Table of Contents

Abbreviation -- List of figure -- Preface to second edition -- Preface -- The peoples and kingdoms of pre-Viking England -- The 'Heptarchy' -- The Tribal Hidage -- Angles or Saxons? -- Hierarchies of command: the Brytenwealda -- The problem of nomenclature -- Early Kent -- The reign of Aethelberht -- The pagan reaction under Eadbald -- The sequel -- The early kings of the western Saxons -- The Anglian territories in the late sixth and early seventh centuries -- The struggle for political and military leadership -- The Deirans and the Bernicians -- The wars with the northern Britons -- The northern Anglian hegemony in the seventh century -- The Humbrian overlordship of Eadwine -- Eadwine's British wars -- The reign of Oswald -- The battle of the Winwaed -- The last phase of northern domination in southern England -- Military recovery in north Britain under Oswiu and Ecgfrith -- Ecclesiastical politics -- The southumbrian kingdoms from the mid-seventh to the mid-eighth century -- The reign of Wulfhere -- The ascendancy of Caedwalla and its aftermath -- Reconstruction -- The reign of Aethelbald -- Northumbria in the eighth century -- Offa -- The Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the first three-quarters of the ninth century -- The Mercian successors of Offa -- Ecgberht, king of Wessex -- Northumbria -- King Aethelwulf and his sons -- The coming of the Vikings -- Appendix -- Notes -- Index.

About the Author

D P Kirby,

Reviews

"In a soft-voiced fashion this book offers a strong revisionism of Anglo-Saxon history in the centuries between the creation of the early kingdoms and the emergence of Wessex under Alfred the Great."
-"Albion
"- Provides in a readable and accessible form a political history of the early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms to the death of Alfred.."
-"Medieval History
"A good example of scholarship presented in an accessible and intellectually stimulating way.."
-"ITeaching History