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Review
| A Brief History of the Anglo-Saxons, by Geoffrey Hindley. New York: Carroll and Graf, 2006. xliv + 404 pages. $14.95, paper.
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| Geoffrey Hindley's previous entry for Carroll and Graf's Brief History series covered the Crusades, and this volume reveals a similar interest in the intricacies of politico-military history in a world characterized by warrior monarchs and ecclesiastical power. Hindley makes no claim to special expertise as an Anglo-Saxonist, instead he approaches the topic as a general medievalist interested in "how the historical reality of an English identity grew out of traditions of loyalty and lordship from the epic heritage of a pagan past" and "how the notion of a warrior church produced an expatriate community that made pioneering contributions to the shaping of the European experience" (p. xxxi). At more than 350 pages of thickly-packed information derived from dozens of secondary sources, this book is more a condensed history than a brief one. The attempt to cover, in some depth, the battles and political maneuverings of Anglo-Saxon monarchs great and minor over half a millennium is likely to lose the reader in an intricate play of eventful detail without any clear understanding as to how those details are grounded in the substance of the Anglo-Saxon social and cultural fabric. Hindley does provide fascinating descriptions of political, social, and religious structures, as well as informative excurses on Old English language and literacy, but these are largely swamped by an overabundance of data on what king X did to bishop or king Y. This is a particular shame because the book's focus on reconstructing how a single England emerged out of the multiple Anglo-Saxon kingdoms provides an excellent model for structuring a survey aimed at a general audience. Indeed, by combining this approach with a highlighting of Anglo-Saxon connections and contributions to continental and especially Frankish culture during the Merovingian and Carolingian eras, Hindley has woven an original and fundamentally illuminating survey using the most recent and the most expert scholarship. |
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A further hindrance to an appreciation of Hindley's book, at least by non-British (or even non-English) readers, is his attempt to lighten the mood or pique the reader's attention with rather donnish references to such things as kvass drinking and the millennial celebrations of the Battle of Maldon in 1991. These comparisons are always relevant to the larger historical points Hindley is making, but are likely to leave most North American readers bemused or perplexed. So in spite of all the confidently erudite familiarity with secondary scholarship on display in Anglo-Saxons, the book can only be moderately recommended for use as a reference work by U.S. high school and college students. They should be encouraged instead to look to some of the authoritative works Hindley himself uses. Among these sources: James Campbell's edited volume The Anglo-Saxons (1991), Frank M. Stenton's comprehensive and classic Anglo-Saxon England (reissued 2001), and Peter Hunter Blair's An Introduction to Anglo-Saxon England (3rd ed., 2003). The last, unlike the others, is organized topically rather than chronologically. Not only are these more solidly grounded in the surviving textual and archaeological evidence, but their styles of presentation also make them comparatively more accessible and inviting to the American reader who is trying to become familiar with the society, culture, and history of the Anglo-Saxons. |
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However, none of these—including Hindley's—could easily serve as a survey textbook for high school or even undergraduate courses. That is a niche still waiting to be better filled, with many history as well as literature instructors preferring to assign their students translations of some of the immensely readable Old English literary sources instead. Instructors, especially if already somewhat knowledgeable in English geography and Anglo-Saxon history (the book begins with four detailed maps and an eight-page chronology) will make better use of Hindley's book as a source for their lectures. Hindley provides a greater abundance of information on the acts and battles of the Anglo-Saxon kings and queens than one finds in other concise works on the era. This would prove immensely useful to teachers wishing to emphasize those topics. The book's special emphasis on the continental activities of the Anglo-Saxons also helps it to stand out by highlighting themes of great importance and emerging interest too often neglected in the standard survey. Finally, the notes for each chapter are prefaced with excellent suggestions for further reading and the book concludes with a select bibliography that is a model of its kind, reflecting Hindley's extensive and thoughtful familiarity with the literature of the field. |
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| California State University, Los Angeles |
Scott Wells |
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