King Alfred of Wessex defeated the Vikings at the Battle of Edington in 878 CE, securing his kingdom. This victory was pivotal in preventing Viking dominance over England. While some viewed it as divine intervention, historians cite practical reasons for Alfred's success. Despite earlier defeats, Alfred's subjects remained loyal when he rallied them. His men were highly motivated to win after previous losses, unlike the overconfident Vikings. Alfred's controversial decision to confiscate church lands, in exchange for defensive fortifications and vassal support, also contributed to his crucial victory over the Vikings at Edington.

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BREVARD COLLEGE
THE SCOURGE OF BRITANNIA – KING ALFRED’S DEFENSE AGAINST THE VIKINGS
A THESIS SUBMITTED TO
THE FACULTY OF THE DIVISION OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF
BACHELOR’S IN HISTORY
DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY
BY
SHAUN POUR
BREVARD, NORTH CAROLINA
MAY 2015

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In 871, King Alfred of Wessex’s war against the Vikings had ended in disaster. His
armies lay in ruins, morale had collapsed and he had suffered defeat after defeat in a disastrous
attempt to take the fight to his enemy. With his entire military campaign an absolute failure and
no way to continue the fight, Alfred’s only option was peace. He was able to sue for peace with
the Vikings who subsequently withdrew back into Mercia, a kingdom located to the north of
Wessex which was formerly ruled by Alfred’s brother in-law. This period of peace with the
Vikings did not last and Alfred was defeated and driven into exile within the marshes of
Somerset in 876. Alfred was eventually able to rally his men and lead a guerilla campaign
against the Vikings before he finally counterattacked against the Vikings at Edington where
Alfred defeated the Vikings and drove them out of Wessex for good. The treaty with the Viking
leader after the Battle of Edington gave King Alfred control of the western half of Mercia while
the Viking leader, Guthrum, retained control of eastern Mercia. Alfred’s victory was of great
importance because it ended any chance of establishing Viking dominance over England and
established Alfred as king of both Wessex and Mercia.
Who was King Alfred the Great to deserve such a title? How did he manage such a
herculean feat like the defeat of the Vikings? King Alfred was born in 849 A.D. At the time, he
was the youngest of five sons of King Aethelwulf of Wessex and, as a result, Alfred was
nowhere near being in line to inherit the throne. Then, over a period of time between 858 and
865, many of Alfred’s brothers died childless, which left only Alfred and his brother. Alfred’s
brother did have two children, which should have secured the line of succession and led to
Alfred being relegated to the background as a lord of some minor title. The arrival of the Vikings
in the British Isles in the middle of the 9th century would change all that. Alfred’s only surviving
brother, Aethelred, who was king at the time, died fighting the Vikings when his children were
still very young, and the nobles of Wessex decided that it would be a colossally bad idea for
them to crown a child as king during a time of war: they circumvented the traditional laws of

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succession and crowned Alfred as the new king of Wessex instead of one of his nephews.1
Alfred fought the Vikings for almost a decade before finally defeating them at the Battle
of Edington in May of 878 A.D. Prior to engaging the Vikings at Edington, Alfred, and a few
retainers that were with him, fled to the marshes of Somerset where he and his men fought a
guerilla war against the Vikings before defeating them at Edington in 878. In 878, Guthrum was
the commander of the Viking forces that engaged Alfred in Wessex as well as being the overall
ruler of the Danelaw, which was the Viking realm in England. In 878, Guthrum desired to
conquer all of Wessex and add it to Danelaw. Any hope of successfully conquering Wessex was
crushed in 878 when Alfred and his men defeated Guthrum at the Battle of Edington, routing the
Viking army and forcing him to surrender and convert to Christianity which, ironically enough,
actually helped give Guthrum’s rule legitimacy in Christian Europe.
Is this battle, then, what makes Alfred, the “Great?” This investigation looks at the major
historiography of the Battle of Edington in order to answer this question about why Alfred was
successful when no other Anglo-Saxon ruler even came close. One of these views is expressed
by Asser, a Welsh priest whose view is that Alfred’s victory was the will of God. Although “the
will of God” is not typically accepted by historians as a single cause of any event’s success,
Asser is an important primary source about Alfred’s campaign against the Vikings. Asser
expresses this view in the book Asser’s Life of King Alfred.2 Asser is a Welsh priest whose view
of Alfred’s victory is that it was the will of God that Alfred was able to defeat the Vikings. While
Asser does concede that Alfred was a popular ruler and a skilled military commander, he
constantly goes back to the idea that the most relevant part of Alfred’s victory is that God willed
Alfred to be victorious against the Vikings. This viewpoint that Alfred’s victory was the will of
God is one of the prominent ones but hardly the only one. Another view is the one expressed by
1 Asser, The Life of King Alfred, (Cooper Square, 1966)
2 Alfred Smyth, King Alfred the Great, (London: Oxford University Press, 1995) 36.

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historian Eleanor Duckett; that Alfred and his men were more inspired to fight since the Vikings
expected victory while Alfred and his men did not.
One of the secondary sources about Alfred the Great’s war with the Vikings is the book
called Alfred the Great – The King and His England, which was written by Eleanor Duckett.
Unlike the Welsh priest, Asser, who views the victory Alfred experienced over the Vikings as
some kind of miracle or the will of God, Duckett takes a more practical view. Her opinion is that
the most likely explanation for Alfred’s victory is that his men were more inspired to fight harder
and were more determined to win. After defeating the Vikings under their leader, Guthrum, the
Vikings fled to their fortress of Chippenham to try and escape Alfred. He forced them to
surrender by trapping them there. “For fourteen days Alfred and his men blockaded the Danes
encamped within its walls, until, starving, cold and hopeless of relief, they surrendered and
yielded hostages in surety of their word.”3 After Alfred defeated Guthrum’s army in the
field, they ran to their fortress, Chippenham, to try and force Alfred to leave them by virtue of
the fact that Alfred and his forces had no siege equipment to speak of. Needless to say, their plan
did not work.
Beyond simply the fact that Alfred’s men were more willing to fight, another
important thing is why he had men to call to war at all. At this point in the Battle of Edington,
Alfred was defeated by a surprise attack that forced him to flee, becoming a king with no
kingdom. Just before the planned battle at Edington, Alfred came to a location called Egbert’s
Stone where he assembled his forces, calling his subjects in the surrounding areas to rally to his
banner there. “At Egbert’s Stone, as Alfred had planned gathered on this day all men of Somerset
and of Wiltshire who could bear arms and many from Hampshire.”4 This meeting of
Alfred and his troops demonstrates one very important thing: despite his being driven into exile
3 Eleanor Duckett, Alfred the Great – The King and His England, (University of Chicago Press,
1956) 79.
4 Duckett, 78.

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within the marshes of Somerset in the southwest-central area of England by the Viking assault,
Alfred still retained the loyalty of his subjects who rallied to his banner when called to fight his
enemies. One of the reasons why Alfred’s subjects stayed loyal to him is that during his reign, he
confiscated land from the church for defensive purposes and gave that land to his subjects in
order to ensure their loyalty to him.
Some of the other reasons expressed by Duckett for Alfred’s victory against the Vikings
were that his people remained loyal to him, his men were more determined to fight, and they
were more inspired than the Vikings. The fact that Alfred’s people were willing to come when he
called was extremely important, mainly because it meant that he actually had an army to fight
against the Vikings. In addition to the determination and tenacity of Alfred and his men to win
no matter what, another idea is that one of Alfred’s more controversial decisions played into his
victory. That decision was Alfred’s choice to confiscate lands of the church in order to both build
defensive fortifications and give the land to his subjects in exchange for their loyalty.
Another of the sources regarding Alfred the Great and his war against the
Vikings from 871 to 886 C.E is an article “Monastic Lands and England’s
Defense in the Viking Age,” which was written by Robin Fleming in 1985. The primary
focus of this article is the Viking raids against English monasteries and how these
monasteries survived the Viking age.5 It also talks about certain kings, Alfred amongst
them, and specifically emphasizes their appropriation of church lands for the purpose of
redistributing them as suited his purpose. “After the death of King Aethelraed his brother
Alfred assumed power. He alienated the vill in which the monastery [of Abingdon] is
situated, . . . with all the appurtenances of the afore-mentioned minster, rendering to the
5
Robin Fleming, “Monastic Lands and England’s Defense in the Viking Age”, The English
Historical Review No. CCCXCV, (April 1985)
http://www.jstor.org/stable/568623?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents [March 22, 2015]

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Lord of victory an unjust injury for the victory which he had enjoyed.'6 Elsewhere in the
Abingdon account, Alfred is likened to Judas among the twelve apostles for taking church
lands.”7
The views of the monks in terms of what they think of these supposed
confiscations went back and forth a bit with some sections claiming this was done for
greed and want of land and others claiming that the monastic lands were being held in
trust to repair the lands after the damages done by the Vikings before either selling the
land back to the church or simply giving it to them. According to Fleming, the Vikings
repeatedly raided the monasteries of England for money and other valuables which they
carried off while killing anyone who got in their way. Their reason for attacking was
primarily to steal treasures and other valuables from them, rather than it being an
attempt to kill the residents for the sake of it and razing buildings to the ground.
The main reason given for the confiscation of these lands, according to Fleming’s
account, is that the king needed them for defensive purposes. At the time, the Vikings were
encroaching on the lands of Wessex and these lands were in areas where King Alfred needed to
place defenses. As a result, the lands were confiscated by the crown and used to build defensive
fortifications that were used to defend against future attacks by the Vikings.
Another important source about Alfred’s victory over the Vikings at Edington was an
article called “Alfred the Great Strikes Back” by Michael Carr which covers Alfred’s actions
against the Vikings after being repeatedly defeated by the Vikings in battle after battle. In 878,
King Alfred had been decisively defeated by the Vikings several times and has been driven into
exile in the marshes of Somerset. He was forced to resort to guerilla warfare in order to continue
fighting the Vikings in England.8 Alfred and other kings in both England and on mainland
6 A vill is an area of land, usually church owned property or the area surrounding a manor
7 Robin Fleming, “Monastic Lands and England’s Defense in the Viking Age”

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Europe, accepted peace with the Viking forces that had attacked and harassed them on many
occasions. Every time, however, the Vikings broke their peace and attacked again, frequently
driving the kings of Europe into exile after forcing these kings from their kingdoms. This was the
fate that was almost shared by King Alfred.
The fact that Alfred was able to defeat the Vikings is amazing in itself, but what is
even more astounding is that he emerged from his period of guerilla campaigns against
the Vikings and still retained the overwhelming support of his people. When he called for
soldiers to take the fight to the Vikings, his subjects came. When Alfred fought the Vikings at
Edington in 878, they were well equipped and confident to the point of arrogance after years of
experiencing victory after victory all across Britain and mainland Europe. Carr argues that
Alfred’s troops were more determined to fight because they had no reason to think that their
victory was guaranteed. Since they had first arrived in Britain, the Vikings had been an
unstoppable tide and nothing had stood in their way. Every enemy they faced and every king
they fought had been swept aside, and defeated with ease. Yet Alfred and his men were able to
win the initial battle against the Vikings and starve them into surrender at the fortress of
Chippenham.
There are a number of reasons why Alfred’s subjects may have remained loyal to
him. For one thing, he came from a long line of good kings who respected the law, did
not rob the church and were, overall, considered to be good rulers. Wessex was also a
stable kingdom, in comparison to the rest of England at the time.
Alfred followed his victory at Edington and the forced withdrawal of the Vikings
from Wessex with a large military construction project on the border with the Danelaw,
the Viking controlled area of England. Alfred built a long line of heavily fortified towns to
8 Michael Carr, Alfred the Great Strikes Back, Military History Vol. 18 Issue 2, page 62, June
2001, (http://search.proquest.com/docview/212652338?pq-origsite=summon)

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act as a defensive barrier that would assist in keeping the Vikings at bay when they
inevitably broke their treaty with Alfred. Carr also argues that King Alfred was successful
against the Vikings because he learned from the failures of his fellow kings in their wars against
the Vikings as well as his own failures and changed how he fought against the Vikings.9 Most
Anglo-Saxon kings fought the Vikings in lengthy pitched battles and massive direct engagements
which frequently, if not always, led to defeat for the Anglo-Saxon troops in question.
One extremely important factor regarding the outcome of Alfred’s campaign against the
Vikings is the weaponry of both sides. Despite the Vikings possessing a clear initial advantage
against the Anglo-Saxon armies of England, there is no evidence of either side having superior
weaponry. In almost every battle between Vikings and the Anglo Saxon forces opposing them,
the weapons being used by both side had virtually no impact on the outcome of the battle as their
weapons were equal in capability and neither side had an advantage due to weapons of a superior
material. Both sides made their weapons in a relatively similar manner which means that they
were technologically equal. The main factor in most battles that led to a Viking victory was
nothing to do with the weapons in use during the battle.
Another scholar of Alfred the Great, his life and his war against the Vikings, is Alfred P.
Smyth. This biography, called Alfred the Great covers a good deal more than simply Alfred’s
war with the Vikings as it also covers his rule as king after defeating the Vikings as well as the
period of his life before being crowned king (during the reign of his brothers). Smyth’s
justification for why Alfred won against the Vikings was the fact that Alfred’s people were loyal
to him and willing to fight for his cause when he asked and that his army was more determined
than the Vikings.10 After several years of battles in the British Isles where they had experienced
nothing but complete and utter victory against their enemies which made the Vikings expect their
9 Carr, Alfred the Great Strikes Back
10 Smyth, 36.

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victory, they had come to believe that they would always win and that their enemies posed no
threat to them. Contrary to this, Alfred and his men had no legitimate reason to believe they
would be able to defeat the Vikings and they had to fight hard in order to have even a small
chance at victory.
Smyth’s biography of Alfred the Great also describes Alfred’s guerilla warfare against
the Vikings as well as the tried Anglo-Saxon battle tactic against the Vikings, and how it always
failed to produce a victory. Between his defeat and the battle of Edington, Alfred fought the
Vikings repeatedly with guerilla warfare in order to do some kind of damage to his enemies and
attempt to contain them. “In the second war from 875 to 878, we find the Danes constantly on
the move, covering huge stretches of countryside, and constantly concluding bogus treaties with
Alfred, while constantly giving him and his army the slip. Alfred for his part, now also seemed
reluctant to risk a pitched battle, and although the initiative still clearly lay with the Danes, the
West Saxon army seems to have adopted the role of trying to contain the activities of the Danish
warband by shadowing their progress throughout Wessex. For a large invading force to survive
in hostile territory, it had to fragment into small foraging parties to live off the land. By
shadowing the main force of invaders with his own large army, Alfred hoped to prevent the
Danes from fanning out over the countryside in smaller groups.”11 This period of guerilla
warfare was a part of the reason for King Alfred’s victory but it was The Battle of Edington
which was the point when he showed that he had learned from his previous defeats at the hands
of the Vikings and had learned how to fight them.
Contrary to the tactics utilized by the typical Anglo-Saxon army during the war
against the Vikings, Alfred tended to avoid direct engagements and pitched battles
where they engaged the enemy directly on many different occasions. All of these
engagements between the Anglo-Saxon armies and the Vikings are almost always a
11 Smyth, 67.

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complete disaster. On nearly every occasion, these attempts ended in defeat for the
Anglo-Saxon troops. “The West Saxons, on the other hand, embarked on meeting the
first Danish threat head-on in a series of pitched battles and perhaps one frontal assault
on Reading which for the most part badly wrong.”12 The next source is The Northern Conquest:
Vikings in Britain and Ireland by Katherine Holman whose stated opinion about the reason for
Alfred’s victories over the Vikings is that it was due to an internal schism within the Viking
ranks between Guthrum and Halfdan, the two Viking commanders in Britain.
Holman’s view is that the reason for Alfred’s victory is the result of a military
disagreement between Halfdan and Guthrum, the two leaders of the Viking army in England.
“The threat that the Vikings posed to England at this point can hardly be underestimated, but
luckily for Wessex - and indeed England - there seems to have been some kind of dispute within
the ranks of the Great Army. After spending the winter of 874 at Repton in Derbyshire, the
Viking army split into two: one half, under Halfdan, went north into Northumbria, where they
settled in 876; the other half, under its leader Guthrum, headed into Wessex.”13
This source is primarily a discussion of the Viking raids themselves as well as a discussion of a
previous trading relationship between England and Scandinavia prior to the beginning of the
Viking raids. The Viking raids in the British Isles started in the 790s with a series of raids on a
number of monasteries located in the coastal regions of Britain. After the success of their initial
raids on the British Isles, the Vikings began to ramp up their operations with more and more
attacks all across Britain. They hit everything from monasteries to rich towns, all of which were
located very close to a river or the sea which made it all too easy for the Vikings to attack
without warning.
“When did the Viking raids on the British Isles begin? Thanks to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and
12 Smyth, 68.
13 Katherine Holman, The Northern Conquest: Vikings in Britain and Ireland, Signal Books Ltd
(October 29, 2007) Page 38

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the Annals of Ulster, this question seems quite easy to answer: during the 790s, when a series of
raids on the coastal monasteries of present-day England, Scotland and Ireland are recorded. The
monastery of Lindisfarne was looted in 793, the Annals of Ulster mention the ‘devastation of all
the islands of Britain by the gentiles’ in 794 and, in the following year, Iona, Skye, Rechru
(almost certainly Rathlin Island), Inismurray, Inisboffin, and St Patrick’s Island all suffered at
the hands of the Vikings.” 14
The Viking attacks on the British isles and Alfred’s claim to fame as the only
Anglo-Saxon ruler to challenge them might never have happened. There are a number of pieces
of evidence that point to a peaceful trading relationship between Britain and Scandinavia,
specifically Norway, for many years prior to the start of the Viking age. In addition to trade,
there was also some speculation about an agreement with certain rulers in the British Isles about
allowing Scandinavians to settle the costal islands around Britain. “One British expert, John
Hines, concludes that what changed with the attack on Lindisfarne was that the Vikings were
acting not only as traders, but also as raiders, signalling a shift in political relationships between
western Europe and Scandinavia. The Norwegian archaeologist, Bjørn Myhre, supports Hines’s
conclusions, pointing to the evidence for considerable trade between Norway and the British
Isles in the eighth century and, more tentatively, the possibility of Scandinavian settlement on the
islands around the coast of Britain at this early date”15
After the death of Alfred’s brother and the defeat of Mercia, there seems to have
been some kind of internal dispute amongst the Vikings as their Great Army split in two
under Halfdan and Guthrum. Guthrum headed south towards Wessex and would eventually be
defeated and made to convert to Christianity by Alfred at the Battle of Edington.
The threat that the Vikings posed to England at this point can hardly be underestimated, but
luckily for Wessex - and indeed England - there seems to have been some kind of dispute within
14 Holman, 29
15 Holman, 31

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the ranks of the Great Army. After spending the winter of 874 at Repton in Derbyshire, the
Viking army split into two: one half, under Halfdan, went north into Northumbria, where they
settled in 876; the other half, under its leader Guthrum, headed into Wessex. Following a surprise
attack on his residence at Chippenham in 878, Alfred and a small force took refuge from
continued Viking attacks in the marshes of Athelney, Somerset, where he built a fortification and
waged a guerrilla war.16
The primary reason expressed by Holman as a justification for Alfred’s victory is
that the schism in the Vikings forces between Halfdan and Guthrum divided the Vikings
forces and made it so that Alfred and the people of Wessex did not have to face the full
force of the Viking army as only half of it marched south to invade Wessex. This
reduction in force was fortunate for Wessex as the Vikings were smaller in number
which meant a greater chance of victory for Alfred and his men.
The sources about why King Alfred The Great was able to beat the Vikings vary between
religious, biographical, and tactical reasons. What seems to be in agreement is that King Alfred’s
victory against the Vikings was extremely unlikely and that the loyalty of Alfred’s subjects was
an important factor in his victory. Asser’s view an important one because his biography of King
Alfred was written during Alfred’s lifetime. Asser’s view is religious because Asser is a priest
serving in Alfred’s court after his war with the Vikings. Another view expressed about the
reasons for King Alfred’s victory is Duckett’s view that he and his men were far more inspired to
fight than the Vikings because they didn’t have any reason to think they would win. The main
primary source used by Duckett is Asser, although Duckett takes the information presented and
makes her own interpretation of the source since she does not follow Asser’s view that Alfred’s
victory was preordained by God. Fleming is another author whose view is that Alfred defeated
the Vikings because he confiscated land from the church to build defenses and reward his
16 Holman, 28

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subjects in exchange for their loyalty to him.
The view expressed by Carr is again different. Carr wrote the article, Alfred the Great
Strikes Back where he expresses the view that Alfred’s use of guerilla warfare against the
Vikings was an important reason for his victory. Another significant view is that of Smyth and
his biography of Alfred called King Alfred The Great where he expresses the view that a change
in how Alfred fought in comparison to typical Anglo-Saxon kings was why he won. The most
important one of the sources used by Smyth is the Anglo Saxon Chronicle, a collection of Anglo-
Saxon historical records. Holman also expresses a different view in his book, The Northern
Conquest – Vikings in Britain and Ireland. Holman’s opinion is that Alfred’s victory was as a
result of a division within the ranks of the Viking army that split up their forces, resulting in
Alfred having to face a much smaller Viking army than he would have done otherwise. Holman
also discusses the fact that there was a trade relationship between the British Isles and
Scandinavia. The primary sources that Holman uses to this end are a number of precious objects
such as Viking coins and other such items which are used to prove the existence of substantial
trade between the two groups. In terms of Holman’s view of the reason for Alfred’s victory, the
main source used is the Anglo Saxon Chronicle, a collection of records of Anglo-Saxon history.
My opinion is that King Alfred’s victory over the Vikings was due to a combination of
several different factors. The reasons for Alfred’s victory are that his men were more inspired to
fight, his utilization of guerilla warfare and his willingness to learn from past mistakes made in
battles against the Vikings. There are also several other views expressed by the few other authors
which I either do not subscribe to or think are far less relevant. Personally, I do not find the view
that Alfred’s victory was preordained by God realistic in the slightest as it completely ignores
any military aspects and suggests that Alfred’s skills as a leader and warrior were completely
irrelevant as his victory was decided long before the Battle of Edington or the arrival of the
Vikings in Britain, regardless of how skilled or unskilled he was in warfare. The other view that I

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don’t support is that his victory was due to confiscating church lands for defensive purposes.
While this was a part of why he won, I don’t think it was nearly as important as the other views
about why Alfred was able to defeat the Vikings.
King Alfred’s various different strategies against the Vikings are a very important part of
why he was able to defeat them, and I consider them to be the majority of why he won. Alfred’s
capacity to recognize that the typical strategy of engaging in a lengthy, pitched battle with the
Vikings was not working is very important because it allowed him to recognize that he needed a
different approach and that he needed to adapt his strategy and fight in a different way or he
would be defeated for good, just as his fellow Anglo-Saxon kings had been. If Alfred has simply
kept using the same old strategy that his fellow kings had tried, he would have lost because those
strategies, which mostly consisted of a direct battle with the Viking forces, had proven to be a
disaster many times already and had never defeated the Vikings in open battle. The other reason
that I think Alfred defeated the Vikings is that his men were more inspired and fought harder.
This is extremely important because the Viking and Anglo-Saxon armies were equal in terms of
equipment. Neither army’s equipment was superior in any way so the weapons and armor of one
side did not give them any advantage whatsoever over their enemies. The importance of Alfred’s
men being inspired to fight is because they had no reason to believe that they could win since the
Vikings were such an overwhelming force and Alfred’s men were going up against this force
with no reason to think that they had a guarantee of victory, unlike the Vikings who had won so
many battles before invading Wessex that they started to consider their victory as inevitable. In
the end, this study of the Battle of Edington shows an unlikely hero rising to a great military
challenge with enough charisma and tactical brilliance to defeat a colonizing army. And
wouldn’t this earn a man the title, “Great?”

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Bibliography
Asser. 893. Life of King Alfred
Carr, Michael. June 2001. Alfred the Great Strikes Back. February 6, 2015
Duckett, Eleanor. October 15, 1958. Alfred the Great – The King and his England. University of
Chicago Press
Fleming, Robin. April 1985. Monastic Lands and England’s Defense in the Viking Age. The
English Historical Review No. CCCXCV. February 4, 2015
Holman, Katherine. October 2007. Signal Books Ltd. The Northern Conquest: Vikings in Britain
and Ireland
Smyth. 1995. Alfred. King Alfred the Great. Oxford University Press