In 1017, King Cnut, later the Great, was crowned the King of all of England. His enemies dead or exiled, the three year war that had ravaged the English people was finished, and on top stood one man.
Cnut was not the First Viking King, despite many claiming as such – an untold number of Scandinavian settlers had held the title of King over various parts of the country. However he was the first Viking king to have all of England.
He was a Dane, and he had won the throne by force. If he intended to keep his throne, he had to be radical.
By the turn of the Second Millennium, England was already shifting radically. Scandinavian settlers had taken over half of England for their own, and in many respects, the country was Anglo-Danish, rather than Anglo-Saxon, especially in the North and the East. These Anglo-Danes, former Vikings or descendants of Vikings, were Cnut’s strongest support base, but these made up a lower class of England.
England’s wealthy, influential aristocracy was still devoutly Anglo-Saxon. Most fitted into one of two categories; either they were Saxon loyalists, devout followers of Cnut’s predecessors, Aethelred the Unready and Edmund Ironside. The other type of Saxon noble were the power hungry social climbers, determined to use Cnut as a stepping stone for their own career. Both of these were incredibly unfavourable to a king like Cnut, hungry to make his own mark on the world.
So Cnut completely overhauled them.
The common people were not fans of their nobles. These nobles allowed Vikings to raid their shores unceasingly, and simply paid them to go away rather than fight back. They also had been incredibly harsh in the way of taxes – to fund these bribes for the Vikings – and so while the rich basked in relative luxury, the poor were left destitute, peasants with no power or wealth to call their own. As you can imagine, their resistance to Cnut’s purge was negligible.
After Cnut had executed and exiled the Anglo-Saxon nobles, only one remained in favour – a minor noble by the name of Leofric Leofwineson, husband to Lady Godiva. Leofric flew through the ranks to the glamorous title of Earl of Mercia.
This left three other major regions of England, named Earldoms, similar in organisations to the regions in Scandinavia. The Anglo-Saxon title Ealdorman was wiped from memory. These regions were: Wessex, Northumbria and East Anglia.
Northumbria fell to a man called Siward – the very one from Shakespeare’s Macbeth. Siward was a revered man. Northumbria was incredibly similar to Scandinavia in terms of culture and tradition, and so he was welcomed with open arms, and so popular that he became the subject of several myths involving dragons in Scotland. He wasn’t arrogant; he never once challenged his king, and the only enemy he ever made was Macbeth, King of Scotland, who he promptly defeated and killed.
East Anglia fell to Thorkell the Tall, a legendary warrior and leader of the Mercenary Jomsvikings, who had fought Cnut’s father, and attempted to take the throne himself, but u-turned in favour of Cnut and became his most powerful supporter. Thorkell did not last long, and was exiled soon after for losing favour with Cnut. Though we don’t know what caused this, a suitable guess is that he challenged Cnut’s authority.
Wessex has the most interesting tale. Godwin, a minor noble from Surrey, had survived Cnut’s initial purge. Some chroniclers have said he joined Cnut early on, and one story says he personally escorted one of Cnut’s best generals to his ships after getting lost, while others say he was loyal to the Saxons, and it was this devout loyalty to his kingdom that appealed to Cnut. Either way, he transformed from being owner of Compton in 1014, to Earl of Wessex by 1o20.
Wessex was the most powerful earldom, and had been directly ruled by the King for hundreds of years previously. However, it was devoutly Anglo-Saxon, and Cnut’s Danish heritage would’ve left him disliked by the traditional and proud people of Wessex – and so he had to find a suitable replacement. Godwin was perfect.
These men under King Cnut all have their own stories and each is incredibly fascinating. I intend to write more about them individually as time goes on, but this is an introduction to who I consider the most amazing figures in all of history.
The History Book 