A Brief History of the Anglo-Saxons Read Online Free

ceremony. Maybe this was because he feared the newcomers could use sorcery against him in an enclosed space, as Bede believed; maybe because Anglo-Saxon pagan sanctuaries were generally in the open air; most probably because it was elementary PR to hold his first encounter with these important strangers in full view of as many of his council and people as possible. Before the end of 597 the king was converted and baptized.
    Gregory, who termed Æthelberht ‘king of the English’ (rex Anglorum ) now addressed a solemn communication to him and Queen Bertha, in which he reminded them of the example of the first Christian emperor, Constantine. The ceremony was to be understood as his solemn enrolment into the family of Catholic kings, of which the present emperor (that is the east Roman, Byzantine ruler at Constantinople), the most ‘serene prince’, as Gregory called him, was the father. 5 To be admitted as a member of this imperial family was probably the chief attraction of the new religion for Æthelberht. By this time, it has been said, it was ‘the aspiration of Germanic leaders all over . . . Europe . . . to emphasize their right to rule by looking like the Byzantines in their use of gold garnet jewellery.’ 6
    But we do not really know why the king took the new faith. Loyalty to his divine ancestors’ religion had served Æthelberht pretty well. He seems to have won recognition as overking without the aid of the new god. The kingdom of the East Saxons, ruled by his nephew Sæberht (d. 616/17), was a client state and further afield Rædwald, king of the East Angles, treated him with respect. Place name evidence indicates Woden cult centres close to Canterbury where Queen Bertha had her chapel. The pagan cult did survive theking’s conversion and in fact his son reverted to it after his death. So why the switch? Possibly the simplest answer is the right one. Had the king, perhaps, experienced a genuine spiritual epiphany?
    The mission proceeded apace. A second team from Rome, under the leadership of Augustine’s deputy Laurentius, arrived in England in 601; it brought the letters from Gregory and, for Augustine, the pallium of office as archbishop. He was duly consecrated and established himself – at Canterbury. Pope Gregory surely expected him to choose ‘Londinium’, a chief city of Roman Britain, as his metropolitan see. As surely, Augustine, the ‘man in the field’, must have found it impossible to present such an idea to the king of Kent. It has been argued that in fact, from the start, Christianity and Christian missions were tools of policy used and supported by kings as a means of extending their influence. 7 The suggestion that the senior sanctuary of the new religion of the English be set up, not in his dominions, the dominions of the senior king, but in the territory of his neighbour and nephew, Sæberht, king of Essex, would not, one feels, have amused Æthelberht. Sæberht followed his uncle’s lead, being converted in 604, when London received Augustine’s helper Mellitus as bishop. Justus, another of the Roman mission, was already installed as bishop in the Romano-British walled city at Rochester. With three centres established in less than a decade and influence established north of the Thames, Pope Gregory’s plans seemed to be advancing well. In a letter to the pope, Augustine had been able to boast of no fewer than 10,000 converts in one baptism campaign.
    On a visit to the court of Kent, Rædwald of the East Angles next became a Christian. It was a celebrity coup for the fledgling Roman Christian settlement in England. As the grave goods unearthed at the Sutton Hoo ship burial demonstrate, the warrior aristocracy of the East Angles and their lord represented a realm of immense wealth. But the conversion may have been no more than a gesture of political deference to his overlord. Returning to his people,Rædwald permitted the practice of the pagan cult to continue, even sanctioning pagan