshes of Somerset on the little island of Athelney. If he had stayed there and given up the struggle against the invaders, the language we speak now would probably be more akin to Dutch than English.

However, while he was on Athelney, he managed to raise a new army and surprised the Norse, trouncing them emphatically later in 878 at the Battle of Ethandune. He negotiated a truce, the Treaty of Wedmore, which mandated that the Vikings withdraw to the northern half of Great Britain and stay there.

In order to keep his erstwhile enemy at bay, Alfred needed to maintain political control in not only his own kingdom, but also in territories not under his rule. He wanted to keep neighboring kingdoms as well as his own people from falling under the power of the Norse.

To do this, Alfred fostered

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