Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Scandinavian Britain - I. The Earlies Raids
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has been proofread at least once.
(diff)
(history)
Denna sida har korrekturlästs minst en gång.
(skillnad)
(historik)
trading-ship. In 684 Ecgfrith of Northumbria sent
his army, under Berhtred, to Ireland, and ravaged
Magh-breg, and in 685 Adamnan sailed to England
to buy back the captives. In 728 the Four
Masters mention a "marine fleet"
of Dalriada
which attacked Inisowen in Ulster. The English
and Irish were already showing the example of the
very deeds they lamented with such bitterness a
little later. Is it to be supposed that no word of
such events reached Scandinavia, when the chief
sea-traders of the age were the Frisians, near neighbours
of Denmark ? Why, one may ask, did not
the Viking raids begin sooner?
As a matter of fact, they did; but we have no
record stating that they reached Britain. About
515 King Chochilaicus, as Gregory of Tours calls
him, or Hugleik, led a fleet from the Baltic to the
mouth of the Meuse or the Rhine, and was overcome
and slain by Theodebert, son of the Frankish king
Theodoric. This is Beowulf’s Hygelac, king of
Goths ;
and the existence of Beowulf shows that
there was early connection, other than hostile, between
Scandinavia and England. But the invasion of
Hugleik, like the Anglo-Saxon settlement, was a part
of the great
"folk-wandering"
movement, not a
Viking raid of a few pirates adventuring for slaves and
gold. Professor Alexander Bugge, in his recent works
Vikingerne, i., 1904, and Vesterlandenes Inflydelse
paa Nordboernes i Vikingetiden, 1905, points out
that the period of Hugleik was full of such enterprises.
Fifty years later (565) the Danes made a
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
