The Last Viking Invasion of England

 The Last Viking Invasion of England

Today is the anniversary of the battle at Stamford Bridge in 1066, it ending, for all intents and purposes, the Viking invasions of England.  Beginning in the 8th century and the famous raid of Lindesfarne (June 8, 793), England had repeatedly suffered both Viking raids and invasions/migrations.  King Canute II (one of only two English kings denominated “the Great”) was an aspect of this chain of events; he was himself Danish.

King Edward the Confessor, who was himself “English” in that he was Anglo-Saxon,  died on January 5, 1066; he was childless.  The crown was assumed by Harald Godwinson.  His dispute with William the Bastard of Normandy over whether Harald had previously agreed to surrender the crown to William would ultimately lead to the Battle of Hastings.  In the meantime, Harald Godwinson had to deal with an invasion from Norway led by another claimant to the throne, Norwegian King Harald Hardrada; Hardrada was supported in this invasion by Tostig Godwinson, Harald Godwinson’s brother. 

Two factors were crucial to the resolution of the Battle of Stamford Bridge.   First, the invading force was dispersed on both sides of the river.  Thus, when the English army attacked the Norse contingent on the south side of the river, they outnumbered their opponent.  Second, the intelligence of the Norse army failed; they did not realize the English army was already present and ready to launch an attack. Another factor whose weight is unknown is that the invading army has days earlier defeated an English army (The Battle of Fulford) led by Earls Morcar (an exiled Northumbrian) and Edwin (Mercia), possibly leading to complacency.

It being a warm day, the invading army had left much of their armor on board their ships. Initially, the English forces largely massacred the Norse forces on the south side of the river.  They then proceeded to attack over the bridge, an effort that, in what was almost certainly an apocryphal story, was delayed by a single Viking yielding an ax who single-handedly killed some forty soldiers before he was himself slain.  With the English having now crossed the bridge, the two armies again faced one another.  Ultimately, the Norse army would collapse consequent to its lack of armor and the deaths in battle of both Harald Hardrada and Tostig.  The few Normans who survived the battle entered into a truce with Harald agreeing to leave and never return.  While the invading fleet filled some 300 ships, the Norse survivors of the battle were able to return home in only 24 of them.

Harold Godwinson must have welcomed the end of this threat to his seat on the English throne.  Then he learned that the forces of William of Normandy had landed in the south.

Theodore of Tarsus

 

Theodore of Tarsus

Today marks the anniversary of the death, in the year 690, of Theodore of Tarsus. At the time of his death, he was the Archbishop of Canterbury. Probably you have never heard of him. That’s unfortunate; he led a most interesting life. 

Theodore was born in Tarsus (the same city as was born Paul the Apostle) on the southern coast of what is today Turkey. He grew up at a time of conflict between the Byzantine Empire controlled out of Constantinople and the Sassanid Empire out of what was then referred to as Persia (today’s Iran). At this time, pre-the rise of Islam, most of the Sassanid Empire was Zorastrian.  By the early 600s and the rise of Islam, the Sassanid Empire converted to Islam. As such, through this stage in his life, Theodore had been immersed in classical Persian and then Muslim cultures even as he studied classical Western and Christian studies. Ultimately, he relocated first to Constantinople and then to Rome, where he entered a monastery and continued his studies. 

Following the death, before consecration, of a man intended to be the Archbishop of Canterbury (a certain Wighard), Theodore was chosen by the Pope to fill that vacant See. He was consecrated as the Archbishop of Canterbury in Rome, and at some point thereafter departed for England. Once in England, he took steps with respect to a variety of issues ranging from the calculation on what day Easter should be held in a variety of matters of church discipline. He is well served as a mediator in a number of political disputes. He as well founded a famous school at Canterbury. Many factors of his time as the Archbishop of Canterbury are known through Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People. 

He would ultimately die in Canterbury at the age of approximately 88.

So there you have it. Theodore was born in southern Turkey, lived under both the Persian Sassanid and then the Persian Islamic Empires, studied in Constantinople and then in Rome, and spent over 20 years as the Archbishop of Canterbury. This suggesting the people in the Middle Ages did not travel far from where they were born is simply not accurate.

The Battle of Sekigahara

 The Battle of Sekigahara

 

Today (by one measurement) is the anniversary of the Battle of Sekigahara, it’s taking place in 1600 and being a if not the foundational event in the history of Japan. FYI, an alternative dating is October 21.

 

Sixteenth century Japan, while nominally led by the Emperor, was controlled by regional lords; the Emperor was a figurehead without effective control. The Sixteenth century had seen an ebb and flow of various clans including that of the famous Takeda Shingen. There then arose first Oda Nobunaga, he overthrowing the nominal but ineffective Ashikaga Shogunate and significantly consolidated power in central Japan under his Oda clan.  He was, however, famously forced to commit seppuku (although it is possible he died fighting) during the Honnō-ji Incident (1582) when his retainer Akechi Mitsuhiderevolted and attacked Nobunaga’s weakly defended position.  Mitsuhide was subsequently killer at the Battle of Yamazaki, it taking place some two weeks after Nobunaga”s death.

 

Nobunaga was nominally succeeded by a grandson, Oda Hidenobu, but as he was just a child the fact of his succession was consequent to the support of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, one of his father’s retainers. Having nothing to do with this discussion, Hidenobu would later convert to Catholicism. But I digress.  Toyotomi Hideyoshi would continue Nobunaga’s program of unification, and although a peasant (he was not born a member of the samurai class) he was by means of an astute adult adoption into the Fujiwara Clan appointed to the highest offices in the land including Imperial Regent; however, he could not reinstate the shogunate in himself as not being born a samurai he could not be the chief samurai. In 1592, after the death of his only son, he adopted and appointed as his heir his nephew Hidetsugu. Thereafter, resigning from his Imperial offices, he was known as the Taiko (retired regent). But then in 1593 Hideyoshi has another son, Hideyori, and tension as to the succession grew. Hideyori was 5 years old when Hideyoshi died in 1598.

 

Tokugawa Ieyasu had like Hideyoshi been a retainer and general under Nobunaga, including having fought at the Battle of Yamazaki. After Nobunaga’s death and a bit of back and forth he entered Hideyoshi’s service but on less than a full vassal basis.  When Hideyoshi died Ieyasu was one of the five members of a regency council (Tokugawa Ieyasu, Maeda Toshiie {succeeded in 1599 by his son Maeda Toshinaga}, Ukita Hideie, Uesugi Kagekatsu, and Mori Terumoto) intended to rule Japan until Hideyori came of ago, which was 15. However, relations among the regents broke down and Ieyasu, by far the most powerful of the five, used the pretext of improper actions by Uesugi Kagekatsu to launch a war that culminated in the Battle of Sekigahara. 

 

Ishida Mitsunari led the forces at least nominally loyal to Hideyori, they (the Western Army) comprising by the time of battle some 80,000 soldiers (their force had been larger but there had been on the eve of battle significant defections to Ieyasu’s side).  Ieyasu went into battle with approximately 88,000 troops (the Eastern Army).  In a day that started with heavy fog the forces clashed. As the day progressed there were several notable defections from the Western Army to the Eastern army (maybe 23,000 troops total), in each case weakening the former and strengthening the latter.  In the end the battle lasted between 2 and 4 hoursduring which the Eastern Army suffered between 8,000 and 35,000 deaths while the Eastern Army is estimated to have lost between 4,000 and 10,000. Taking the middle point of the higher of these ranges the Eastern Army, initially not that much different in size from the Eastern Army, suffered 17,500 casualties while Ieyasu’s Eastern Army suffered 5,000.  Ieyasu then began a program of redistribution of territories to favor those who had supported his position as those who were part of the Western Army and who did not defect were stripped of their lands and power. Hideyori was forced to commit seppuku when Ieyasu’s forces laid siege to his remaining forces in Osaka Castle.

 

In 1603 Tokugawa Ieyasu was appointed Shogun by the Emperor, thus starting the Tokugawa Shogunate that would rule Japan until 1868.

 

And thus was Japan unified by the sequential acts of Oda Nobunaga, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and Tokugawa Ieyasu.

 

For those of you who enjoyed the 2024Shogun tv series (the recent one, not whatever that was circa 1980 with Richard Chamberlain), it is set in this period, but significant aspects of it, well, lets just say they depart from the historic record in order to tell a story.  There was an English sailor, a navigator, named William Adams who was a retainer to Tokugawa Ieyasu.  The chronology of his arrival and place in the Tokugawa court do not match that in the tv series or Clavell’s book.

 

Battle of Marathon (490 b.c.)

 Athenian Forces Defeat Invading Persians at Marathon

      Today might be the anniversary of the great battle, fought in 490 b.c. at Marathon, at which the forces of Athens defeated the Persian invasion sent by Darius the Great. The exact date of the battle is subject to controversy, although there is something of an alternative consensus on the 21st.

      At the time of the battle, the Persian Empire extended from the western boundaries of what is today India across the Middle East, Turkey and to Southwest Europe.  Darius had decided that the land we refer to today as Greece, inhabited by a variety of city-states, would be next incorporated into his empire.  The fact that various of the Greek city-states were supporting rebellious territories in what is today Western Turkey and the Mediterranean probably had a big role in that decision.  An invasion fleet landed its troops some twenty-six miles northeast of Athens at the Bay of Marathon.  Working with collaborators in Athens, it was thought that the army could be drawn away and destroyed even as the collaborators led an internal revolt, taking control of the city and making it available to Darius.  It would not turn out that way.

      At news of the landing, Athens sent word to Sparta seeking its assistance, the Spartan hoplite troops being the strongest force in the region.  Famously, the Spartans were unwilling to send their forces in light of an upcoming religious festival. In consequence, Athens would stand alone.  The Athenian army, well smaller than that of the Persian forces, camped facing their enemy for over a week.  On the 8th day, seeing that the Persians were re-embarking some troops onto ships and fearing that they intended to launch a direct assault on Athens, the Greek forces attacked.  Although outnumbered, by skillful flanking maneuvers the Greeks were able to envelop the Persian forces.  While the historical records recite what must be grossly inflated figures, certainly the Persians lost in excess of 6,000 men while the Greeks lost fewer than 200.

Although not recounted in the contemporary historic record, a runner, Pheidippides, took off to announce the victory to Athens.  Just over 26 miles later, he entered the city, announced “nickomen” (“victory”) and dropped dead from exhaustion.  Meanwhile, the balance of the Persian army embarked on their ships and set out from the Bay of Marathon with the intent of directly attacking Athens.  The Athenian army force-marched itself back to the city, manning its walls as the Persian fleet approached.  The Persians decided that another attack was not in their best interest and they withdrew.  

     A decade after Marathon, the Persian forces under Xerces, son of Darius, would again invade Greece.  They would ultimately fall victim to the Spartan and allied forces at Thermopylae, the Greek naval forces at Salamis and again the allied forces at Plataea.

            As for the famous runner bring news of victory, probably not.  The runner to Athens after the Battle of Marathon is not supported in the historic record, and is first recorded in the writings of the Roman Lucian. Lucian lived in the Second Century a.d., so generously there were six hundred thirty years between the Battle of Marathon and Lucian drafting the first report of this event.

And So Begin the Middle Ages

 And So Begin the Middle Ages

      By a certain measure, today marks the anniversary of the date in 476 from which the “Middle Ages” may be dated.  On this day, the last emperor of the Western Roman Empire, Romulus Augustus, who was little more than a child and was completely controlled by his father, Orestes, the Magister Militum of the Roman military, was deposed by Odoacer. Orestes had little standing to complain about the over-throw of his son's reign - Orestes had revolted against the prior emperor and put his son on the imperial throne.  

      With Romulus' resignation the imperial regalia was packed up and shipped off to Byzantium.  With this event, the Western Roman Empire ceased to exist, its fragments now under control of various “barbarian” tribes.