23.3 Europe: a.d. 801 to 900  (Page 5/10)

The French language developed in this period. As early as 813 Charlemagne ordered sermons to be preached in lingua romana rustica , acknowledging this new language, which was nascent French. The six cases of classical Latin were merged into two cases, the predominant morphological characteristic of "old French". Twenty-nine years later came the first written text in French, a treaty known as the "Oath of Strasbourg" between Carolingian princes. (Ref. 168 ) Sometime in this or the preceding century a university was founded at Montpellier and it soon had a rabbinical school of Spanish origin which taught grammar and later medicine. (Ref. 125 )

The netherlands and belgium

On the eve of the Viking period, this area was concerned with a growing commerce in coastal markets called "wics", the greatest of which was Dorestad (with others in England), dealing in supplies of furs, skins and walrus tusks. (Ref. 8 ) In general, the Lowlands can be considered as a part of the Frankish kingdom and France, at this period.

Frisia disappeared and the North Sea was controlled by no one until the Danish chieftains became rulers of this and various large areas of Flanders at the end of the century.

Additional Notes

British isles

Additional Notes

England

Just before the era of the Viking invasions, participating with Dorestad as a "wic" market, was Hamwic, later to become Southampton. Early in the century Offa, of Mercia, sometimes known as "King of the English", bargained and dealt with Charlemagne apparently almost as an equal. But then the Danish Viking attacks began, first on the island of Sheppey in 835, continuing for thirty years of disturbance and destruction. Usually 30 to 300 Danish ships left home in the spring, raided during the summer and returned home to Denmark with the booty before winter. (Ref. 43 ) After A.D. 835 hardly a year passed in which there was no reference in the Anglo-Saxon chronicle as to Viking attacks on England. (Ref. 237 ) The year 865 was a turning point when that autumn a great Viking army landed in East Anglia, under Ivor the Boneless, to stay. In the meantime, however, King Egbert of Wessex had united most of the southern kingdoms under his control, including Wessex, the Cornish Welsh and the southern parts of both Mercia and Northumbria. (A.D. 829). After the Danes had taken the middle 2/3 of England by about 898, it remained for King Alfred, the Saxon, successor to Egbert, to finally defeat the Danes and confine them to the northeastern part of the country in an area to be called the "Danelaw". Alfred's victory involved the use of a great fleet to meet the invaders' reinforcements at sea before they could land. Payments of money apparently helped in this confinement, however, and even after their defeat the Danes kept their own customs and laws while living nominally under the English king. Many Danes later moved south and became important in English government and the church. (Ref. 43 , 137 ) Additional Notes

Scotland

Thousands of second generation Anglo-Saxons, now called "English", were driven into Scotland by the Danish invasion and this resulted in a strong influx of Anglo- Saxon blood in the Scottish people. In the meantime, there was a Norse invasion of the islands and the north and west shores of Scotland and the main Pictish army was destroyed along with their last king, Eoghann. Kenneth Mac Alpin, alleged descendant of forty tribal kings, took this opportunity about 842 to unite the Picts and Scots, forming the small mountain kingdom of Alba (Albainn). After that union the Pictish culture disappeared. It is said that Kenneth murdered seven earls of Dalriada, kinsmen who might have laid a claim to his new throne. (Ref. 137 , 170 )