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Saxons
The Saxons (Latin: Saxones, German: Sachsen, Old English:
Seaxan, Old Saxon: Sahson, Low German: Sassen, Dutch: Saxons
Saksen) were a group of Germanic[1] peoples whose name was Sahson
given in the early Middle Ages to a large country (Old Saxony,
Latin: Saxonia) near the North Sea coast of northern
Germania, in what is now Germany.[2] In the late Roman
Empire, the name was used to refer to Germanic coastal
raiders, and also as a word something like the later "Viking".[3]
Their origins appear to be mainly somewhere in or near the
above-mentioned German North Sea coast where they are
found later, in Carolingian times. In Merovingian times,
continental Saxons had also been associated with the activity
and settlements on the coast of what later became Normandy.
Their precise origins are uncertain, and they are sometimes
described as fighting inland, coming into conflict with the
Franks and Thuringians. There is possibly a single classical Spread of Angles (orange) and
reference to a smaller homeland of an early Saxon tribe, but its Saxons (blue) around 500 AD
interpretation is disputed (see below). According to this Regions with significant
proposal, the Saxons' earliest area of settlement is believed to populations
have been Northern Albingia. This general area is close to the
Old Saxony, Jutland, Frisia,
probable homeland of the Angles.[4]
Heptarchy (England)
During the 8th and 9th centuries the Saxons of Old Saxony Languages
were in continual conflict with the Franks, whose kingdom at
Old Saxon, Old English
the time was ruled by the Carolingian dynasty. After 33 years
of conquest due to military campaigns led by the lord king and Religion
emperor Charlemagne beginning in 772 and ending around Originally Germanic and Anglo-
804, the Franks defeated the Saxons, forced them to convert Saxon paganism, later Christianity
to Christianity and seized the territory of Old Saxony ,
annexing it into the Carolingian domain, although the Franks Related ethnic groups
had been enemies of the Saxons as far earlier as the time of Anglo-Saxons, Angles, Frisii, Jutes
Clovis I during the early Merovingian period of the 5th and 6th
centuries.

Charles Martel, Duke and prince of the Franks and Mayor of the Palace of Austrasia, the
grandfather of Charlemagne, had also fought and led numerous campaigns against the Saxons.

In contrast, the British "Saxons", today referred to in English as Anglo-Saxons, became a single
nation bringing together migrant Germanic peoples (Frisian, Jutish, Anglish [whence "English"])
and assimilated British populations. Their earliest weapons and clothing south of the Thames were
based on late Roman military fashions, but later immigrants north of the Thames showed a
stronger North German influence.[5][6] The term "Anglo-Saxon", combining the names of the
Angles and the Saxons, came into use by the eighth century (for example Paul the Deacon) to
distinguish the Germanic inhabitants of Britain from continental Saxons (referred to in the Anglo-
Saxon Chronicle as Ealdseaxe, 'old Saxons'), but both the Saxons of Britain and those of Old
Saxony (Northern Germany) continued to be referred to as 'Saxons' in an indiscriminate manner,
especially in the languages of Britain and Ireland.

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While the English Saxons were no longer raiders, the political history of the continental Saxons is
unclear until the time of the conflict between their semi-legendary hero Widukind and the
Frankish emperor Charlemagne. While the continental Saxons are no longer a distinctive ethnic
group or country, their name lives on in the names of several regions and states of Germany,
including Lower Saxony (which includes central parts of the original Saxon homeland known as
Old Saxony), Saxony in Upper Saxony, as well as Saxony-Anhalt (which includes Old, Lower and
Upper Saxon regions).

Contents
Etymology
Saxon as a demonym
Celtic languages
Romance languages
Non-Indo-European languages
Related personal names
Saxony as a toponym
History
Early history
Netherlands
Italy and Provence
Gaul
Saxons in Britain
Later Saxons in Germany
Culture
Social structure
Religion
Germanic Religion
Christianity
Christian literature
See also
Notes
References
External links

Etymology
The name of the Saxons may derive from a kind of
knife associated with the ethnos; such a knife has the
name seax in Old English, Sax in German, sachs in
Old High German, and sax in Old Norse.[7][8] The
seax has had a lasting symbolic impact in the English
counties of Essex and Middlesex, both of which
feature three seaxes in their ceremonial emblem. The
names of these counties, along with the names The remains of a seax together with a
"Sussex" and "Wessex", contain a remnant of the reconstructed replica
root of the word "Saxon".
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The Elizabethan-era play Edmund Ironside suggests that the name "Saxon" derives from the Latin
saxa (stones; singular form: saxum):[9]

Their names discover what their natures are,

More hard than stones, and yet not stones
indeed.

— I.i.181-2

Saxon as a demonym

Celtic languages

In the Celtic languages, the words designating English nationality derive from the Latin word
Saxones. The most prominent example, a loanword in English from Scottish Gaelic (older spelling:
Sasunnach), is the word Sassenach, used by Scots-, Scottish English- and Gaelic-speakers in the
21st century[10] as a racially pejorative term for an English person. The Oxford English Dictionary
(OED) gives 1771 as the date of the earliest written use of the word in English. The Gaelic name for
England is Sasann (older spelling: Sasunn, genitive: Sasainn), and Sasannach (formed with a
common adjective suffix -ach[11]) means "English" in reference to people and things, though not
when naming the English language, which is Bearla.

Sasanach, the Irish word for an Englishman (with Sasana meaning England), has the same
derivation, as do the words used in Welsh to describe the English people (Saeson, singular Sais)
and the language and things English in general: Saesneg and Seisnig.

Cornish terms the English Sawsnek, from the same derivation. In the 16th century Cornish-
speakers used the phrase Meea navidna cowza sawzneck to feign ignorance of the English
language.[12] The Cornish words for the English people and England are Sowsnek and Pow Sows
('Land [Pays] of Saxons'). Similarly Breton, spoken in north-western France, has saoz(on)
('English'), saozneg ('the English language'), and Bro-saoz for 'England'.

Romance languages

The label "Saxons" (in Romanian: Sași) also became attached to German settlers who settled
during the 12th century in southeastern Transylvania. From Transylvania, some of these Saxons
migrated to neighbouring Moldavia, as the name of the town Sas-cut shows. Sascut lies in the part
of Moldavia that forms part of present-day Romania.

During Georg Friederich Händel's visit to the Republic of Venice (1706–09), much was made of his
origins in Saxony; in particular, the Venetians greeted the 1709 performance of his opera
Agrippina with the cry Viva il caro Sassone, "Cheers for the beloved Saxon!"[13]

Non-Indo-European languages

The Finns and Estonians have changed their usage of the root Saxon over the centuries to apply
now to the whole country of Germany (Saksa and Saksamaa respectively) and the Germans
(saksalaiset and sakslased, respectively). The Finnish word sakset (scissors) reflects the name of
the old Saxon single-edged sword — seax — from which the name "Saxon" supposedly derives.[14]
In Estonian, saks means "a nobleman" or, colloquially, "a wealthy or powerful person". (As a result
of the 13th-century Northern Crusades, Estonia's upper class comprised mostly persons of German
origin until well into the 20th century.)
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Related personal names

The word also survives as the surnames of Saß / Sass (in Low German or Low Saxon), Sachse and
Sachs. The Dutch female given name, Saskia, originally meant 'a Saxon woman' (metathesis of
Saxia).

Saxony as a toponym

Following the downfall of Henry the Lion (1129–1195, Duke of Saxony 1142–1180), and the
subsequent splitting of the Saxon tribal duchy into several territories, the name of the Saxon duchy
was transferred to the lands of the Ascanian family. This led to the differentiation between Lower
Saxony (lands settled by the Saxon tribe) and Upper Saxony (the lands belonging to the House of
Wettin). Gradually, the latter region became known as "Saxony", ultimately usurping the name's
original geographical meaning. The area formerly known as Upper Saxony now lies in Central
Germany - in the eastern part of the present-day Federal Republic of Germany: note the names of
the federal states of Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt.

History

Early history

Ptolemy's Geographia, written in the second

century, is sometimes considered to contain the
first mentioning of the Saxons. Some copies of this
text mention a tribe called Saxones in the area to
the north of the lower Elbe.[15] However, other
versions refer to the same tribe as Axones. This may
be a misspelling of the tribe that Tacitus in his
Germania called Aviones. According to this theory,
"Saxones" was the result of later scribes trying to
correct a name that meant nothing to them.[16] On
the other hand, Schütte, in his analysis of such
problems in Ptolemy's Maps of Northern Europe,
believed that "Saxones" is correct. He notes that the
loss of first letters occurs in numerous places in Map of the Roman Empire and contemporary
indigenous Europe in 125 AD, showing the
various copies of Ptolemy's work, and also that the
location of the Saxons in Northern Germany
manuscripts without "Saxones" are generally
inferior overall.[17]

Schütte also remarks that there was a medieval tradition of calling this area "Old Saxony"
(covering Westphalia, Angria and Eastphalia).[18] This view is in line with Bede who mentions Old
Saxony was near the Rhine, somewhere to the north of the river Lippe (Westphalia, northeastern
part of modern German state Nordrhein-Westfalen).[19]

The first undisputed mention of the Saxon name in its modern form is from AD 356, when Julian,
later the Roman emperor, mentioned them in a speech as allies of Magnentius, a rival emperor in
Gaul. Zosimus also mentions a specific tribe of Saxons, called the Kouadoi, which have been
interpreted as a misunderstanding for the Chauci, or Chamavi. They entered the Rhineland and
displaced the recently settled Salian Franks from Batavi, whereupon some of the Salians began to
move into the Belgian territory of Toxandria, supported by Julian.[20]

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Both in this case and in others the Saxons were

associated with using boats for their raids. In order
to defend against Saxon raiders, the Romans
created a military district called the Litus
Saxonicum ("Saxon Shore") on both sides of the
English Channel.

In 441–442 AD, Saxons are mentioned for the first

time as inhabitants of Britain, when an unknown
Gaulish historian wrote: "The British
provinces...have been reduced to Saxon rule".[21]

Saxons as inhabitants of present-day Northern Europe in the late fifth century. Most names
Germany are first mentioned in 555, when the shown are the Latin names of fifth-century
Frankish king Theudebald died, and the Saxons peoples, with the exceptions of Syagrius (king of
used the opportunity for an uprising. The uprising a Gallo-Roman rump state), Odoacer (Germanic
was suppressed by Chlothar I, Theudebald's king of Italy), and (Julius) Nepos (nominally the
last Western Roman emperor, de facto ruler of
successor. Some of their Frankish successors fought
Dalmatia).
against the Saxons, others were allied with them.
The Thuringians frequently appeared as allies of
the Saxons.

Netherlands

In the Netherlands, Saxons occupied the territory south of

the Frisians and north of the Franks. In the west it reached
as far as the Gooi region, in the south as far as the Lower
Rhine. After the conquest of Charlemagne, this area formed
the main part of the Bishopric of Utrecht. The Saxon duchy
of Hamaland played an important role in the formation of
the duchy of Guelders.

The local language, although strongly influenced by

standard Dutch, is still officially recognised as Dutch Low
Saxon.

Italy and Provence

In 569, some Saxons accompanied the Lombards into Italy

under the leadership of Alboin and settled there.[22] In 572,
they raided southeastern Gaul as far as Stablo, now
Estoublon. Divided, they were easily defeated by the Gallo-
Roman general Mummolus. When the Saxons regrouped, a Possible locations of the Angles,
peace treaty was negotiated whereby the Italian Saxons were Saxons and Jutes before their migration
allowed to settle with their families in Austrasia.[23] to Britain.
Gathering their families and belongings in Italy, they
returned to Provence in two groups in 573. One group
proceeded by way of Nice and another via Embrun, joining up at Avignon. They plundered the
territory and were as a consequence stopped from crossing the Rhône by Mummolus. They were
forced to pay compensation for what they had robbed before they could enter Austrasia. These
people are known only by documents, and their settlement cannot be compared to the
archeological artifacts and remains that attest to Saxon settlements in northern and western Gaul.

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Gaul

A Saxon king named Eadwacer conquered Angers in 463 only to be dislodged by Childeric I and
the Salian Franks, allies of the Roman Empire.[24] It is possible that Saxon settlement of Great
Britain began only in response to expanding Frankish control of the Channel coast.[25]

Some Saxons already lived along the Saxon shore of Gaul as Roman foederati. They can be traced
in documents, but also in archeology and in toponymy. The Notitia Dignitatum mentions the
Tribunus cohortis primae novae Armoricanae, Grannona in litore Saxonico. The location of
Grannona is uncertain and was identified by the historians and toponymists at different places:
mainly with the town known today as Granville (in Normandy) or nearby. The Notitia Dignitatum
does not explain where these "Roman" soldiers came from. Some toponymists have proposed
Graignes (Grania 1109–1113) as the location for Grannona/Grannonum. Although some scholars
believe it could be the same element *gran, that is recognised in Guernsey (Greneroi 11th
century),[26] it most likely derives from the Gaulish god Grannos.[27] This location is closer to
Bayeux, where Gregory of Tours evokes otherwise the Saxones Bajocassini (Bessin Saxons), which
were ineffective against the Breton Waroch II in 579.[28][29]

A Saxon unit of laeti settled at Bayeux  –  the Saxones Baiocassenses.[30] These Saxons became
subjects of Clovis I late in the fifth century. The Saxons of Bayeux comprised a standing army and
were often called upon to serve alongside the local levy of their region in Merovingian military
campaigns. In 589, the Saxons wore their hair in the Breton fashion at the orders of Fredegund
and fought with them as allies against Guntram.[31] Beginning in 626, the Saxons of the Bessin
were used by Dagobert I for his campaigns against the Basques. One of their own, Aeghyna, was
created a dux over the region of Vasconia.[32]

In 843 and 846 under king Charles the Bald, other official documents mention a pagus called
Otlinga Saxonia in the Bessin region, but the meaning of Otlinga is unclear. Different Bessin
toponyms were identified as typically Saxon, ex : Cottun (Coltun 1035–1037 ; Cola's "town"). It is
the only place name in Normandy that can be interpreted as a -tun one (English -ton; cf.
Colton).[33] In contrast to this one example in Normandy are numerous -thun villages in the north
of France, in Boulonnais, for example Alincthun, Verlincthun, and Pelingthun,[34] showing, with
other toponyms, an important Saxon or Anglo-Saxon settlement. Comparing the concentration of -
ham/-hem (Anglo-Saxon hām > home) toponyms in the Bessin and in the Boulonnais gives more
examples of Saxon settlement.[35] In the area known today as Normandy, the -ham cases of Bessin
are unique – they do not exist elsewhere. Other cases were considered, but there is no determining
example. For example, Canehan (Kenehan 1030/Canaan 1030–1035) could be the biblical name
Canaan[36] or Airan (Heidram 9th century), the Germanic masculine name Hairammus.[37]

The Bessin examples are clear; for example, Ouistreham (Oistreham 1086), Étréham (Oesterham
1350  ?),[38] Huppain (*Hubbehain  ; Hubba's "home"), and Surrain (Surrehain 11th  century).
Another significant example can be found in the Norman onomastics: the widespread surname
Lecesne,[39] with variant spellings: Le  Cesne, Lesène, Lecène, and Cesne. It comes from Gallo-
Romance *SAXINU "the Saxon", which is saisne in Old French. These examples are not derived
from more recent Anglo-Scandinavian toponyms, because in that case they would have been
numerous in the Norman regions (pays de  Caux, Basse-Seine, North-Cotentin) settled by
Germanic peoples. That is not the case, nor does Bessin belong to the pagii, which were affected by
an important wave of Anglo-Scandinavian immigration.

In addition, archaeological finds add evidence to the documents and the results of toponymic
research. Around the city of Caen and in the Bessin (Vierville-sur-Mer, Bénouville, Giverville,
Hérouvillette), excavations have yielded numerous examples of Anglo-Saxon jewellery, design
elements, settings, and weapons. All of these things were discovered in cemeteries in a context of
the fifth, sixth and seventh centuries AD.[40][41]
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The oldest and most spectacular Saxon site found in France to date is Vron, in Picardy. There,
archaeologists excavated a large cemetery with tombs dating from the Roman Empire until the
sixth century. Furniture and other grave goods, as well as the human remains, revealed a group of
people buried in the fourth and fifth centuries AD. Physically different from the usual local
inhabitants found before this period, they instead resembled the Germanic populations of the
north. Starting around 375 AD the burials are located in the region known in Roman times as the
Saxon Shores. 92% of these burials were inhumations, and sometimes included weapons of typical
Germanic type. Starting from around 440 AD the burial ground displaced eastward. The burials
were now arranged in rows and displayed a strong Anglo-Saxon influence until around 520 AD,
when this influence subsided. Archaeological material, neighbouring toponymy, and historical
accounts support the conclusion of settlement of Saxon foederati with their families on the shores
of the English Channel. Further anthropological research by Joël Blondiaux shows these people
were from Lower Saxony.[42]

Saxons in Britain

Saxons, along with Angles, Frisians and Jutes, invaded or migrated to

the island of Great Britain (Britannia) around the time of the collapse
of the Western Roman Empire. Saxon raiders had been harassing the
eastern and southern shores of Britannia for centuries before,
prompting the construction of a string of coastal forts called the
Litora Saxonica or Saxon Shore. Before the end of Roman rule in
Britannia, many Saxons and other folk had been permitted to settle in
these areas as farmers.

According to tradition, the Saxons (and other tribes) first entered

Britain en masse as part of an agreement to protect the Britons from
the incursions of the Picts, Gaels and others. The story, as reported in
such sources as the Historia Brittonum and Gildas, indicates that the Alfred the Great
British king Vortigern allowed the Germanic warlords, later named as
Hengist and Horsa by Bede, to settle their people on the Isle of Thanet
in exchange for their service as mercenaries. According to Bede, Hengist manipulated Vortigern
into granting more land and allowing for more settlers to come in, paving the way for the
Germanic settlement of Britain.

Historians are divided about what followed: some argue that the takeover of southern Great
Britain by the Anglo-Saxons was peaceful. The known account from a native Briton who lived in
the mid-5th century AD, Gildas, described events as a forced takeover by armed attack:

For the fire...spread from sea to sea, fed by the hands of our foes in the east, and did
not cease, until, destroying the neighbouring towns and lands, it reached the other side
of the island, and dipped its red and savage tongue in the western ocean. In these
assaults...all the columns were levelled with the ground by the frequent strokes of the
battering-ram, all the husbandmen routed, together with their bishops, priests and
people, whilst the sword gleamed, and the flames crackled around them on every side.
Lamentable to behold, in the midst of the streets lay the tops of lofty towers, tumbled to
the ground, stones of high walls, holy altars, fragments of human bodies, covered with
livid clots of coagulated blood, looking as if they had been squeezed together in a press;
and with no chance of being buried, save in the ruins of the houses, or in the ravening
bellies of wild beasts and birds; with reverence be it spoken for their blessed souls, if,
indeed, there were many found who were carried, at that time, into the high heaven by
the holy angels... Some, therefore, of the miserable remnant, being taken in the
mountains, were murdered in great numbers; others, constrained by famine, came and
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yielded themselves to be slaves for ever to their foes, running the risk of being instantly
slain, which truly was the greatest favour that could be offered them: some others
passed beyond the seas with loud lamentations instead of the voice of
exhortation...Others, committing the safeguard of their lives, which were in continual
jeopardy, to the mountains, precipices, thickly wooded forests and to the rocks of the
seas (albeit with trembling hearts), remained still in their country.

Gildas described how the Saxons were later slaughtered at the battle of Mons Badonicus 44 years
before he wrote his history, and their conquest of Britain halted. The eighth-century English
historian Bede tells how their advance resumed thereafter. He said this resulted in a swift
overrunning of the entirety of South-Eastern Britain, and the foundation of the Anglo-Saxon
kingdoms.

Four separate Saxon realms emerged:

1. East Saxons: created the Kingdom of Essex.

2. Middle Saxons: created the province of Middlesex
3. South Saxons: led by Aelle, created the Kingdom of Sussex
4. West Saxons: created the Kingdom of Wessex

During the period of the reigns from Egbert to Alfred the Great, the kings of Wessex emerged as
Bretwalda, unifying the country. They eventually organised it as the kingdom of England in the
face of Viking invasions.

Later Saxons in Germany

The Continental Saxons living in what was known as Old

Saxony (c. 531–804) appear to have become consolidated by
the end of the eighth century. After subjugation by the
Emperor Charlemagne, a political entity called the Duchy of
Saxony (804-1296) appeared, covering Westphalia, Eastphalia,
Angria and Nordalbingia (Holstein, southern part of modern-
day Schleswig-Holstein state).

The Saxons long resisted becoming Christians[43] and being

incorporated into the orbit of the Frankish kingdom.[44] In 776
the Saxons promised to convert to Christianity and vow loyalty
to the king, but, during Charlemagne's campaign in Hispania The later stem duchy of Saxony
(778), the Saxons advanced to Deutz on the Rhine and (c. 1000 AD), which was based in
plundered along the river. This was an oft-repeated pattern the Saxons' traditional homeland
bounded by the rivers Ems, Eider
when Charlemagne was distracted by other matters.[44]
They
and Elbe
were conquered by Charlemagne in a long series of annual
campaigns, the Saxon Wars (772–804). With defeat came
enforced baptism and conversion as well as the union of the
Saxons with the rest of the Germanic, Frankish empire. Their sacred tree or pillar, a symbol of
Irminsul, was destroyed. Charlemagne also deported 10,000 Nordalbingian Saxons to Neustria
and gave their now largely vacant lands in Wagria (approximately modern Plön and Ostholstein
districts) to the loyal king of the Abotrites. Einhard, Charlemagne's biographer, says on the closing
of this grand conflict:

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The war that had lasted so many years was at length ended by their acceding to the
terms offered by the king; which were renunciation of their national religious customs
and the worship of devils, acceptance of the sacraments of the Christian faith and
religion, and union with the Franks to form one people.

Under Carolingian rule, the Saxons were reduced to tributary status. There is evidence that the
Saxons, as well as Slavic tributaries such as the Abodrites and the Wends, often provided troops to
their Carolingian overlords. The dukes of Saxony became kings (Henry I, the Fowler, 919) and
later the first emperors (Henry's son, Otto I, the Great) of Germany during the tenth century, but
they lost this position in 1024. The duchy was divided in 1180 when Duke Henry the Lion refused
to follow his cousin, Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, into war in Lombardy.

During the High Middle Ages, under the Salian emperors and, later, under the Teutonic Knights,
German settlers moved east of the Saale into the area of a western Slavic tribe, the Sorbs. The
Sorbs were gradually Germanised. This region subsequently acquired the name Saxony through
political circumstances, though it was initially called the March of Meissen. The rulers of Meissen
acquired control of the Duchy of Saxony (only a remnant of the previous Duchy) in 1423; they
eventually applied the name Saxony to the whole of their kingdom. Since then, this part of eastern
Germany has been referred to as Saxony (German: Sachsen), a source of some misunderstanding
about the original homeland of the Saxons, with a central part in the present-day German state of
Lower Saxony (German: Niedersachsen).

Culture

Social structure

Bede, a Northumbrian writing around the year 730, remarks that "the old (that is, the continental)
Saxons have no king, but they are governed by several ealdormen (or satrapa) who, during war,
cast lots for leadership but who, in time of peace, are equal in power." The regnum Saxonum was
divided into three provinces  – Westphalia, Eastphalia and Angria  – which comprised about one
hundred pagi or Gaue. Each Gau had its own satrap with enough military power to level whole
villages that opposed him.[45]

In the mid-9th century, Nithard first described the social structure of the Saxons beneath their
leaders. The caste structure was rigid; in the Saxon language the three castes, excluding slaves,
were called the edhilingui (related to the term aetheling), frilingi and lazzi. These terms were
subsequently Latinised as nobiles or nobiliores; ingenui, ingenuiles or liberi; and liberti, liti or
serviles.[46] According to very early traditions that are presumed to contain a good deal of
historical truth, the edhilingui were the descendants of the Saxons who led the tribe out of
Holstein and during the migrations of the sixth century.[46] They were a conquering warrior elite.
The frilingi represented the descendants of the amicii, auxiliarii and manumissi of that caste. The
lazzi represented the descendants of the original inhabitants of the conquered territories, who
were forced to make oaths of submission and pay tribute to the edhilingui.

The Lex Saxonum regulated the Saxons' unusual society. Intermarriage between the castes was
forbidden by the Lex, and wergilds were set based upon caste membership. The edhilingui were
worth 1,440 solidi, or about 700 head of cattle, the highest wergild on the continent; the price of a
bride was also very high. This was six times as much as that of the frilingi and eight times as much
as the lazzi. The gulf between noble and ignoble was very large, but the difference between a
freeman and an indentured labourer was small.[47]

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According to the Vita Lebuini antiqua, an important source for early Saxon history, the Saxons
held an annual council at Marklo (Westphalia) where they "confirmed their laws, gave judgment
on outstanding cases, and determined by common counsel whether they would go to war or be in
peace that year."[45] All three castes participated in the general council; twelve representatives
from each caste were sent from each Gau. In 782, Charlemagne abolished the system of Gaue and
replaced it with the Grafschaftsverfassung, the system of counties typical of Francia.[48] By
prohibiting the Marklo councils, Charlemagne pushed the frilingi and lazzi out of political power.
The old Saxon system of Abgabengrundherrschaft, lordship based on dues and taxes, was
replaced by a form of feudalism based on service and labour, personal relationships and oaths.[49]

Religion

Germanic Religion

Saxon religious practices were closely related to their political practices. The annual councils of the
entire tribe began with invocations of the gods. The procedure by which dukes were elected in
wartime, by drawing lots, is presumed to have had religious significance, i.e. in giving trust to
divine providence – it seems – to guide the random decision making.[50] There were also sacred
rituals and objects, such as the pillars called Irminsul; these were believed to connect heaven and
earth, as with other examples of trees or ladders to heaven in numerous religions. Charlemagne
had one such pillar chopped down in 772 close to the Eresburg stronghold.

Early Saxon religious practices in Britain can be gleaned from place names and the Germanic
calendar in use at that time. The Germanic gods Woden, Frigg, Tiw and Thunor, who are attested
to in every Germanic tradition, were worshipped in Wessex, Sussex and Essex. They are the only
ones directly attested to, though the names of the third and fourth months (March and April) of
the Old English calendar bear the names Hrethmonath and Eosturmonath, meaning "month of
Hretha" and "month of Ēostre." It is presumed that these are the names of two goddesses who
were worshipped around that season.[51] The Saxons offered cakes to their gods in February
(Solmonath). There was a religious festival associated with the harvest, Halegmonath ("holy
month" or "month of offerings", September).[52] The Saxon calendar began on 25 December, and
the months of December and January were called Yule (or Giuli). They contained a Modra niht or
"night of the mothers", another religious festival of unknown content.

The Saxon freemen and servile class remained faithful to their original beliefs long after their
nominal conversion to Christianity. Nursing a hatred of the upper class, which, with Frankish
assistance, had marginalised them from political power, the lower classes (the plebeium vulgus or
cives) were a problem for Christian authorities as late as 836. The Translatio S. Liborii remarks on
their obstinacy in pagan ritus et superstitio (usage and superstition).[53]

Christianity

The conversion of the Saxons in England from their original Germanic religion to Christianity
occurred in the early to late seventh century under the influence of the already converted Jutes of
Kent. In the 630s, Birinus became the "apostle to the West Saxons" and converted Wessex, whose
first Christian king was Cynegils. The West Saxons begin to emerge from obscurity only with their
conversion to Christianity and keeping written records. The Gewisse, a West Saxon people, were
especially resistant to Christianity; Birinus exercised more efforts against them and ultimately
succeeded in conversion.[51] In Wessex, a bishopric was founded at Dorchester. The South Saxons
were first evangelised extensively under Anglian influence; Aethelwalh of Sussex was converted by
Wulfhere, King of Mercia and allowed Wilfrid, Bishop of York, to evangelise his people beginning
in 681. The chief South Saxon bishopric was that of Selsey. The East Saxons were more pagan than
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the southern or western Saxons; their territory had a

superabundance of pagan sites.[54] Their king, Saeberht, was
converted early and a diocese was established at London. Its
first bishop, Mellitus, was expelled by Saeberht's heirs. The
conversion of the East Saxons was completed under Cedd in
the 650s and 660s.

The continental Saxons were evangelised largely by English

missionaries in the late seventh and early eighth centuries.
Around 695, two early English missionaries, Hewald the White
and Hewald the Black, were martyred by the vicani, that is,
villagers.[50] Throughout the century that followed, villagers
and other peasants proved to be the greatest opponents of
Christianisation, while missionaries often received the support
1868 illustration of Augustine
of the edhilingui and other noblemen. Saint Lebuin, an
addressing the Saxons
Englishman who between 745 and 770 preached to the Saxons,
mainly in the eastern Netherlands, built a church and made
many friends among the nobility. Some of them rallied to save him from an angry mob at the
annual council at Marklo (near river Weser, Bremen). Social tensions arose between the
Christianity-sympathetic noblemen and the pagan lower castes, who were staunchly faithful to
their traditional religion.[55]

Under Charlemagne, the Saxon Wars had as their chief object the conversion and integration of
the Saxons into the Frankish empire. Though much of the highest caste converted readily, forced
baptisms and forced tithing made enemies of the lower orders. Even some contemporaries found
the methods employed to win over the Saxons wanting, as this excerpt from a letter of Alcuin of
York to his friend Meginfrid, written in 796, shows:

If the light yoke and sweet burden of Christ were to be preached to the most obstinate
people of the Saxons with as much determination as the payment of tithes has been
exacted, or as the force of the legal decree has been applied for fault of the most trifling
sort imaginable, perhaps they would not be averse to their baptismal vows.[56]

Charlemagne's successor, Louis the Pious, reportedly treated the Saxons more as Alcuin would
have wished, and as a consequence they were faithful subjects.[57] The lower classes, however,
revolted against Frankish overlordship in favour of their old paganism as late as the 840s, when
the Stellinga rose up against the Saxon leadership, who were allied with the Frankish emperor
Lothair I. After the suppression of the Stellinga, in 851 Louis the German brought relics from
Rome to Saxony to foster a devotion to the Roman Catholic Church.[58] The Poeta Saxo, in his
verse Annales of Charlemagne's reign (written between 888 and 891), laid an emphasis on his
conquest of Saxony. He celebrated the Frankish monarch as on par with the Roman emperors and
as the bringer of Christian salvation to people. References are made to periodic outbreaks of pagan
worship, especially of Freya, among the Saxon peasantry as late as the 12th century.

Christian literature

In the ninth century, the Saxon nobility became vigorous supporters of monasticism and formed a
bulwark of Christianity against the existing Slavic paganism to the east and the Nordic paganism of
the Vikings to the north. Much Christian literature was produced in the vernacular Old Saxon, the
notable ones being a result of the literary output and wide influence of Saxon monasteries such as
Fulda, Corvey and Verden; and the theological controversy between the Augustinian, Gottschalk
and Rabanus Maurus.[59]
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From an early date, Charlemagne and Louis the Pious supported Christian vernacular works in
order to evangelise the Saxons more efficiently. The Heliand, a verse epic of the life of Christ in a
Germanic setting, and Genesis, another epic retelling of the events of the first book of the Bible,
were commissioned in the early ninth century by Louis to disseminate scriptural knowledge to the
masses. A council of Tours in 813 and then a synod of Mainz in 848 both declared that homilies
ought to be preached in the vernacular. The earliest preserved text in the Saxon language is a
baptismal vow from the late eighth or early ninth century; the vernacular was used extensively in
an effort to Christianise the lowest castes of Saxon society.[60]

See also
List of Germanic tribes

Notes
1.
Moreland, John F. (2012). "Saxons" ([Link]
9780199545568.001.0001/acref-9780199545568-e-5728?). In Hornblower, Simon;
Spawforth, Antony; Eidinow, Esther (eds.). The Oxford Classical Dictionary (4 ed.). Oxford
University Press. ISBN 9780191735257. Retrieved 26 January 2020. "Saxons, a Germanic
tribe..."
Buchberger, Erica; Loseby, Simon (2018). "Saxons" ([Link]
w/10.1093/acref/9780198662778.001.0001/acref-9780198662778-e-4214?). In Nicholson,
Oliver (ed.). The Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity. Oxford University Press.
ISBN 9780191744457. Retrieved 26 January 2020. "Saxons. A Germanic people located
primarily in modern north-west Germany..."
Darvill, Timothy, ed. (2009). "Saxons" ([Link]
f/9780199534043.001.0001/acref-9780199534043-e-3710?). The Concise Oxford
Dictionary of Archaeology (3 ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780191727139.
"Saxons. Germanic people whose homeland was in the north German coastal plain..."
Kerr, Anne; Wright, Edmund, eds. (2015). "Saxons" ([Link]
w/10.1093/acref/9780199685691.001.0001/acref-9780199685691-e-3256?). A Dictionary
of World History (3 ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780191765728. Retrieved
26 January 2020. "Germanic tribes, possibly named from their single-edged seax
('sword')."
2. (Springer 2004, p. 12): "Unter dem alten Sachsen ist das Gebiet zu verstehen, das seit der
Zeit Karls des Großen (reg. 768-814) bis zum Jahre 1180 also Saxonia '(das Land) Sachsen'
bezeichnet wurde oder wenigstens so genannt werden konnte."
3. (Springer 2004, p. 2004): "Im Latein des späten Altertums konnte Saxones als
Sammelbezeichnung von Küstenräubern gebraucht werden. Es spielte dieselbe Rolle wie viele
Jahrhunderte später das Wort Wikinger."
4. (Springer 2004, p. 2004)
5. Halsall, Guy, Barbarian Migration and the Roman West 376-568, pp. 386–392
6. Haydn Middleton (2001). Romans, Anglo-Saxons & Vikings in Britain ([Link]
m/books?id=pcrqYA_vdX4C&pg=PA7). Heinemann. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-431-10209-2.
7. "Saxon | Definition of Saxon in English by Oxford Dictionaries" ([Link]
m/definition/saxon). Oxford Dictionaries | English. Retrieved 10 March 2019.
8. "sax" ([Link] Oxford English Dictionary
(Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership ([Link]
[Link]/public/login/loggingin#withyourlibrary) required.)
9. "New times and old stories". Literary Appropriations of the Anglo-Saxons. p. 111 fn 14.

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10. "Definition of SASSENACH" ([Link]

Merriam-Webster, Inc. Retrieved 16 January 2019.
11. "Sassenach" ([Link] Oxford English
Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution
membership ([Link] required.)
12. Richard Carew, Survey of Cornwall, 1602. N.B. in revived Cornish, this would be transcribed,
My ny vynnaf cows sowsnek. The Cornish word Emit meaning 'ant' (and perversely derived
from Old English) is more commonly used in Cornwall as of 2015 as slang to designate non-
Cornish Englishmen.
13. Barber, David W. (1996). Bach, Beethoven And the Boys: Music History as it Ought to be
Taught ([Link] Toronto: Sound and Vision.
ISBN 0-920151-10-8.
14. Suomen sanojen alkuperä. Etymologinen sanakirja, R-Ö. Suomalaisen kirjallisuuden seura,
Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus. 2012. p. 146.
15. Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Saxony"  ([Link]
dia_(1913)/Saxony). Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
16. Green, D. H. & Siegmund, F.: The Continental Saxons from the Migration Period to the Tenth
Century: An Ethnographic Perspective, Boydell Press, 2003, pp. 14–15 ISBN 1-84383-026-4,
ISBN 978-1-84383-026-9
17. Schütte, page 22-23 ([Link]
up/search/saxones).
18. Schütte page 64 ([Link]
earch/saxones).
19. Lanting; van der Plicht (2010), "De 14C-chronologie van de Nederlandse Pre- en Protohistorie
VI: Romeinse tijd en Merovingische periode, deel A: historische bronnen en chronologische
schema's" ([Link] Palaeohistoria,
51/52: 70, ISBN 9789077922736
20. Haywood, John (January 1991), Dark Age Naval Power: A Re-Assessment of Frankish and
Anglo-Saxon Seafaring ... ([Link]
p. 42, ISBN 9780415063746
21. John T. Koch (2006). Celtic Culture: A Historical Encyclopedia ([Link]
s?id=f899xH_quaMC&pg=PA59). ABC-CLIO. p. 59. ISBN 978-1-85109-440-0.
22. Bachrach, p. 39.
23. Bachrach, p.39.
24. Gregory of Tours, History of the Franks, Penguin 1974.
25. Stenton, 12.
26. François de Beaurepaire, Les noms des communes et anciennes paroisses de la Manche,
éditions Picard 1986. p. 125 –127.
27. Questions d'histoire de Bretagne ([Link]
nnona+Dieu+Gaulois+Grannos) (in French). E.N.S.B. 1984. p. 127. ISBN 9782735500468.
28. History of the Franks, volume II. Trans. O. M. Dalton, Clarendon Press 1967.
29. Bachrach, 52.
30. Bachrach, 10.
31. Bachrach, 63.
32. Fredegar, IV.54, p. 66.
33. Albert Dauzat and Charles Rostaing, Dictionnaire étymologique des noms de lieux en France,
Librairie Guénégaud 1979. p. 215.
34. Dauzat and Rostaing, DENL.
35. Louis Guinet, Les emprunts gallo-romans au germanique (du Ier à la fin du Vème siècle),
éditions Klincksieck 1982.
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36. François de Beaurepaire, Les noms des communes et anciennes paroisses de la Seine-
Maritime, éditions Picard 1979. p. 56.
37. René Lepelley, Dictionnaire étymologique des noms de communes de Normandie, Charles
Corlet / Presses universitaires de Caen. p. 46.
38. fr:Ernest Nègre, fr:Toponymie générale de la France, Volume II, Librairie Droz. p. 1008.
39. "Répartition des LECESNE entre 1891 et 1915" ([Link]
[Link]?nom=lecesne&client=carte) (in French).
40. Quelques témoignages de le présence Anglo-Saxonne dans le Calvados, Basse-Normandie
(Christian Pilet), in Frühmittelalterliche Studien (1979), Berlin, New York (Walter de Gruyter)
2009.
41. Des Saxons en Basse-Normandie au VIe siècle ? A propos de quelques découvertes
archéologiques faîtes récemment dans la basse vallée de l'Orne (C. Lorren) in Studien zur
Sachsenforschung 2, 1980.
42. C. Seillier, La Présence germanique en Gaule du Nord au Bas-Empire, Revue du Nord, 1995,
n° 77.
43. "They are much given to devil worship," Einhard said, "and they are hostile to our religion," as
when they martyred the Saints Ewald.
44. Benjamin Lieberman (22 March 2013). Remaking Identities: God, Nation, and Race in World
History ([Link] Rowman & Littlefield
Publishers. p. 53. ISBN 978-1-4422-1395-1.
45. Goldberg, 473.
46. Goldberg, 471.
47. Goldberg, 472.
48. Goldberg, 476.
49. Goldberg, 479.
50. Goldberg, 474.
51. Stenton, 97–98.
52. Stenton.
53. Goldberg, 480.
54. Stenton, 102.
55. Goldberg.
56. Goldberg, 478.
57. Hummer, 141, based on Astronomus.
58. Hummer, 143.
59. Goldberg, 477.
60. Hummer, 138–139.

References
Bachrach, Bernard S. Merovingian Military Organisation, 481–751. Minneapolis: University of
Minnesota Press, 1971.
Goldberg, Eric J. "Popular Revolt, Dynastic Politics, and Aristocratic Factionalism in the Early
Middle Ages: The Saxon Stellinga Reconsidered." ([Link]
Speculum, Vol. 70, No. 3. (Jul., 1995), pp. 467–501.
Hummer, Hans J. Politics and Power in Early Medieval Europe: Alsace and the Frankish
Realm 600–1000. Cambridge University Press: 2005.
Reuter, Timothy. Germany in the Early Middle Ages 800–1056. New York: Longman, 1991.
Reuter, Timothy (trans.) The Annals of Fulda ([Link]
p://[Link]/[Link]). (Manchester Medieval series, Ninth-Century
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Histories, Volume II.) Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1992.

Springer, Matthias (2004), Die Sachsen, Kohlhammer Verlag
Stenton, Sir Frank M. Anglo-Saxon England. third ed. Oxford University Press, 1971.
Wallace-Hadrill, J. M., translator. The Fourth Book of the Chronicle of Fredegar with its
Continuations ([Link]
grch4+[Link]). Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1960.
Thompson, James Westfall. Feudal Germany. 2 vol. New York: Frederick Ungar Publishing
Co., 1928.

External links
James Grout: Saxon Advent, part of the Encyclopædia Romana ([Link]
~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/britannia/saxonadvent/[Link])
Saxons and Britons ([Link]
Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Saxons"  ([Link]
dia_Britannica/Saxons). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Retrieved from "[Link]

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