The power, sophistication, unity and wealth of the late Anglo-Saxon state have been underestimated. The shadow of defeat in 1066, and an assumption that the Normans brought about strong government and a unification that had not previously been there, has prevented many of the remarkable features of Anglo-Saxon society from being seen. In The Anglo-Saxon State James Campbell shows how strong, unified and well-governed Anglo-Saxon England was and how numerous and wealthy were its inhabitants. Late Anglo-Saxon England was also a country with a political class considerably wider than just the earls and thegns. William Stubbs’s vision of Anglo-Saxon England as a country with real representative institutions may indeed be truer than that of his denigrators. James Campbell’s work demands the rethinking of Anglo-Saxon history.
‘James Campbell’s importance lies not in the vast amount he knows, nor even in the unexampled richness of what he writes, but in how he has taught historians of early times to think.’ PATRICK WORMALD
JAMES CAMPBELL is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Oxford.
