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Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms
Saxons & Jutes of Southern England
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The Middel Seaxe (Middle Saxons / Middlesex)
Moving westwards along the Thames in the late fifth century, the
Middle Saxons detached themselves from the
Thames Valley Saxons when they
reached Roman Londinium. They founded settlements to the west and north of
the city, threatening the Britons at Caer Mincip (St Albans) in the
process. Londinium itself became abandoned for much of the sixth century while the Saxons settled
villages in the countryside. The Saxons south of the Thames became known as
the Suther-ge, or "southern region"
of the Middle Saxons.
By AD 704, the region (which included modern Hertfordshire) was mentioned in
a charter as Middelseaxan, by 1086 Midelsexe (in Domesday Book). |
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c.440 - 496 |
Saxon settlers begin advancing along the Thames Valley,
and some form settlements. Two large groups to
the
north, west and south of Londinium become known as the Middel Seaxe and the
Suther-ge. |
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c.496 |
Probable date of the battle of
Mons Badonicus,
in which Ælle, as Bretwalda, attacks
the Britons in the region of Caer Baddan.
Ælle's route probably takes him through the
Thames Valley to collect his
forces from the large numbers of Saxons there, and then they head westwards along the
upper Thames Valley until they emerge through the Goring Gap. The ensuing
defeat halts Saxon advances for a generation. |
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c.571 |
The
West Seaxe capture of four towns along the Icknield Way,
to the immediate west of the Middel Seaxe. |
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c.575 - 600 |
Caer Mincip (Roman
Verulamium, modern St Albans) shows plenty of evidence
for the survival of a British enclave here, in between the Middel Seaxe and
the Icknield Way. A late Roman building had been converted into a barn or
granary by the application of huge buttressed foundations. Corn dryers were
inserted inside the building so that such agricultural work could take place
within the safety of the town walls. A wooden water pipe was later
constructed across the site and maintained, quite possibly until the
collapse of the enclave at the end of the sixth century.
This date is very close to that of Cynwidion's
collapse, and this territory lay to the immediate north. It seems likely
that Caer Mincip was a Cynwidion outpost in its final days, and perhaps a
final survivor of the postulated Caer Lundein territory before that. That
it survived at all was probably due to the weakened state of all the
southern Saxon kingdoms after their Mons Badonicus defeat in c.496. |
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c.600 |
The region
comes under the dominance of the East Seaxe,
who seem to treat it as a sub-kingdom, and
Suth-rig as a further
sub-kingdom. |
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c.730 |
The region comes
under the dominance of Mercia,
and the Middle Saxons now lose any individual identity they may have held
onto. |
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