Wednesday, May 20, 2020

London - After the Romans (part three)

By Walter Besant

The conquest of England was now virtually completed. There was fighting at Old Sarum in 552; at Banbury in 556; at Bedford, at Aylebury, and at Benson in the year 571. One would judge this to be the last sortie made by the Welsh who had been driven into the fens. In the year 577 three important places in the west were taken - Gloucester, Bath, and Cirencester. In 584 there was fighting at Fethan-lea, when the victor took many towns and spoils innumerable; "and wrathful he thence returned to his own."

As late as 596 we hear that the King of the West Saxons fought and contended incessantly against either the Angles (his own cousins), or the Welsh, or the Picts, or the Scots; and in 607 was fought the great battle of Chester, in which "numberless" Welsh were slain, including two hundred priests who had come to pray for victory.

It is therefor evident that the conquest of the country took a long time to effect - not less, indeed, than two hundred years. First, Kent, with Surrey fell; next, Sussex - both before the end of the fifth century. Early in the sixth century the West Saxons conquered the country covered by Hampshire, a part of Surrey and Dorsetshire; next, Essex fell; and there was stubborn fighting for many years in the country beyond the great Middlesex Forest.

The conquest of the North concerns us little, save that it drew off some of those who were fighting in what afterward became the kingdom of Mercia. I desire to note here only the surroundings of London, and to mark how by successive steps of the invaders' march it was gradually cut off, bit by bit, from the surrounding country. When Kent fell, the bridge gate was closed, and the roads south, southwest, and southeast were blocked; at the fall of Essex, Norforlk, and Suffolk, the eastern gat was closed. When Wessex was an established kingdom, the river highway was closed; there remained only the western gate, and that, during the whole of the sixth century, led out into a country perpetually desolated and destroyed by war, so that by the middle of the sixth century no communication whatever was possible between London and the rest of the country, unless the people made a sortie and cut there way through the enemy.

Observe, however, that no mention whatever is made of the capture of London in the Chronicle. Other and less important towns are mentioned.  Anderida or Pevensey, Aquae Solis or Bath, Gloucester, Chester, and many others; but of London there is no mention. Consider. London, though not much greater than other cities in the country - York, Verulam, Lincoln, Colchester, for instance - was undoubtedly the chief port of the country. We need not bring modern ideas to bear when we read of the vast trade, the immense concourse of merchants, and so forth. Roman London was not modern Liverpool. Its bulk of trade was quite insignificant compared with that of the present. When we begin to understand medieval trade this will become apparent. Still, a vigorous and flourishing place, and the chief port of the country. Why, therefore, does the Chronicle absolutely pass over so great an event as the taking of London?