The First Kingdom: Britain in the age of Arthur

While there are many books that deal with the Roman era in Britain, and then the later Anglo Saxon Period, I have not come across any book before that deals with the transitional period, between the Roman colonisation and the established Anglo Saxon kingdoms from the seventh/ eighth centuries. As the author acknowledges there is very little present knowledge of the period, and apart from a few "unreliable" written sources, there is only a limited amount of archaeological evidence currently from which we can use to fill in the blank pages of the history of this period. The author has in the circumstances done a really comprehensive job to give the best picture these "dark" centuries.Unfortunately the one area that has been a disappointment to me, has been the author's explanation of the radical cultural change, from a Romanised Celtic Britain, to Anglo Saxon England, with its new language, architecture, religion and culture. On what is admitted to be very thin archaeological evidence, the author concludes that there was no significant influx of Angles and Saxons into Britain during the fifth century (only a few war bands perhaps), but that the effect was that the local Britains, found the culture so appealing that the entire country wholesale ditched their own language, customs and religion and somehow turned into Germans ! The only example of such a practice given, was to suggest in the same way that the twenty-first century Dutch people "are expected to speak only English in 50 years time", so in the way all the Britons had started speaking Old English, and stopped speaking their own Celtic language. There is no precedence for such an event. The Britons had just been through 300 years of Roman occupation, and had still maintained their own language and customs, so why would a few culturally unimpressive Germans succeed where the Romans failed. Only if the culture were overwhelmed by significant numbers would such a situation possibly take place.The influx of Vikings a few centuries later failed to turn England into a Scandinavian culture speaking Norse - the Vikings were assimilated into English culture. Why do the Normans not speak Norse instead of French. Why do the Southern Italians not speak Norman French instead of Italian. Why does India not speak entirely English instead of Hindi and its other languages. The reason is that there were insufficient "invaders" to swamp the existing culture - as was the case in both North and South America. While there were likely to be many Britons who were assimilated into a German culture, this would only happen if the original culture was swamped by numbers of incomers.The author seems to have taken the position that absence of evidence, during this obscure period, is evidence of absence. In order for such a cultural change to have been achieved (which would have included the rejection of an evangelising Christianity, for pagan Gods) only with significant arrival of new people would such a change be possible. The conclusion that there was no significant immigration to Britain, but the people just turned into Germans, is poor. If there is currently no evidence for an invasion or mass immigration, just say that that is our current state of knowledge, don't try to come up with an explanation that is clearly improbable and never witnessed anywhere else in history.

Due to the title, I believed there would be more of a focus around Kingb Arthur and its mythologies however this book focuses on tribal lordship and the emergence of Kings and the church through out Britain post the Roman Empire. There is no denying that this book is well researched and informative however the writing style at times felt somewhat dry and repetitive. I would recommend it if you are heavily interested in this time period but not if you wish to read about Arthur.

Hi, I am just about coming to the end of this and found it very enjoyable. For those who have read a great deal about this period this book does not say anything new but that would have been difficult given the scarcity of contemporary or near contemporary written sources and archaeological evidence. What this book does do is pull the information that we do have together and present a reasonable hypothesis of what happened in Britain between 400-600 CE. This makes it an excellent book for people interested in this period who want to read their first book on sub-Roman Britain. There is some padding at times and sometimes the author lapses into a more evocative style of writing that I would like from a factual history book. But that should not detract from a particular good description of how Roman Britain came to an end and the Early Medieval period began. One slight criticism, why put Arthur in the title? it can be misleading to people who want to read about this semi mythical character. This period is fascinating enough without relying on this semi mythical character to sell it.

I did not like this book at first. There was a lot of detail and it looked as if all I would get is a lot of lists and major equivocations. To be fair, the author sets the stall out and tells us at the outset that, to borrow the words of Nigel Tufnell of Spinal Tap, "No one knows who they were - or, what they were doin'" Despite this, always assuming you can keep all the information in your head (which I can't) it is possible to get an idea of what happened in the dark ages (we are told, as if from a stern headmaster, that it is no longer 'the Dark Ages" but "Early Medieval". What happened after the Romans? That is the question and in the end you perhaps do not get a satisfying answer, but you can be satisfied that it is the only answer you are going to get - unless somebody discovers new primary material.Now here's the thing; it is the "Age of Arthur" bit. This book is not about Arthur or even the Arthur of Monty Python. Arthur, if he existed at all, as the author uses this caveat, is not really a feature of the book, merely a convenient and populist tag to sell copies.Despite all this, I gradually fell for it, like somehow making a friend. In answer to the question, what happened when the Romans left (or melted into the landscape and married the locals) to the emergence of some kind of society we can understand and recognise, this book gives a very credible account. It is a keeper and I shall read it again. Not only that, I bought another of Max Adams' other books, "Aelfred's Britain", so you might say I am a fan.