1066 was an extremely important date in our history. It was the first and last time that the land mass known as England was defeated and taken over in war. William the Conqueror, also known as William of Normandy, or William the first was the person who had the tower of London built to help defend his new acquisition.
He also ended slavery in Britain, anyone who owned a slave would pay a fine to him, the lords of the day eventually got around it by declaring their slaves free men in service to the lord of the manor-Serfs - no rights and just a new way of owning slaves.
@@mehere6865 he did, which was a good move. But should be pointed out it wasn’t done for any moral or ethical reasons. Was purely a tactical move to strengthen his own position.
@Baked Biehn I am sure what you say is true however for a completely ignorant twit like myself I still have acquired at least some understanding and grounding on the subject. From this mistakes can then be identified and corrected - all part of the learning process.
@@morrison37171 without Alfred there’d be no England. He laid the foundations to make the dream of a united England possible. Without him who knows what these isles would look like today.
@Baked Biehn True, but at least it was said to be an over view. All credit to the guy for at least looking with an open view to non American general teaching.
Boudica (also written as Boadicea) was a Celtic queen who led a revolt against Roman rule in ancient Britain in A.D. 60 or 61. As all of the existing information about her comes from Roman scholars, particularly Tacitus and Cassius Dio, little is known about her early life; it’s believed she was born into an elite family in Camulodunum (now Colchester) around A.D. 30.At the age of 18, Boudica married Prasutagas, king of the Iceni tribe of modern-day East Anglia. When the Romans conquered southern England in A.D. 43, most Celtic tribes were forced to submit, but the Romans let Prasutagas continue in power as a forced ally of the Empire. When he died without a male heir in A.D. 60, the Romans annexed his kingdom and confiscated his family’s land and property. As a further humiliation, they publicly flogged Boudica and raped her two daughters. Tacitus recorded Boudicca’s promise of vengeance after this last violation: “Nothing is safe from Roman pride and arrogance. They will deface the sacred and will deflower our virgins. Win the battle or perish, that is what I, a woman, will do.” Like other ancient Celtic women, Boudica had trained as a warrior, including fighting techniques and the use of weapons. With the Roman provincial governor Gaius Suetonius Paulinus leading a military campaign in Wales, Boudica led a rebellion of the Iceni and members of other tribes resentful of Roman rule. After defeating the Roman Ninth Legion, the queen’s forces destroyed Camulodunum, then the captain of Roman Britain, and massacred its inhabitants. They went on to give similar treatment to London and Verulamium (modern St. Albans). By that time, Suetonius had returned from Wales and marshaled his army to confront the rebels. In the clash that followed-the exact battle site is unknown, but possibilities range from London to Northamptonshire-the Romans managed to defeat the Britons despite inferior numbers, and Boudica and her daughters apparently killed themselves by taking poison in order to avoid capture.
I'm pretty certain Anglia in a sense being from the Angles, in their own language their name being spelt Engle, where the name England comes from meaning Land of the Angles. Gan still in the Geordie dialect is directly from Old English either meaning run or go.
I'm assuming you will not see this as many other won't either but I need to get this of my chest as there were so many problems. First of all, I hate summaries as they miss so much, this missed out so much of the Spanish conflict, the Viking conflict, and so so so much more. The English language is not French and old English, it's actually Old English, Old Norse (mother to our language), French and Old Latin. Hence why it's so difficult. It missed out so much detail of King John and the Magna Carta not to mention that as I've seen some people say, the Norman's weren't strictly French as a Viking Warrior turned French Noble man was actual named Rollo a Viking ruler, not French. The only reason why William beat our King was because they marched so long and far, and we're weakened, lossed many in casualties from the battle with Hardrada that William defeated us. Great Britain, as we know it, did come to exist until the early 1700s (18th century). I find there were many inaccuracies in this informative video. It is, for the most part, correct but missed out so many other important historical events and information.
I sympathize with your sentiment, but I believe summaries have their place. Not everyone wants or has the time to watch a two-hours long documentary on the history of a nation, which will also miss a lot because there's always more to learn and learning history is a never-ending rabbit hole. That's not to say I wouldn't want a History Re-Summarized on England from OSP, because I personally like their presentation style and would love to see Blue go into more detail and take more time to properly explain certain things, but I don't hate summaries as a concept, especially for people who are just starting to dip their toe into a topic. Of course, Tyler should watch more about the history of England than this video. This should just be a starting point, not the whole story. (Also, gonna be pedantic here : English has a lot of vocabulary from Latin, either Classical, Ecclesiastical, or New Latin, but not so much Old Latin. Old Latin was spoken before Rome was an empire.)
@@Mercure250 There is also a legacy of Celto Brythonic language, mostly hidden by being converted into an anglicised spelling, but prominent in place names in Wales, Scotland and Cornwall. Of course local versions still exist as discrete languages in Brittany, Cornwall, Wales, Ireland and Scotland. But ignored by Anglo Norman historians, why waste time on your enemies?
@@etherealbolweevil6268 To be fair, vocabulary-wise, if we exclude place names, Celtic languages did not have that much of an influence (it is also true about Gaulish and French). But interestingly, it seems the way English uses "do" and the continuous tenses come from Celtic languages. So not much of an influence on the lexicon, but some significant influence on the grammar. But yeah, Celtic erasure is cringe.
Correction: the romans weren’t blocked by a wall, they built a wall known as Hadrians wall which is located entirely in Modern day England, which kept out the those they deemed “savages” which is now modern day Scotland and a small section of Northern England Also Spain English conflict: yes the battle of the Armada but does an American not know the Spanish+French+Dutch helped them win the American Revolution
Though the Romans did eventually expand into Scotland. They built another wall, the Antoine walk, north of the Central belt but also built settlements and forts in the Southern Highlands.
@@wessexdruid7598 100% correct. it does annoy me when Videos like these skip over a lot of the Tribal conflict and Kingdoms that use to make the collective name called England. (these Tribal / Lord/Barons areas developed into what we call constituencies in the modern age who represented in the commons, this was before MPs even became a thing , it was lords and Barons in the commons(nobles really) funny enough it wasn't really for peasants) and as you put one king william didn't want the peasants to revolt so he built castles for the lords/barons to hold the kingdom for him, in many cases replaced Barons that were more loyal to the new king William.
The Normans were not really "French". They were the descendants of Viking invaders who eventually accepted the French king as their overlord - but they kept fairly independent. They adopted the French language and French culture - but they were not, strictly speaking, actually French or Frankish...The name Normandy (and the Normans) is related to its settlement by Vikings - aka "Northmen"...
I’m British and my ancestry was actually traced back to viking chiefs Azlock and Ozlack. This was very interesting because my grandparents surname is Haselock which obviously is incredibly similar sounding
England and France are like squabbling siblings. We're more alike than either would care to admit, but we've been stuck next to each other for so long our tiny differences really irritate us 😅
Nah this is 100% more the English and the Germans. Apparently during the Christmas truce in 1914 many of them thought they should have been fighting together against the French not each other 😂
Never feel embarrassed about not knowing something, the only thing that matters is that you’re making an effort to now 👌 Most people can’t be bothered to learn their history, as an American your family roots probably come from the British Isles or Europe 😎
Ignorance is the ability of not to want to learn or question what we are told. He has made an effort. It would take an historian a lifetime to learn about British history. As equally so with European or other nations histories.
If you want to find out who all the King’s and queens of England were, I recommend watching ‘Horrible Histories Kings and Queens song’. Also if you want to learn more, just watch any Horrible Histories. That’s how we learnt our history as kids in primary school and it all still slaps 😌😂
As a middle aged British woman with two teenage children... I also suggest the Horrible Histories books and first few seasons of the TV Show to adults just starting to gain an interest in British history. It is a great way to introduce topics that you can use as a springboard to then expand your research in what interests you. Be warned the songs will be burned into your memory for the rest of your life.
I would like to suggest Elanor Farjeon's book of rhymes about the Kings and Queens. Ms Farjeon is also the person that wrote the lyrics to the song/hymn "Morning has broken" - made famous when Cat Stevens added music to it.
This made me laugh so much, our History is crazy, and it’s not until someone trying to figure it out, that you realise just how complicated and intriguing the UK is God I’m proud.
Your thoughts about living on an island as opposed to a larger continental landmass sums up what it is to be British. As Churchill said; "We have our own dream and our own task. We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not combined. We are interested and associated but not absorbed. If Britain must choose between Europe and the open sea, she must always choose the open sea.”
Game of Thrones was based on real events from Scotland and England, even the seven Kingdoms, the enemy across the sea, the Great wall and the barbarians to the north. Wales has a national animal of dragons and believe it or not Scotland's national animal is the Unicorn. The red wedding really happened in Scotland. England was Albion, Ireland was Hibernia, and Scotland Caledonia.
It's not popular now, but it's nursery rhyme that I knew in the early 1970s and goes back to the 1600s. It's about the relationship between England and Scotland.
@@daveofyorkshire301 - i guess in the middle ages even the lion was a legendary animal. No one in England would have seen one since the Romans left. A lot of heraldic animals were just exaggerated retellings of real ones. The cameleopard was a giraffe, the manticore was a tiger, the unicorn may have been the retelling of someone once seeing a rhinoceros and passing the story on by word of mouth.
It's so very nice to see an American to be so interested in other parts of history of the world.. I'm a Canadian, and I learnt a few new things myself, many thanks.. I thoroughly enjoy your Reacts, I like it that you really do like learning more of the world outside of USA.. 🐦
I bet the native Americans would disagree with your assessment that US history starts at the revolutionary war 😉 I'm pretty sure that your country has some really interesting history before the European arrived
I 'm actually quite staggered with the amount of complete insensitivity towards Native American history, as much as possible it was destroyed and buried.
Agree totally. Ignored the Spanish influence in Florida and the French (which he has already seen) and the Louisiana purchase and then Alaska and Hawaii.
@@patsydf Well if this is the case, I'm somewhat staggered by the complete insensitivity from the British towards the Australian Indigenous, I mean it was only 200 years odd that the British went to Australia. So much of a muchness!
Clearly Alfred did not do *all* of the work because, at his death, half the territory now known as England was ruled by the Danes. He did part of the work but the idea of a unified England was essentially his (imparted, legend has it, in a dream by St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne). Edward the Elder, Aethelflaed (Lady of the Mercians) and Aethelstan did the rest and, even then, subsequent kings (Edmund, Eadred, Edwig and Edgar), had to win back territory lost to other Viking invaders who divided Aethelstan's England again by setting up the Kingdom of York which lasted several decades.
You can check out the history of the English Language. It's far more complicated than Anglo Saxon and French. Thrown in some Latin, Greek, German, Dutch, Norse and various other words and expressions picked up from trading around the world and the Empire 😁
I think all of Europe has a bit of Norse - the Vikings came up with the compass points. And then we did a lot of nicking words from wherever was popular or learned at the time and we DIDN'T SORT THE SPELLINGS OUT. Kids who learn to read in English learn much more slowly than those doing it in languages where they kept tidying up.
As a Brit, I find it fascinating how many pieces of knowledge and/or perspectives you take for granted that you (and by extension other non brits) just have never thought about. I Love that you are interested in it and am throoughly enjoying listening to your journy through our history.
You are like abreath of fresh air! Everyone outside of the USA thinks that Americans don't know anything about anywhre outside of North America..... seems we were right huh?! Good for you for being open to learn. On behalf of Brits everywhere I thank you!!!
England, like most of Europe, was inhabited by Celtic tribes, but they were also invaders in previous centuries. Before them, various other neolithic people lived in what came to be called England. Stonehenge and many other stone circles in Britain date back to the time of the ancient Egyptians (3000 BC) but we know very little about them.
There were the Celts. Then the Romans. Then there were the Saxons. Then the Vikings. And then the Normans. The Celts moved North and West and kept themselves pretty much to themselves. The Romans were active in England. The Saxons came mostly to South East England. The Vikings carried out raids and some of them stayed. The Normans took over pretty well all of the British Isles, including Ireland. You can see the influence of all the invasions on the English language.
Celtic Britain was extremely scary for the Romans, for Romans Britain was some strange island on the edge of the known world where the Celtic Druids still practiced human sacrifice. The Celts of the European continent had become slightly Romanised whereas Britain hadn't, so Britain was completely alien for the Romans. There's records of Celts in Britain harassing Roman soldiers then hiding in marshes and bogs then goading Romans to following knowing the Romans couldn't fight effectively in those conditions. The Romans only wanted Britain due to the high amount of Tin, which was important for making steel weapons, armour and tools. Roman soldiers hated being stationed on this cold rainy island to the north
From "Heart of Darkness" when the characters are sailing out on the Thames estuary on their way to Africa: “And this also,” said Marlow suddenly, “has been one of the dark places of the earth.”
Lead, copper and gold very important. Tin they could buy on the open market at reasonable prices. Tin not of much use in steel production, loosing its value in the iron age due to bronze (alloy of copper and tin) being the old technology.
The first King of England was Æthelstan, Grandson of Alfred the Great of Wessex, which is often a shock to people who somehow think the Guillaume la Batard (William I the Bastard/Conqueror) is the beginning of the Monarchy.
Scandinavia - A lot of the English language has Norse (Viking) origins. Place names like York were Viking settlements (Jorvik). Then the names ended up in places like New York.... originally from a Viking name. Days of the week like Wednesday (Odin), Friday (Frey) and Thursday (Thor). The Vikings were also in North America FAR before Columbus and other Europeans. Queen Boadicea was one tough broad and a thorn in the Roman side. Yes Spain and England fought. The Spanish Armada was wiped out by the English. As comedian John Cleese (Monty Python fame) said "The Spanish are building a new armada. It will be glass bottom so they can see their old armada".
I went to a tourist center in Almansa Spain and they had a section about the British fighting with them. They even had The Times newspaper cuttings on what happened. The Brits with the Duke of Marlborough (1701-13), stopped France dominating Europe. You probably know about it.
The whole of the Wirral on Merseyside was a Norse stronghold. I watched some egrets flying over the river to Tranmere, Birkenhead yesterday. Tranmere is Norse and means the place of cranes (egrets) in English.
Tyler you need to check out Boudica, Queen of the Iceni. The Victorians created a version of their image of her which is often used to represent "Britannia". Britannia is the name the Romans called the area of the UK that was conquered as part of the Roman Empire.
It probably comes from the name Pritain Island which supposed to mean Island of tin or pewter. Becouse Romans and probably also Greeks used to trade tin from the Island.
I feel the need to point that Brittany was not part of France during the hundred years war. It was an independant state and would remain so till the end of the XVth century. That said, England and France both wanted it and heavily intervened during Brittany's own succession's conflicts.
We tend to think of "King Alfred the Great" of Wessex as the turning point that starts the whole England thing. He was the grandfather of Aethelstan who eventually completed the job. Although since then there have been some lesser adjustments over time to the actual borders with Scotland and Wales.
@@antonygill5104 England existed for centuries before that bastard seized the throne. Though, after the Normans finished subjugating the English, they began many of the invasions that started the formation of the UK and the bitter hatred for England that still exists in many Welshmen, Scots and Irish people today so I guess you're not totally wrong.
The Celts were not a a distinct racial group but people who adopted a similar culture. DNA wise, us indigenous Brits are descended from the stone age inhabitants of Britain.
Wales was controlled by the Romans dude. They conquered all the way out to Pembrokeshire and as far North as Anglesey. You can still find ruins of Roman amphitheaters in some places in Wales. Famously they controlled the dolaucothi gold mines that were a major source of revenue via slave labour. Also Cornwall was a part of Roman Britain and there are some old Roman sites in Cornwall just not as many as it it was quite depopulated at that time. Scotland was the only real part of Britain they didn’t go into much and in fact they eventually couldn’t be bothered with them at all and ended up building a big ass wall just to keep them out.
I live in York. used to be the capital of Northumbria. The whole city has a wall guarding it that was built by the romans. We also have a famous medieval street called that Shambles and it was the street that influenced Diagon ally in Harry Potter.
I just skimmed the video, and it seems like the original video that Tyler is commenting on didn't mention the small island, between Northern Ireland and Scotland.
Don't worry, even we British are not aware of lot of it, we're taught in schools mostly about Prehistoric Britain, Romans, Vikings, Saxons, War of the Roses, Tudors, Elizabethan era (Shakespeare), Victorian era and the world wars. Mainly because as you've discovered here, there's a hell of a lot to even glaze over, let alone deep dive into.
Well I worked in education and I know that it's changed a lot since I was in the system. At primary school, we were taught about the stone age, the iron age, lake dwellers right up to the Norman Invasion. My secondary school history included British and European history, including social reform, wars of independence etc. All this in State school. Then Thatcher changed the curriculum. 🤦♀️
Although I do not know all of this I do remember learning some of it in school and I am an American 🇺🇸 but I may be in the low percentile. I loved history and it was always my favorite subject in school. I also had a strange fascination with England, Great Britain/UK but particularly England. My family lineage on both sides is traced back to Primarily England and Ireland but also France and Germany. My favorite vacation I ever went on was when I went to England and France. While i only saw a small portion of England I was in love with its history and looked forward to going back someday. My favorite place there was in Windsor where Windsor castle is. I absolutely loved that area and found it so charming. What’s crazy is I actually grew up in a small town in upstate NY USA called Windsor.
You appear to confuse Britain with the UK; these are not synonyms. England = a country within the island of Great Britain; England shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north and is part of the United Kingdom. Great Britain = large geographical island in the British Isles comprising three small countries: England, Scotland, and Wales. United Kingdom = country and kingdom consisting of four smaller countries: England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. English = belonging to or relating to England, or its people: Englishwoman, Englishman. British = belonging to or relating to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, or to its people (English, Scottish, Welsh, and Northern Irish) or its culture. Englishwoman = me. Hope this helps. xx
England and its people were/are basically a hybrid of ancient British/Celtic/Brythonic, Angles/Saxons/Jutes, a small amount of Roman, a bit of Viking/Danish, and then a sizeable part of Norman French (who themselves were, as I understand it, orignally Vikings who settled in Northern Gaul).
Culturally Roman but not genetically, not alot of Romans colonized Britain because: 1. It was considered a backwater province full of rebellions 2. It was out of the way for trade And when Rome declined many of the Romans that did live there fled from the Anglo Saxons.
The north of England was more anglo-danish than anglo-saxon by the time the normans arrived. But the northern lords refused to bend the knee so the norman armies marched north and decimated the population. The scourging of the north is rarely mentioned in history lessons, though the north-south divide in England endures to this day, socially and economically (though the south hasn't always been on top: the industrial revolution was mostly in the north, which is why if you look at a satellite map of England at night the belt from Liverpool through Manchester to Leeds and Bradford outshines most of the southern counties even now. There's only really London and its commuter zones that light up down south. And Birmingham in the midlands).
@@nagillim7915 that event you're talking about is called "the harrying of the North", it's pretty interesting because the North had a rebellion under Godwinson due to taxes, his own brother led this rebellion, then went to Norway to convince Haradra to invade England.
@@the98themperoroftheholybri33 Yes, but what about inter-marriage during the 350 years when the Romans occupied? Isn't that why the population is referred to as Romano-British? Isn't it also true that, whilst the northern parts were subject predominantly to military occupation by ethnically diverse legions from far flung parts of the Empire (e.g. the Middle East and North Africa), the most southerly parts of the island were settled domestically by a denser population with actual cities (rather than just forts with a satellite vicus attached), a lot more villas and farms?
Here's an interesting fact: Big Ben is the name of the bell inside the tower not the tower itself. The tower is called The Elizabethan Tower after Queen Elizabeth II.
Great reaction mate! Love your enthusiasm and eagerness to learn. In fairness to the maker of the video you are reacting to, it's almost impossible to condense the story into a half hour show, fully get your confusion over what would be obvious if the original video explained it fully.
The whole of mostly England is riddled with Roman settlements.You get some also in Wales and Scotland.Also many British names of towns have their origin from Rome.
yep! I'm from Manchester, we get our name from the latin name for the fort Mancunium, potentially coming from either 'mamma' meaning breast since we're on a big ole hill, or some have also suggested it comes from the name of a local river goddess. Whatever the case, the people of Manchester have been known as Mancunians more or less since and to this day 😁
I know you asked about groups of people in terms of where they're from but I know a little more about it in terms of religions so I'm gonna talk about that :D Before the roman invasion, the land was called Albion, and it consisted of Iron age tribes, the last emigrants being from southern Europe at the end of the stone age. Their religion was ancestral worship, similar to current beliefs in Japan, the various henges up and down Britain being places where bones were crushed and scattered among the stones, and people would journey there along rivers and burn great fires and feast to celebrate the solstice. The celts never wrote anything down, they'd create beautiful metal work and tattoo their bodies with blue ink but due to their reluctance to write, we know very little about them. Though we do know they lived rather harmoniously, it's thought the latest update on stone henge was done to celebrate the coming together of the native people and the emigrants from southern Europe in 2500 BC. When the Romans invaded, the locals were pagans, who still didn't write about themselves. Paganism and druidism today is mostly guesswork about what it was like, built on by people from the 1920s. Pagans had several gods for things, similar to the Romans and the Norse. The Romans were the first to write about it. When the Vikings invaded, christianity had spread upwards via the roman roads, few people were Pagan, most were Christian. The records we have of this era all come from the Christian monks, who wrote everything down, often exaggerating history so that the Vikings threatening them might offer mercy. The monks practised pacifism, and so were often taken as slaves, sometimes even thrown overboard if the viking longboats became too heavy. Vikings settled in America, in Greenland, in Iceland, in England and Ireland from where they took slaves, and they travelled all the way to India to trade their slaves. Norways land was unreliable to farm on and so families that would rather not bother with that, get themselves slaves (called thralls) to do it for them, and then traded them for exotic food, spices and silks. That's why in some places in Norway you can find really old Buddha statues. By the time of William the Conquerer's invasion, some Vikings had agreed to settle in the North of England, so long as they didn't go around killing anyone. You can find viking burial grounds there, as the people becoming one with the locals found new ways to hold their belief in Norse gods with the knowledge that if valhallah were truly real then they wouldn't be able to reach it as they didn't die in battle. They gradually converted to christianity, after rioting alongside the locals against the castles William the Conquerer built there. Those who continued to resist his rule died. William brought the first Jewish people to England too, as the local Christians believed to deal in things like loaning money was sinful, this role fell to them, giving them a high standing and hated position in a society under a king the locals didn't approve of. Civil unrest grew for 150 years and crested in attacks, massacres and in some cities total genocide of the Jewish people in the 1100s. England has remained a christian nation ever since, though switching between Catholic and Protestant after its invention by Henry VIII in the 1500s. Until this year! When the census revealed that for the first time in recorded history, less than half the population identify themselves as being Christian. Anyway I'm laughing so hard at the "Why would he replace the existing aristocracy with people from France?" Call that colonisation buddy, its pretty shitty but its all about power and control. If you're interested in more history I'd recommend reacting to Horrible Histories. Don't let the fact its made for kids put you off, it's genuinely funny and educational.
I dont think that Albion is actualy such an old name - from before Roman invasion. I guess that it was invented rather in early medieval age though with use of some of older native word. But we cannot be sure what the Iron age Celtic tribes have called their islands before Romans came and invented their own names for the islands. Though we know that the word could be derived from Greek language. These two Roman authors en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avienius en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pytheas were probably the first authors who used Albion as name of all island. Though kingdom of Alba in 9th century which unified Scotland tribes (Picts and Irish) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Alba was the first British kingdom to use this name.
they travelled all the way to India to trade their slaves Never heard about vikings in India. They were in Bysantium for sure and in Russia (known as varangians) in Iceland and Greenland, and on Sicily, but they never traveled around Africa and the eastern parts of Europe with Black Sea and Russia, the main viking routes there were big rivers - Don, Dniepr, Dniestr. the never found the route to India, either around Africa or through the Caucasus, they were too small power to go there esp becouse of the islamic states in the region of Caucasus. That's why in some places in Norway you can find really old Buddha statues It was becouse of trade routes - from one to the other trader on the Silk Road - but not becouse vikings themselves were in India. When the Vikings invaded, christianity had spread upwards via the roman roads, In Britain christianity was main religion long before vikings invasion of England. The first place vikings destroyed was monastery on Lindisfarne Island near Britain. Vikings age is 7th to 11th century (at Greenland and Iceland it can be up to 13th c.)
@@TallisKeeton when I said had I was using past tense, as in, by the time Vikings invaded, the British were Christian. I learnt about Vikings travelling to india on a TV show on a history channel, I see now that although they traded and may have met with Indian people, there's no evidence of them actually being there. The guy hosting the show went to a modern Indian Market while he was talking about it so I think I've been mislead lol.
@@SpeedyOwl I guess there was not big invasion or big settlement of vikings (Scandinavians) in India, as the kingdoms there were too strong and too long travel - on the land - for their interests :) they were not great force without their ships :) though there is always possibility that few persons - for example Bysantinian hired mercenaries of viking origin - could 've mingled here and there in their travels :) But IMO more probably is that the trade roads worked from one trader to another, someone traveled a bit, sold his stuff and next traveled a bit, sold it and so on, all the way from India to Britain. The idea of traveling from India to Britain or from Norwey to India all the way was actualy impossible - due to the many obstacles, like wars, ruffians, desserts, lack of roads, big forests, big mountains, and one thing which not much ppl would think about in our modern days - big differences of legal systems and customs. The long range trade - from continent to continent was diffictult becouse all of those topics it was much more profitable and safer to ride from Norway to for example south Germany or France, and then from it to Rome or Bysantium, and some other guy would trade your things to Persia or Egypt. We usualy forget that it was time when the only means of traveling most ppl got was oxen wagon or horse and not every horse could be used to wagon full of traded stuff. The main "speed roads" of the international trade were actualy great rivers, so the places without great rivers - rivers like Rhine, Danube, Don, Dnepr or Nile could not be centres of trade. I think I've seen the same show on HistoryChannel about vikings - it was about the excavation of one of their fortresses build by Bluetooth, and about the smiths in one of their cities AFAIR Bergen - and about first wooden churches. that was the show when they talked also about budda figure I guess :)
A Castle is a Fortified Residence. Most of the supporters / high born soldiers who came over to England from Normandy were rewarded by William by being given Titles and Land. They needed to protect their land from the locals and rivals. That class of nobles and aristocracy were all French speakers for several centuries. King Edward III was the first King to speak English as his first language. But English any way was an ever evolving language. The US has an expression to denote the elevated class (tongue in cheek) of certain people by saying "They came over in the Mayflower". We have a similar expression ... "They came over with the Conqueror" 👍😎
It's quite amazing, the history of the British Isles.. I can leave my home here in Wales, drive 5mins and there's ruins of a roman town just there... sitting in a field.
Wow, seeing your reaction, this video really badly explains things for a history newbie. Quick summary: -In Roman times, the original inhabitants of England were Celts (like Irish and Scottish people today) called Britons. The Romans sort of conquered them and called the province Brittania, but then left when the Roman Empire collapsed (oversimplification) in 410 and Germanic peoples from Scandinavia and Germany came over. -The Germanic peoples called Angles, Saxons and Jutes migrated over in the 400s to 600s, and created several kingdoms while fighting and repelling the original Celtic and Romanized Britons who got pushed to the west (what is now Wales). -Viking invasions happened in the 800s to the 1000s. The Vikings (also called Danes bc most were from Denmark) set up kingdoms in eastern and northern England. In response, the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex conquered remaining Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and fought the Vikings for a century before having all of England under Anglo-Saxon control around 1040. -In 1066, the next-to-last Anglo-Saxon king of the House of Wessex, Edward the Confessor, died without a son, so powerful noble Harold Godwinson took the throne. King Harald Hardrada of Norway, the last Viking king, tried conquering England but was defeated and killed by Harold Godwinson. -Then, Duke William of Normandy (the Normans were descendants of Vikings who had settled in northern France, become christianized and assimilated into French/Frankish culture), who was basically an independent ruler even though he was supposed to be subordinate to the king of France, invaded England, defeated Godwinson and the Anglo-Saxon and established a dynasty of French-speaking kings and aristocracy at the head of England for hundreds of years.
Sam Revlej This is all makes really good sense, but to put your final paragraph into full context for American readers, we need to mention, or indeed confirm, that Duke William of Normandy is widely known in history as William the Conqueror (becoming William 1st) and the defeat of Harold Godwinson (King Harold) took place on October 14th 1066 and is known as the Battle of Hastings
Also, Edward the Confessor had promised his throne to William, but apparently playing more than 1 horse he hadnt ordered it to his nobles. The Normans were also descendants of Danish Viking, who under the great Rollo (in Danish Rolf or in Old Danish Hrólfr) laid siege to Paris a few times for ransom, until the French king gave him, what became Normady (land of the Northmen) in 911. It is said, that at the time of William the Conqueror Danish was still spoken in the streets of Caen. Modern English is a hodgepodge of Old Celtish, Roman Latin, Old Danish and Norman French, that baked for a few hundred years. So like the Brits themselves its a very mixed breed. And as a Dane, I still shudder, every time I hear about "King Canute". English speakers really butcher that name. His name was Knud with a hard k at the start and a soft d at the end, called "den Store" or "the Great". But apparently English speakers are incapable of pronouncing the kn and soft d sounds.
I love how this is like the most basic knowledge in England that basically everyone knows but step across an ocean and suddenly it becomes a complicated mess
The Normans were descended from Vikings who France gave land to in return for protection against other Viking raiders. The vikings were also known as Norse men, being from the Norse (North). Which is where we get the name Norman. Norse-man > Norman. So the land of Normandy was a region of France that was technically still under the French King but acted as its own state. So in a weird way, both the Saxon/Dane invasion and the Norman invasion were kinda both the Vikings. (Although the vikings who settled in Normandy heavily intermixed with the French, so by 1066 they were their own distinct group)
You should react to "Every Country England Has Ever Invaded: Visualized" by RealLifeLore. its incorrect and misleading in some places but gives a very good overview of the power and success of the British army and navy throughout history.
Hey hey. I am a British person who just wanted to say, that I am very much enjoying watching your videos. I lived in the US (in Michigan) for a few years as a child - mid 1970s - so with that, plus a number of subsequent visits to the US, and many American friends, I fully understand the gap in knowledge and perspective, that you are exploring. You do this very well. And you come across as someone with intelligence, humour and kindness, as well as being just INTERESTED in our country and its culture. You occasionally get some details wrong for a short while, but you usually bring it back around to the real facts. I think it is actually quite important for people to be open to other (and/ore related) cultures, the way that you clearly are. Thank you again, this is brilliant work that you are doing.
I can't even put into words how much I appreciate you trying to learn about European history. Btw Romans were at one point, around year 100 AD, pretty much spread out through the whole continent+Northern Africa and Middle East.
Some facts that might help you remember the constituent parts of the British Isles. 1) The Romans (Ptolemy) named the British Isles as "Greater Britain" and "Lesser Britain". i.e. the larger island and the smaller island. 2) "Greater Britain" is now known as "Great Britain". 3) Great Britain consists of England, Scotland and Wales 4) "Lesser Britain" is now know as The Republic of Ireland AND Northern Ireland. 5) Each of those divisions of territory has a fierce history worthy of it's own examination. 6) The full name of the UK is "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland"
generally, most english look to alfred the great as the first king of england. he stopped the vikings from taking over ALL of england. academics would not agree with this. However he is the most famous of the anglo saxon kings.
Now that you've done the History of England, you should do the same for Scotland, Wales and Ireland! Those on the 'Fire of Learning' Channel are pretty comprehensive and similarly illustrated to the one you've used for England, if a little long... However, one thing they don't put across so well is that the climate of much of Scotland is very different to England, Wales, Ireland & France, etc. This is not so much because it is any great distance away, as the curvature of the Earth is such that it is actually around a corner, so far as much of England is concerned - and that probably explains more than anything why the Romans and early English attempts to conquer Scotland failed - and why the Viking invasions did not! (The Romans did actually have summer camps well into the Scottish Highlands, but the lack of infrastructure such as roads prevented their permanent occupation). If you can find siuitable footage of it, you may wish to do a reaction to "Up Helly Aa," which is an annual fire festival held in the Shetland Islands, to commemorate their Norse Heritage. Similar fire festivals also take place throughout Eastern Scotland actually, with the town of Stonehaven celebrating each coming New Year with the hurling oif fireballs through its streets; and even Edinburgh has a hilltop 'Beltane Festival,' that is similarly related. Perhaps owing to its generally more established population and earlier civil infrastructure that had come, thanks to the Romans; it also appears that France took a more intelligent approach to spreading its influence - whilst the English simply marched up north, hoping for the best! This is illustrated by the fact they forged diplomatic relations with Scotland, though of course this also had the desirable effect of making it easier to quell any English ambitions to invade France! It is certainly true that the successful Norman Conquest culminating in the Battle of Hastings in 1066 was one of the key moments of English history. There was a significant influx of Norman/French immigrants in England after that time and indeed, some of these slowly expanded into Northern England and into Ireland, over the next seven or eight centuries! Indeed, my own family name most likely has French origins and is associated with wood workers - who were lured into these areas by the availability of such employment and indeed, the bulk of their descendants remain in Irish Plantations territory, today!
Spookily enough they called the first William "William I" when there was a second William (II) I don't think they could make it any simpler. Now if they they had numbered them 3, 6, 2 ,1, 7, 4 I could understand your confusion.
When you as an American speak of English as your language, it reminds me of my daughter who did a school exchange visit to Panama Beach in the Florida panhandle an American schoolgirl asked her "D'ya Speak English"? to which my daughter replied "It's obvious you don't"
As someone born in Belfast, plenty of British adults don't know that the United Kingdom is "Great Britain and Northern Ireland". I've had people argue with me about it!
Look at a map Tyler. Normandy still currently a region of France. In those days it was a Dukedom. Most of the current French regions were individual Dukedoms or Kingdoms with their own rulers. France itself was a much smaller and separate entity. However, many of the Dukedoms, etc. gave fealty to the King of France. William was the Duke of Normandy. Of course he's going to need his own Army and bring over his own people he can trust to take charge of different parts of Country. He can't do it all personally. Otherwise he'll end up dead within a couple of days 🙄
I really appreciate you successfully trying to speak properly and not mumble, and correcting yourself on the occasional Americanism :') The history is so vast and longstanding, most Americans don't really understand how many hundreds and thousands of years of history we've already had over here, vs your 300 year old country.
The Vikings settled in both England and Scotland and many areas of North East of both countries are full of Viking place names. Some places adopted a lot of the Viking language and many English words and slang are from the Vikings. Regarding Royal families, it was common for Royal families throughout Europe to swap daughters amongst each other plus a lot of cousins marrying each other, so they are mostly all related to each other to some degree. And they were always fighting each other as well. The Normans beat the Anglo Saxons in battle and took over England, they didn't let them in.
There are many place names in northern England and lowland Scotland which come from Celtic ( Brythonic - Welsh) too. All over England even, cf Dover which comes from the word 'dwfr' which means 'water'. ( 'dwr' in modern Welsh).
@@marythurlow9132 That is true. My local town is Dumbarton (Dun Britton - fort of the Britons) and was a major centre for a kingdom that stretched from Scotland to North Wales. The Vikings also ruled the far West and the Hebrides (inner and outer) and the Isle of Man. Their rule eventually evolved into the Lord of the Isles which lasted for a few centuries. Scottish town and mountain names are predominantly Celtic but the far North West, the North East and a few other areas have Viking names. The United Kingdom is a hotch potch of names derived from Anglo Saxons, Normans, Vikings and Celts but I was trying to emphasise that the the Vikings did not just raid but also colonised and settled and interbred and became part of the country in the same way as various immigrants became Americans.
You need to react to Horrible Histories. They are a massive cultural piece and many people's including myself's childhood, they are hilarious and will also teach you about Britain's History.
There are plenty of British-made movies and series that represent particular events, attitudes and identities. If you wanted to diversify your content you could include some of these to analyse how Brits tell stories about themselves, especially if they focus on a subject you have acquired prior knowledge of.
Rollo, from the show Vikings, was the great great grandad of William the Conqueror. Rollo caused so much shit in France that King Charles the Simple gave him the chunk of land he named Normandy, basically Land of the Northman.
Referring to the monks saving historical information you might like to look up how the Irish saved civilization. It refers to Irish monks how stored and hide literature leading into the dark ages to preserve history.
I'm English, and I tend to get rather irked when it's stated that English history began with the Romans: as if we hadn't already had a thousand years of history before that. I've read that there were eight waves of prehistoric peoples who came to Britain, but only the last wave survived; they've found plenty of evidence for Neanderthal colonisation. The English Channel didn't exist until about 12,000 years ago, so people could walk across what is now the North Sea, and was then Doggerland, to follow migrating herds. Once the Channel was formed, people were stuck here. There was actually a second Roman Wall, the Antonine Wall, further north, but the Romans couldn't hold it and pulled back to Hadrian's Wall. I think English royalty was like any other nation's royalty: bunches of bullies fighting to see who was the biggest bully, who then became king until a bigger bully came along.
Good afternoon from Wessex! There's a ton of ancient stuff in England wherever you care to turn your eye. The small town I live in is the burial place of two of King Æthelstan's uncles who were bigwigs in the Royal House of Wessex before England's unification. Stonehenge is just up the road and we're still not entirely sure how they built it with 5000 year old technology. Down the road in the other direction is a 2000 year old chalk engraved figure in a hillside called "The Cerne Giant". He's instantly recognisable by the large club he's wielding over his head and the large erection he's sporting. There is a local legend that barren couples could conceive if they made love on his engraved ding-dong on the night before May-Day. If you like history, folklore, mythology and a very tangible sense of being able to touch the past then England should definitely be on the bucket list. Right,I'm off fer a cuppa tea. Cheers bruv! 🇬🇧👍
The composition of Great Britain can't change as that is a geographical area, but the UK could change if Scotland gains independence. England didn't exist at the time of the Romans as that was name given later to the 'Land of the Anglisch (English) Speaking People" and English didn't exist as a language yet. Aethelstan was the first king of all the English but later dynasties were not his descendants. The current Monarchy are descendants of the Electress Sophia of Hanover. William I was a Norman who had invaded, which is why he replaced the Anglo-Saxon aristocracy with Normans.
The vote to leave the EU polarised the countries of the UK. Scotland & N.Ireland voted to stay - and Wales's vote to leave was swung by the number of English retirees who live there. That has left internal strains on the UK - if one union can be left, why not another? IMHO it's only a matter of time, now - and I say that as someone born 'British', of English, Welsh & Irish roots who married a Scot. The break up of the UK will diminsh all of us - and further damage our influence and economies. It angers me that the nationality I was born with is likely to be taken from me, by ignorance and lies.
Also Anglo Saxon kings weren't in power through purely bloodlines, often they'd be voted in by the other nobility if the heir was considered incompetent or not worthy
@@wessexdruid7598 well that's not strictly true, it's due to the SNPs incompetence and blaming Westminster for their own mishandling of things, so they lie and push for a referendum, it failed once so they just keep trying to push again and again, I truly hope Scotland wakes up to the SNP and realise they're a nationalist part in name only, they're a globalist party who want to exchange England (a partner with shared history and culture) with the EU (a master who doesn't care about anyone). I personally want English independence from the UK, we bear the brunt of everything and receive very little in return but everyone hates us for it, it's about time we let everyone else hold the bill
The true Game Of Thrones was Brittan in the middle ages. Like the Princes in the Tower, one day they were the hair and the spare, and the next day they were considered Bastards/ illegitimate. Not Royal blood.
The Norman claim was also Viking related. Vikings or Norsemen, settled in France and became the "Normans". American history, along with Canadian, Australian, New Zealand etc are actually just continuations of "British" history if you look at it that way. William replaced the English barons with this own men. And PS, this is very, very simple explanation of a much more complex history.
The Angevin Empire wasn't really England ruling bits of France, it was really a French dynasty that ruled both England and parts of France. It was common for the "English" kings of that time to actually spend most of their time in France.
Yeah the majority of Plantagenet kings wouldn't have identified as "English", at least not until King Henry IV who was the first to speak English as his first language. Also there were the Burgundians who were French nobility who were on the English Crown's side for rulership of France, its believed by some that the concept of an army uniform came from the Burgundians who required all soldiers to wear a blue uniform and red X on their chest and backs (with their heraldry and badges displayed elsewhere), every man from Knight to simple man at arms had to adopt this dress within their army
Worth noting, before anyone gets any funny ideas that France ever successfully conquered us, The Normans weren't French, they were essentially more refined and civilised Vikings (Norsemen) from Normandy (now modern France)
It only takes 14 hours (traffic dependent 😁) to drive from the top of the mainland to the bottom. I think almost every UK museum you visit contains Roman artifacts.
Small correction: The English crown did not pass from Elizabeth I to James I&VI (two royal numbers to account for both England and Scotland) due to Elizabeth not having a male heir, she didn't have an heir, period. Edit: Corrected spelling error
@@lizbignell7813 Yes, I can see ^^ Accidently used how her name is spelled in my native language (German), so I can assure you no disrespect was intended
The reference is to William the Conquerer, otherwise known as William the Bastard. William was nominally French, but was actually of Viking inheritance. He was a Nordic.
Checkout The people profile channal, it has some good royal profiles, or David Starkey, you want William the conqueror, who build the castle to mark his domance of England, then his sons, William 2, known as William Rufus, then Hernry first, 20:12
The British Isles go back quite a way before the Romans. Julius Caesar landed near Hastings in 55 BC in Pegwell Bay, Thanet, not far from the International train station … built more than two thousand years later. There’s a big rock on the beach near Hastings where he was supposed to have landed - and where my and my friends ate fish and chips once all the while thinking that the rock was quite big but not big enough for Caesar to have stepped on it when he landed and used it to commemorate the event.
An important point to remember is that the vast majority of the population could not read or write. Only the nobles and the clergy got the education necessary to write books. It wasn't until 1870 that the Education Act became the very first piece of legislation to deal specifically with the provision of education in England and Wales.
You have a wonderful channel and it is great to see someone explore a place in which I call home all of my life home. I think I don't appreciate it as much as I should because I live here. Certainly this needs to change.
In the UK 100 miles is a long way, in American 100 years is a long time.
I see what you did there 😂
1066 was an extremely important date in our history. It was the first and last time that the land mass known as England was defeated and taken over in war. William the Conqueror, also known as William of Normandy, or William the first was the person who had the tower of London built to help defend his new acquisition.
Except of course for the glorious revolution of 1688.
Or William the Bastard… my personal favourite moniker
He also ended slavery in Britain, anyone who owned a slave would pay a fine to him, the lords of the day eventually got around it by declaring their slaves free men in service to the lord of the manor-Serfs - no rights and just a new way of owning slaves.
@@mehere6865 he did, which was a good move. But should be pointed out it wasn’t done for any moral or ethical reasons. Was purely a tactical move to strengthen his own position.
Here in Hastings we call him William the bastard. 'Cos he was!
I'm shocked that there was no mention of Alfred the Great! He was such an important figure in the history of Britain.
There was a mention of him as the King of Wessex but not by name.
No point crying over burnt 🍰.
@Baked Biehn I am sure what you say is true however for a completely ignorant twit like myself I still have acquired at least some understanding and grounding on the subject. From this mistakes can then be identified and corrected - all part of the learning process.
@@morrison37171 without Alfred there’d be no England. He laid the foundations to make the dream of a united England possible. Without him who knows what these isles would look like today.
@Baked Biehn True, but at least it was said to be an over view. All credit to the guy for at least looking with an open view to non American general teaching.
Boudica (also written as Boadicea) was a Celtic queen who led a revolt against Roman rule in ancient Britain in A.D. 60 or 61. As all of the existing information about her comes from Roman scholars, particularly Tacitus and Cassius Dio, little is known about her early life; it’s believed she was born into an elite family in Camulodunum (now Colchester) around A.D. 30.At the age of 18, Boudica married Prasutagas, king of the Iceni tribe of modern-day East Anglia. When the Romans conquered southern England in A.D. 43, most Celtic tribes were forced to submit, but the Romans let Prasutagas continue in power as a forced ally of the Empire. When he died without a male heir in A.D. 60, the Romans annexed his kingdom and confiscated his family’s land and property. As a further humiliation, they publicly flogged Boudica and raped her two daughters. Tacitus recorded Boudicca’s promise of vengeance after this last violation: “Nothing is safe from Roman pride and arrogance. They will deface the sacred and will deflower our virgins. Win the battle or perish, that is what I, a woman, will do.”
Like other ancient Celtic women, Boudica had trained as a warrior, including fighting techniques and the use of weapons. With the Roman provincial governor Gaius Suetonius Paulinus leading a military campaign in Wales, Boudica led a rebellion of the Iceni and members of other tribes resentful of Roman rule. After defeating the Roman Ninth Legion, the queen’s forces destroyed Camulodunum, then the captain of Roman Britain, and massacred its inhabitants. They went on to give similar treatment to London and Verulamium (modern St. Albans). By that time, Suetonius had returned from Wales and marshaled his army to confront the rebels. In the clash that followed-the exact battle site is unknown, but possibilities range from London to Northamptonshire-the Romans managed to defeat the Britons despite inferior numbers, and Boudica and her daughters apparently killed themselves by taking poison in order to avoid capture.
I'm pretty certain Anglia in a sense being from the Angles, in their own language their name being spelt Engle, where the name England comes from meaning Land of the Angles.
Gan still in the Geordie dialect is directly from Old English either meaning run or go.
She was Iceni anglo saxon not celtic
@@grahammorters4715she wasn’t Anglo Saxon!
@@jeremysmith54565Also means the same in Scotland
@@grahammorters4715 Mate wtf are you talking about, the Icenis were Celts, this is like 400 years before the Anglo Saxons turned up
I'm assuming you will not see this as many other won't either but I need to get this of my chest as there were so many problems. First of all, I hate summaries as they miss so much, this missed out so much of the Spanish conflict, the Viking conflict, and so so so much more. The English language is not French and old English, it's actually Old English, Old Norse (mother to our language), French and Old Latin. Hence why it's so difficult. It missed out so much detail of King John and the Magna Carta not to mention that as I've seen some people say, the Norman's weren't strictly French as a Viking Warrior turned French Noble man was actual named Rollo a Viking ruler, not French. The only reason why William beat our King was because they marched so long and far, and we're weakened, lossed many in casualties from the battle with Hardrada that William defeated us. Great Britain, as we know it, did come to exist until the early 1700s (18th century). I find there were many inaccuracies in this informative video. It is, for the most part, correct but missed out so many other important historical events and information.
I sympathize with your sentiment, but I believe summaries have their place. Not everyone wants or has the time to watch a two-hours long documentary on the history of a nation, which will also miss a lot because there's always more to learn and learning history is a never-ending rabbit hole.
That's not to say I wouldn't want a History Re-Summarized on England from OSP, because I personally like their presentation style and would love to see Blue go into more detail and take more time to properly explain certain things, but I don't hate summaries as a concept, especially for people who are just starting to dip their toe into a topic.
Of course, Tyler should watch more about the history of England than this video. This should just be a starting point, not the whole story.
(Also, gonna be pedantic here : English has a lot of vocabulary from Latin, either Classical, Ecclesiastical, or New Latin, but not so much Old Latin. Old Latin was spoken before Rome was an empire.)
@@Mercure250 There is also a legacy of Celto Brythonic language, mostly hidden by being converted into an anglicised spelling, but prominent in place names in Wales, Scotland and Cornwall. Of course local versions still exist as discrete languages in Brittany, Cornwall, Wales, Ireland and Scotland. But ignored by Anglo Norman historians, why waste time on your enemies?
@@etherealbolweevil6268 To be fair, vocabulary-wise, if we exclude place names, Celtic languages did not have that much of an influence (it is also true about Gaulish and French). But interestingly, it seems the way English uses "do" and the continuous tenses come from Celtic languages. So not much of an influence on the lexicon, but some significant influence on the grammar.
But yeah, Celtic erasure is cringe.
Correction: the romans weren’t blocked by a wall, they built a wall known as Hadrians wall which is located entirely in Modern day England, which kept out the those they deemed “savages” which is now modern day Scotland and a small section of Northern England
Also Spain English conflict: yes the battle of the Armada but does an American not know the Spanish+French+Dutch helped them win the American Revolution
They never beat great britain, they signed a treaty and sued GB for smashing there country up.
Though the Romans did eventually expand into Scotland. They built another wall, the Antoine walk, north of the Central belt but also built settlements and forts in the Southern Highlands.
And castles weren't to protect the English from invaders - they were built by the Norman invaders to keep the locals subjugated.
And many slaves too.
@@wessexdruid7598 100% correct. it does annoy me when Videos like these skip over a lot of the Tribal conflict and Kingdoms that use to make the collective name called England. (these Tribal / Lord/Barons areas developed into what we call constituencies in the modern age who represented in the commons, this was before MPs even became a thing , it was lords and Barons in the commons(nobles really) funny enough it wasn't really for peasants) and as you put one king william didn't want the peasants to revolt so he built castles for the lords/barons to hold the kingdom for him, in many cases replaced Barons that were more loyal to the new king William.
The Normans were not really "French". They were the descendants of Viking invaders who eventually accepted the French king as their overlord - but they kept fairly independent. They adopted the French language and French culture - but they were not, strictly speaking, actually French or Frankish...The name Normandy (and the Normans) is related to its settlement by Vikings - aka "Northmen"...
Exactly
Norse
I bet the English were thrilled when they found out their French overlords were also Vikings too.
@@hareecionelson5875 lol...well if there was an England then, I'm sure they did...lol
I am 68 in London and did not know that or realise The Tudor Dynasty came from The War Of The Roses.
Never call someone from Scotland or Wales English, and never call anyone from England Scottish or Welsh.
Not unless you don’t mind getting a smack in the mouth.
Those three just love to hate each other 😁
@@petebennett3733 my mum is Scottish ,my (step) Dad is Welsh and I was born in England , politics and sports are "fun " conversations in our family.
@@petebennett3733. Yes, we do have a love/hate relationship. 😆
@@kirstygunn9149. I bet you do.
I’m British and my ancestry was actually traced back to viking chiefs Azlock and Ozlack. This was very interesting because my grandparents surname is Haselock which obviously is incredibly similar sounding
Fair enough but actually a lot of British people have Scandinavian in them somewhere. They just don’t know it.
My paternal grandmother's family name is Oddie, which is a bastardisation of Odin.
England and France are like squabbling siblings. We're more alike than either would care to admit, but we've been stuck next to each other for so long our tiny differences really irritate us 😅
I am not related in any way to a French person, thank you.
Calm down Barry lad.
@@matteoj226 Apologies, I went "off my head" with that reckless comment.
Nah this is 100% more the English and the Germans. Apparently during the Christmas truce in 1914 many of them thought they should have been fighting together against the French not each other 😂
English and Germans are more alike than the french
Never feel embarrassed about not knowing something, the only thing that matters is that you’re making an effort to now 👌 Most people can’t be bothered to learn their history, as an American your family roots probably come from the British Isles or Europe 😎
Ignorance is the ability of not to want to learn or question what we are told. He has made an effort. It would take an historian a lifetime to learn about British history. As equally so with European or other nations histories.
William the Conqueror was from Normandy (part of France) but was a descendent of the Viking Rollo who settled in Normandy in the 900's
If you want to find out who all the King’s and queens of England were, I recommend watching ‘Horrible Histories Kings and Queens song’. Also if you want to learn more, just watch any Horrible Histories. That’s how we learnt our history as kids in primary school and it all still slaps 😌😂
Absolutely seconding this! Frankly Horrible Histories generally does a rly good job of explaining British history in an accessible way
As a middle aged British woman with two teenage children... I also suggest the Horrible Histories books and first few seasons of the TV Show to adults just starting to gain an interest in British history. It is a great way to introduce topics that you can use as a springboard to then expand your research in what interests you. Be warned the songs will be burned into your memory for the rest of your life.
i know EVERY lyric!
such a banger song
I would like to suggest Elanor Farjeon's book of rhymes about the Kings and Queens. Ms Farjeon is also the person that wrote the lyrics to the song/hymn "Morning has broken" - made famous when Cat Stevens added music to it.
Yessss
Only at 5:10 but I find it interesting how starting with the romans is like starting lord of the rings with the second book 😅
This made me laugh so much, our History is crazy, and it’s not until someone trying to figure it out, that you realise just how complicated and intriguing the UK is God I’m proud.
The War of the Roses between the houses of Lancaster and York for the throne of England was the inspiration for the Game of Thrones books and series.
It was also part of the nook the white queen.
Hadrian's wall to keep the wild northerners out played a part, too :)
@@RCassinelloHow so?
@@ianmatthews3041 Well ... there was this wall built to keep wild people from the north out of the realm.
@@RCassinello Nope!
It was to Control the Passage of People Crossing over!
Your thoughts about living on an island as opposed to a larger continental landmass sums up what it is to be British. As Churchill said; "We have our own dream and our own task. We are with Europe, but not of it. We are linked but not combined. We are interested and associated but not absorbed. If Britain must choose between Europe and the open sea, she must always choose the open sea.”
That's a fabulous statement by Churchill.
So he explained Brexit in a nutshell
@@scarba yup
SPOT ON THIS NEEDS TO BE REMEMBERED AND ENFORCED!! 👍💪👊🤬🏴🇬🇧
And then he took a lead role in the formation of the European Community.
Game of Thrones was based on real events from Scotland and England, even the seven Kingdoms, the enemy across the sea, the Great wall and the barbarians to the north.
Wales has a national animal of dragons and believe it or not Scotland's national animal is the Unicorn.
The red wedding really happened in Scotland.
England was Albion, Ireland was Hibernia, and Scotland Caledonia.
the lion and the unicorn were fighting for the crown,
the lion beat the unicorn and chased him round the town
@@ianprince1698 The Lion is real, the Unicorn is make-believe. Is that a childhood fable or something???
@@daveofyorkshire301 that rhyme I learnt as a child.
It's not popular now, but it's nursery rhyme that I knew in the early 1970s and goes back to the 1600s. It's about the relationship between England and Scotland.
@@daveofyorkshire301 - i guess in the middle ages even the lion was a legendary animal. No one in England would have seen one since the Romans left.
A lot of heraldic animals were just exaggerated retellings of real ones. The cameleopard was a giraffe, the manticore was a tiger, the unicorn may have been the retelling of someone once seeing a rhinoceros and passing the story on by word of mouth.
I'm from Manchester, England, and now live in Perth, Scotland. And I think your videos are quality bruv. Keep them going, fella.
It's so very nice to see an American to be so interested in other parts of history of the world.. I'm a Canadian, and I learnt a few new things myself, many thanks.. I thoroughly enjoy your Reacts, I like it that you really do like learning more of the world outside of USA.. 🐦
I bet the native Americans would disagree with your assessment that US history starts at the revolutionary war 😉
I'm pretty sure that your country has some really interesting history before the European arrived
Not to mention the fact that British Colonies were there for over 100 years before the revolution, so they do have history
I 'm actually quite staggered with the amount of complete insensitivity towards Native American history, as much as possible it was destroyed and buried.
Agree totally. Ignored the Spanish influence in Florida and the French (which he has already seen) and the Louisiana purchase and then Alaska and Hawaii.
@@patsydf Well if this is the case, I'm somewhat staggered by the complete insensitivity from the British towards the Australian Indigenous, I mean it was only 200 years odd that the British went to Australia. So much of a muchness!
Yep and the Australian indigenous would disagree with when Australia's history began, which the British seemed to define!
Alfred is an important king and not mentioned in the film ! Aethelstan was his grandson, but Alfred did all the work.
Clearly Alfred did not do *all* of the work because, at his death, half the territory now known as England was ruled by the Danes. He did part of the work but the idea of a unified England was essentially his (imparted, legend has it, in a dream by St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne).
Edward the Elder, Aethelflaed (Lady of the Mercians) and Aethelstan did the rest and, even then, subsequent kings (Edmund, Eadred, Edwig and Edgar), had to win back territory lost to other Viking invaders who divided Aethelstan's England again by setting up the Kingdom of York which lasted several decades.
You can check out the history of the English Language. It's far more complicated than Anglo Saxon and French. Thrown in some Latin, Greek, German, Dutch, Norse and various other words and expressions picked up from trading around the world and the Empire 😁
Here’s a link to the history of English: ruclips.net/p/PLbBvyau8q9v4hcgNYBp4LCyhMHSyq-lhe
I think all of Europe has a bit of Norse - the Vikings came up with the compass points. And then we did a lot of nicking words from wherever was popular or learned at the time and we DIDN'T SORT THE SPELLINGS OUT. Kids who learn to read in English learn much more slowly than those doing it in languages where they kept tidying up.
Also you have the languages of Galic, ( Scotland and Ireland ) and Welsh which are some of the oldest languages in Europe. Also Manx and Cornish.
@@rockybateman2904 and the Britons of Elmet,Rheged, and Strathclyde..present day West Yorkshire, Cumbria and present day Ayrshire and Galloway...😊
Such as French and Indian words like 'Cha, Bungalow, Jodhpurs......
As a Brit, I find it fascinating how many pieces of knowledge and/or perspectives you take for granted that you (and by extension other non brits) just have never thought about. I Love that you are interested in it and am throoughly enjoying listening to your journy through our history.
You are like abreath of fresh air! Everyone outside of the USA thinks that Americans don't know anything about anywhre outside of North America..... seems we were right huh?! Good for you for being open to learn. On behalf of Brits everywhere I thank you!!!
England, like most of Europe, was inhabited by Celtic tribes, but they were also invaders in previous centuries. Before them, various other neolithic people lived in what came to be called England. Stonehenge and many other stone circles in Britain date back to the time of the ancient Egyptians (3000 BC) but we know very little about them.
There were the Celts. Then the Romans. Then there were the Saxons. Then the Vikings. And then the Normans.
The Celts moved North and West and kept themselves pretty much to themselves.
The Romans were active in England.
The Saxons came mostly to South East England.
The Vikings carried out raids and some of them stayed.
The Normans took over pretty well all of the British Isles, including Ireland.
You can see the influence of all the invasions on the English language.
@@emmajones8590 Not most..there were Cetic tribes. from france etc..Scots and the others think they are unique
Iron Age tribes, not Celtic. The Keltoi were German.
There were people before the Celts!
@@emmajones8590 Nah there were people here before the Celts arrived, they were just wiped out
Celtic Britain was extremely scary for the Romans, for Romans Britain was some strange island on the edge of the known world where the Celtic Druids still practiced human sacrifice.
The Celts of the European continent had become slightly Romanised whereas Britain hadn't, so Britain was completely alien for the Romans.
There's records of Celts in Britain harassing Roman soldiers then hiding in marshes and bogs then goading Romans to following knowing the Romans couldn't fight effectively in those conditions.
The Romans only wanted Britain due to the high amount of Tin, which was important for making steel weapons, armour and tools.
Roman soldiers hated being stationed on this cold rainy island to the north
@@Alloya I don't like the thought of this as a Cornishman, but good to be informed! Thanks. We don't do this these days. Tyler, great video.
From "Heart of Darkness" when the characters are sailing out on the Thames estuary on their way to Africa: “And this also,” said Marlow suddenly, “has been one of the dark places of the earth.”
Lead, copper and gold very important. Tin they could buy on the open market at reasonable prices. Tin not of much use in steel production, loosing its value in the iron age due to bronze (alloy of copper and tin) being the old technology.
The first King of England was Æthelstan, Grandson of Alfred the Great of Wessex, which is often a shock to people who somehow think the Guillaume la Batard (William I the Bastard/Conqueror) is the beginning of the Monarchy.
I live north of Manchester and we still have a local roman road with a roman cross
Roman history is extremely significant in cities such as York and Bath.
Viking is not a race of people. It is a culture! Viking means Raider. They came from all over .
Scandinavia - A lot of the English language has Norse (Viking) origins. Place names like York were Viking settlements (Jorvik). Then the names ended up in places like New York.... originally from a Viking name. Days of the week like Wednesday (Odin), Friday (Frey) and Thursday (Thor). The Vikings were also in North America FAR before Columbus and other Europeans.
Queen Boadicea was one tough broad and a thorn in the Roman side.
Yes Spain and England fought. The Spanish Armada was wiped out by the English. As comedian John Cleese (Monty Python fame) said "The Spanish are building a new armada. It will be glass bottom so they can see their old armada".
More on the days of the week Tuesday is tyr's day -> god of war
Friday could also be freyja's day
Vikings: what is now Newfoundland, in Canada.
I went to a tourist center in Almansa Spain and they had a section about the British fighting with them. They even had The Times newspaper cuttings on what happened. The Brits with the Duke of Marlborough (1701-13), stopped France dominating Europe. You probably know about it.
The whole of the Wirral on Merseyside was a Norse stronghold.
I watched some egrets flying over the river to Tranmere, Birkenhead yesterday. Tranmere is Norse and means the place of cranes (egrets) in English.
@@sophiabee8924 - Cool. Thanks.
Oh God, I shouted at the TV so much when watching this. But well done for wanting to learn.
Tyler you need to check out Boudica, Queen of the Iceni.
The Victorians created a version of their image of her which is often used to represent "Britannia".
Britannia is the name the Romans called the area of the UK that was conquered as part of the Roman Empire.
It probably comes from the name Pritain Island which supposed to mean Island of tin or pewter. Becouse Romans and probably also Greeks used to trade tin from the Island.
How ironic
I feel the need to point that Brittany was not part of France during the hundred years war. It was an independant state and would remain so till the end of the XVth century. That said, England and France both wanted it and heavily intervened during Brittany's own succession's conflicts.
Look at Norman architecture in our Cathedrals.....we have the french fleur-de-lis on our Royal Crowns. etc etc
We tend to think of "King Alfred the Great" of Wessex as the turning point that starts the whole England thing. He was the grandfather of Aethelstan who eventually completed the job. Although since then there have been some lesser adjustments over time to the actual borders with Scotland and Wales.
You left out the main turning point that brought us here 1066
yh aethelstan was the king of the english this was the title of the king till 1066 when william i became king of england and not the king of english
@@antonygill5104 England existed for centuries before that bastard seized the throne. Though, after the Normans finished subjugating the English, they began many of the invasions that started the formation of the UK and the bitter hatred for England that still exists in many Welshmen, Scots and Irish people today so I guess you're not totally wrong.
@@antonygill5104 1066 has no relevance to the creation of a unitary state in England which existed fully formed from the 900s.
He is said to have seen a vision of St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne who told him to go and do it.
'Who was living there already, I'd be interested to know' - he literally just told you before you asked that question: The Celts 🤣
There were several layers of settlement before the Celt, back to interglacial nomadic groups crossing Doggerland.
@@rosemarielee7775 True dat. But he was specifically asking who was there when the Romans arrived :P
@@rosemarielee7775 yes but by the time the Romans showed up, those layers were culturally if not politically unified as Celtic speaking tribes
@@realitywins9020 Was Celtic a common culture more than a common ancestry, as some posit?
The Celts were not a a distinct racial group but people who adopted a similar culture. DNA wise, us indigenous Brits are descended from the stone age inhabitants of Britain.
The map of Roman Britain suggests Cornwall was part of it, but like Wales & Scotland it was a Celtic region outside their control
Wales was controlled by the Romans dude. They conquered all the way out to Pembrokeshire and as far North as Anglesey. You can still find ruins of Roman amphitheaters in some places in Wales. Famously they controlled the dolaucothi gold mines that were a major source of revenue via slave labour. Also Cornwall was a part of Roman Britain and there are some old Roman sites in Cornwall just not as many as it it was quite depopulated at that time. Scotland was the only real part of Britain they didn’t go into much and in fact they eventually couldn’t be bothered with them at all and ended up building a big ass wall just to keep them out.
@@Dantheman-0..1 Same for Kernow.
I live in York. used to be the capital of Northumbria. The whole city has a wall guarding it that was built by the romans. We also have a famous medieval street called that Shambles and it was the street that influenced Diagon ally in Harry Potter.
Love York!
I just skimmed the video, and it seems like the original video that Tyler is commenting on didn't mention the small island, between Northern Ireland and Scotland.
Don't worry, even we British are not aware of lot of it, we're taught in schools mostly about Prehistoric Britain, Romans, Vikings, Saxons, War of the Roses, Tudors, Elizabethan era (Shakespeare), Victorian era and the world wars. Mainly because as you've discovered here, there's a hell of a lot to even glaze over, let alone deep dive into.
My school didn't want to teach English history until A-level. We learnt European history - mainly French and American History.
Well I worked in education and I know that it's changed a lot since I was in the system. At primary school, we were taught about the stone age, the iron age, lake dwellers right up to the Norman Invasion. My secondary school history included British and European history, including social reform, wars of independence etc. All this in State school.
Then Thatcher changed the curriculum.
🤦♀️
Although I do not know all of this I do remember learning some of it in school and I am an American 🇺🇸 but I may be in the low percentile. I loved history and it was always my favorite subject in school. I also had a strange fascination with England, Great Britain/UK but particularly England. My family lineage on both sides is traced back to Primarily England and Ireland but also France and Germany. My favorite vacation I ever went on was when I went to England and France. While i only saw a small portion of England I was in love with its history and looked forward to going back someday. My favorite place there was in Windsor where Windsor castle is. I absolutely loved that area and found it so charming. What’s crazy is I actually grew up in a small town in upstate NY USA called Windsor.
You appear to confuse Britain with the UK; these are not synonyms.
England = a country within the island of Great Britain; England shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north and is part of the United Kingdom.
Great Britain = large geographical island in the British Isles comprising three small countries: England, Scotland, and Wales.
United Kingdom = country and kingdom consisting of four smaller countries: England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.
English = belonging to or relating to England, or its people: Englishwoman, Englishman.
British = belonging to or relating to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, or to its people (English, Scottish, Welsh, and Northern Irish) or its culture.
Englishwoman = me.
Hope this helps. xx
England and its people were/are basically a hybrid of ancient British/Celtic/Brythonic, Angles/Saxons/Jutes, a small amount of Roman, a bit of Viking/Danish, and then a sizeable part of Norman French (who themselves were, as I understand it, orignally Vikings who settled in Northern Gaul).
Culturally Roman but not genetically, not alot of Romans colonized Britain because:
1. It was considered a backwater province full of rebellions
2. It was out of the way for trade
And when Rome declined many of the Romans that did live there fled from the Anglo Saxons.
The north of England was more anglo-danish than anglo-saxon by the time the normans arrived. But the northern lords refused to bend the knee so the norman armies marched north and decimated the population. The scourging of the north is rarely mentioned in history lessons, though the north-south divide in England endures to this day, socially and economically (though the south hasn't always been on top: the industrial revolution was mostly in the north, which is why if you look at a satellite map of England at night the belt from Liverpool through Manchester to Leeds and Bradford outshines most of the southern counties even now. There's only really London and its commuter zones that light up down south. And Birmingham in the midlands).
@@nagillim7915 that event you're talking about is called "the harrying of the North", it's pretty interesting because the North had a rebellion under Godwinson due to taxes, his own brother led this rebellion, then went to Norway to convince Haradra to invade England.
Yes except that the Normans were overwhelmingly native French with just the ruling class being partly of Viking descent
@@the98themperoroftheholybri33 Yes, but what about inter-marriage during the 350 years when the Romans occupied? Isn't that why the population is referred to as Romano-British? Isn't it also true that, whilst the northern parts were subject predominantly to military occupation by ethnically diverse legions from far flung parts of the Empire (e.g. the Middle East and North Africa), the most southerly parts of the island were settled domestically by a denser population with actual cities (rather than just forts with a satellite vicus attached), a lot more villas and farms?
You should check out the "horrible histories kings and queens" video... will make you laugh, and show ALL the kings and queens of England :)
Here's an interesting fact: Big Ben is the name of the bell inside the tower not the tower itself. The tower is called The Elizabethan Tower after Queen Elizabeth II.
Great reaction mate! Love your enthusiasm and eagerness to learn. In fairness to the maker of the video you are reacting to, it's almost impossible to condense the story into a half hour show, fully get your confusion over what would be obvious if the original video explained it fully.
The whole of mostly England is riddled with Roman settlements.You get some also in Wales and Scotland.Also many British names of towns have their origin from Rome.
yep! I'm from Manchester, we get our name from the latin name for the fort Mancunium, potentially coming from either 'mamma' meaning breast since we're on a big ole hill, or some have also suggested it comes from the name of a local river goddess. Whatever the case, the people of Manchester have been known as Mancunians more or less since and to this day 😁
A man after my own heart. Love facts and how life evolves. History is so interesting and complex.
I love these videos because I really want to jump through the camera and explain all his questions
I know you asked about groups of people in terms of where they're from but I know a little more about it in terms of religions so I'm gonna talk about that :D
Before the roman invasion, the land was called Albion, and it consisted of Iron age tribes, the last emigrants being from southern Europe at the end of the stone age. Their religion was ancestral worship, similar to current beliefs in Japan, the various henges up and down Britain being places where bones were crushed and scattered among the stones, and people would journey there along rivers and burn great fires and feast to celebrate the solstice. The celts never wrote anything down, they'd create beautiful metal work and tattoo their bodies with blue ink but due to their reluctance to write, we know very little about them. Though we do know they lived rather harmoniously, it's thought the latest update on stone henge was done to celebrate the coming together of the native people and the emigrants from southern Europe in 2500 BC.
When the Romans invaded, the locals were pagans, who still didn't write about themselves. Paganism and druidism today is mostly guesswork about what it was like, built on by people from the 1920s. Pagans had several gods for things, similar to the Romans and the Norse. The Romans were the first to write about it.
When the Vikings invaded, christianity had spread upwards via the roman roads, few people were Pagan, most were Christian. The records we have of this era all come from the Christian monks, who wrote everything down, often exaggerating history so that the Vikings threatening them might offer mercy. The monks practised pacifism, and so were often taken as slaves, sometimes even thrown overboard if the viking longboats became too heavy.
Vikings settled in America, in Greenland, in Iceland, in England and Ireland from where they took slaves, and they travelled all the way to India to trade their slaves. Norways land was unreliable to farm on and so families that would rather not bother with that, get themselves slaves (called thralls) to do it for them, and then traded them for exotic food, spices and silks.
That's why in some places in Norway you can find really old Buddha statues.
By the time of William the Conquerer's invasion, some Vikings had agreed to settle in the North of England, so long as they didn't go around killing anyone. You can find viking burial grounds there, as the people becoming one with the locals found new ways to hold their belief in Norse gods with the knowledge that if valhallah were truly real then they wouldn't be able to reach it as they didn't die in battle. They gradually converted to christianity, after rioting alongside the locals against the castles William the Conquerer built there. Those who continued to resist his rule died.
William brought the first Jewish people to England too, as the local Christians believed to deal in things like loaning money was sinful, this role fell to them, giving them a high standing and hated position in a society under a king the locals didn't approve of.
Civil unrest grew for 150 years and crested in attacks, massacres and in some cities total genocide of the Jewish people in the 1100s.
England has remained a christian nation ever since, though switching between Catholic and Protestant after its invention by Henry VIII in the 1500s.
Until this year! When the census revealed that for the first time in recorded history, less than half the population identify themselves as being Christian.
Anyway I'm laughing so hard at the "Why would he replace the existing aristocracy with people from France?" Call that colonisation buddy, its pretty shitty but its all about power and control.
If you're interested in more history I'd recommend reacting to Horrible Histories. Don't let the fact its made for kids put you off, it's genuinely funny and educational.
I dont think that Albion is actualy such an old name - from before Roman invasion. I guess that it was invented rather in early medieval age though with use of some of older native word. But we cannot be sure what the Iron age Celtic tribes have called their islands before Romans came and invented their own names for the islands. Though we know that the word could be derived from Greek language.
These two Roman authors
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avienius
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pytheas
were probably the first authors who used Albion as name of all island.
Though kingdom of Alba in 9th century which unified Scotland tribes (Picts and Irish)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Alba
was the first British kingdom to use this name.
@@TallisKeeton ah my bad, I misconstrued the text under the headline Ptolemy's Albion here
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Iron_Age
they travelled all the way to India to trade their slaves
Never heard about vikings in India. They were in Bysantium for sure and in Russia (known as varangians) in Iceland and Greenland, and on Sicily, but they never traveled around Africa and the eastern parts of Europe with Black Sea and Russia, the main viking routes there were big rivers - Don, Dniepr, Dniestr. the never found the route to India, either around Africa or through the Caucasus, they were too small power to go there esp becouse of the islamic states in the region of Caucasus.
That's why in some places in Norway you can find really old Buddha statues
It was becouse of trade routes - from one to the other trader on the Silk Road - but not becouse vikings themselves were in India.
When the Vikings invaded, christianity had spread upwards via the roman roads,
In Britain christianity was main religion long before vikings invasion of England. The first place vikings destroyed was monastery on Lindisfarne Island near Britain. Vikings age is 7th to 11th century (at Greenland and Iceland it can be up to 13th c.)
@@TallisKeeton when I said had I was using past tense, as in, by the time Vikings invaded, the British were Christian.
I learnt about Vikings travelling to india on a TV show on a history channel, I see now that although they traded and may have met with Indian people, there's no evidence of them actually being there. The guy hosting the show went to a modern Indian Market while he was talking about it so I think I've been mislead lol.
@@SpeedyOwl I guess there was not big invasion or big settlement of vikings (Scandinavians) in India, as the kingdoms there were too strong and too long travel - on the land - for their interests :) they were not great force without their ships :) though there is always possibility that few persons - for example Bysantinian hired mercenaries of viking origin - could 've mingled here and there in their travels :) But IMO more probably is that the trade roads worked from one trader to another, someone traveled a bit, sold his stuff and next traveled a bit, sold it and so on, all the way from India to Britain. The idea of traveling from India to Britain or from Norwey to India all the way was actualy impossible - due to the many obstacles, like wars, ruffians, desserts, lack of roads, big forests, big mountains, and one thing which not much ppl would think about in our modern days - big differences of legal systems and customs. The long range trade - from continent to continent was diffictult becouse all of those topics it was much more profitable and safer to ride from Norway to for example south Germany or France, and then from it to Rome or Bysantium, and some other guy would trade your things to Persia or Egypt. We usualy forget that it was time when the only means of traveling most ppl got was oxen wagon or horse and not every horse could be used to wagon full of traded stuff. The main "speed roads" of the international trade were actualy great rivers, so the places without great rivers - rivers like Rhine, Danube, Don, Dnepr or Nile could not be centres of trade.
I think I've seen the same show on HistoryChannel about vikings - it was about the excavation of one of their fortresses build by Bluetooth, and about the smiths in one of their cities AFAIR Bergen - and about first wooden churches. that was the show when they talked also about budda figure I guess :)
I commend you on your search for knowledge sir! And I'm learning right along with ya, that video is DENSE with info damn
A Castle is a Fortified Residence. Most of the supporters / high born soldiers who came over to England from Normandy were rewarded by William by being given Titles and Land. They needed to protect their land from the locals and rivals. That class of nobles and aristocracy were all French speakers for several centuries. King Edward III was the first King to speak English as his first language. But English any way was an ever evolving language.
The US has an expression to denote the elevated class (tongue in cheek) of certain people by saying "They came over in the Mayflower".
We have a similar expression ... "They came over with the Conqueror" 👍😎
I don't wish to be pedantic,"Pedantic Lady" but shouldn't " any way" be one word in this context?
It's quite amazing, the history of the British Isles.. I can leave my home here in Wales, drive 5mins and there's ruins of a roman town just there... sitting in a field.
Wow, seeing your reaction, this video really badly explains things for a history newbie. Quick summary:
-In Roman times, the original inhabitants of England were Celts (like Irish and Scottish people today) called Britons. The Romans sort of conquered them and called the province Brittania, but then left when the Roman Empire collapsed (oversimplification) in 410 and Germanic peoples from Scandinavia and Germany came over.
-The Germanic peoples called Angles, Saxons and Jutes migrated over in the 400s to 600s, and created several kingdoms while fighting and repelling the original Celtic and Romanized Britons who got pushed to the west (what is now Wales).
-Viking invasions happened in the 800s to the 1000s. The Vikings (also called Danes bc most were from Denmark) set up kingdoms in eastern and northern England. In response, the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Wessex conquered remaining Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and fought the Vikings for a century before having all of England under Anglo-Saxon control around 1040.
-In 1066, the next-to-last Anglo-Saxon king of the House of Wessex, Edward the Confessor, died without a son, so powerful noble Harold Godwinson took the throne. King Harald Hardrada of Norway, the last Viking king, tried conquering England but was defeated and killed by Harold Godwinson.
-Then, Duke William of Normandy (the Normans were descendants of Vikings who had settled in northern France, become christianized and assimilated into French/Frankish culture), who was basically an independent ruler even though he was supposed to be subordinate to the king of France, invaded England, defeated Godwinson and the Anglo-Saxon and established a dynasty of French-speaking kings and aristocracy at the head of England for hundreds of years.
Sam Revlej This is all makes really good sense, but to put your final paragraph into full context for American readers, we need to mention, or indeed confirm, that Duke William of Normandy is widely known in history as William the Conqueror (becoming William 1st) and the defeat of Harold Godwinson (King Harold) took place on October 14th 1066 and is known as the Battle of Hastings
@@gregcoles6555 True, true, I forgot to be precise in my haste to oversimplify.
Thanks.
I have cut 'n pasted your excellent summary.
Also, Edward the Confessor had promised his throne to William, but apparently playing more than 1 horse he hadnt ordered it to his nobles. The Normans were also descendants of Danish Viking, who under the great Rollo (in Danish Rolf or in Old Danish Hrólfr) laid siege to Paris a few times for ransom, until the French king gave him, what became Normady (land of the Northmen) in 911. It is said, that at the time of William the Conqueror Danish was still spoken in the streets of Caen.
Modern English is a hodgepodge of Old Celtish, Roman Latin, Old Danish and Norman French, that baked for a few hundred years. So like the Brits themselves its a very mixed breed.
And as a Dane, I still shudder, every time I hear about "King Canute". English speakers really butcher that name. His name was Knud with a hard k at the start and a soft d at the end, called "den Store" or "the Great". But apparently English speakers are incapable of pronouncing the kn and soft d sounds.
I love how this is like the most basic knowledge in England that basically everyone knows but step across an ocean and suddenly it becomes a complicated mess
You could check out "The monarchs song" from horrible histories, its funny and a really quick way to get to know all the monarchs.
The Normans were descended from Vikings who France gave land to in return for protection against other Viking raiders. The vikings were also known as Norse men, being from the Norse (North). Which is where we get the name Norman. Norse-man > Norman. So the land of Normandy was a region of France that was technically still under the French King but acted as its own state.
So in a weird way, both the Saxon/Dane invasion and the Norman invasion were kinda both the Vikings. (Although the vikings who settled in Normandy heavily intermixed with the French, so by 1066 they were their own distinct group)
You should react to "Every Country England Has Ever Invaded: Visualized" by RealLifeLore. its incorrect and misleading in some places but gives a very good overview of the power and success of the British army and navy throughout history.
Hey hey. I am a British person who just wanted to say, that I am very much enjoying watching your videos. I lived in the US (in Michigan) for a few years as a child - mid 1970s - so with that, plus a number of subsequent visits to the US, and many American friends, I fully understand the gap in knowledge and perspective, that you are exploring. You do this very well. And you come across as someone with intelligence, humour and kindness, as well as being just INTERESTED in our country and its culture. You occasionally get some details wrong for a short while, but you usually bring it back around to the real facts. I think it is actually quite important for people to be open to other (and/ore related) cultures, the way that you clearly are. Thank you again, this is brilliant work that you are doing.
Ignorance is forgivable. You're already ahead of the curve....
I can't even put into words how much I appreciate you trying to learn about European history.
Btw Romans were at one point, around year 100 AD, pretty much spread out through the whole continent+Northern Africa and Middle East.
When this programme was made, Scotland was thinking of going independent.
When has it not been?
Some facts that might help you remember the constituent parts of the British Isles.
1) The Romans (Ptolemy) named the British Isles as "Greater Britain" and "Lesser Britain". i.e. the larger island and the smaller island.
2) "Greater Britain" is now known as "Great Britain".
3) Great Britain consists of England, Scotland and Wales
4) "Lesser Britain" is now know as The Republic of Ireland AND Northern Ireland.
5) Each of those divisions of territory has a fierce history worthy of it's own examination.
6) The full name of the UK is "The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland"
generally, most english look to alfred the great as the first king of england. he stopped the vikings from taking over ALL of england. academics would not agree with this. However he is the most famous of the anglo saxon kings.
Now that you've done the History of England, you should do the same for Scotland, Wales and Ireland! Those on the 'Fire of Learning' Channel are pretty comprehensive and similarly illustrated to the one you've used for England, if a little long... However, one thing they don't put across so well is that the climate of much of Scotland is very different to England, Wales, Ireland & France, etc. This is not so much because it is any great distance away, as the curvature of the Earth is such that it is actually around a corner, so far as much of England is concerned - and that probably explains more than anything why the Romans and early English attempts to conquer Scotland failed - and why the Viking invasions did not! (The Romans did actually have summer camps well into the Scottish Highlands, but the lack of infrastructure such as roads prevented their permanent occupation). If you can find siuitable footage of it, you may wish to do a reaction to "Up Helly Aa," which is an annual fire festival held in the Shetland Islands, to commemorate their Norse Heritage. Similar fire festivals also take place throughout Eastern Scotland actually, with the town of Stonehaven celebrating each coming New Year with the hurling oif fireballs through its streets; and even Edinburgh has a hilltop 'Beltane Festival,' that is similarly related.
Perhaps owing to its generally more established population and earlier civil infrastructure that had come, thanks to the Romans; it also appears that France took a more intelligent approach to spreading its influence - whilst the English simply marched up north, hoping for the best! This is illustrated by the fact they forged diplomatic relations with Scotland, though of course this also had the desirable effect of making it easier to quell any English ambitions to invade France! It is certainly true that the successful Norman Conquest culminating in the Battle of Hastings in 1066 was one of the key moments of English history. There was a significant influx of Norman/French immigrants in England after that time and indeed, some of these slowly expanded into Northern England and into Ireland, over the next seven or eight centuries! Indeed, my own family name most likely has French origins and is associated with wood workers - who were lured into these areas by the availability of such employment and indeed, the bulk of their descendants remain in Irish Plantations territory, today!
Spookily enough they called the first William "William I" when there was a second William (II) I don't think they could make it any simpler. Now if they they had numbered them 3, 6, 2 ,1, 7, 4 I could understand your confusion.
When you as an American speak of English as your language, it reminds me of my daughter who did a school exchange visit to Panama Beach in the Florida panhandle an American schoolgirl asked her "D'ya Speak English"? to which my daughter replied "It's obvious you don't"
As someone born in Belfast, plenty of British adults don't know that the United Kingdom is "Great Britain and Northern Ireland". I've had people argue with me about it!
Look at a map Tyler. Normandy still currently a region of France. In those days it was a Dukedom. Most of the current French regions were individual Dukedoms or Kingdoms with their own rulers. France itself was a much smaller and separate entity. However, many of the Dukedoms, etc. gave fealty to the King of France.
William was the Duke of Normandy. Of course he's going to need his own Army and bring over his own people he can trust to take charge of different parts of Country. He can't do it all personally. Otherwise he'll end up dead within a couple of days 🙄
Useful Charts channel has good videos of royal family trees that strike a balance of brevity and comprehensiveness.
Scandinavia is broadly regarded as Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and sometimes Finland and Iceland.
Amazing video, loved your honest reactions...they just forgot King William of Orange.
I really appreciate you successfully trying to speak properly and not mumble, and correcting yourself on the occasional Americanism :')
The history is so vast and longstanding, most Americans don't really understand how many hundreds and thousands of years of history we've already had over here, vs your 300 year old country.
The Vikings settled in both England and Scotland and many areas of North East of both countries are full of Viking place names. Some places adopted a lot of the Viking language and many English words and slang are from the Vikings.
Regarding Royal families, it was common for Royal families throughout Europe to swap daughters amongst each other plus a lot of cousins marrying each other, so they are mostly all related to each other to some degree.
And they were always fighting each other as well.
The Normans beat the Anglo Saxons in battle and took over England, they didn't let them in.
There are many place names in northern England and lowland Scotland which come from Celtic ( Brythonic - Welsh) too. All over England even, cf Dover which comes from the word 'dwfr' which means 'water'. ( 'dwr' in modern Welsh).
@@marythurlow9132 That is true. My local town is Dumbarton (Dun Britton - fort of the Britons) and was a major centre for a kingdom that stretched from Scotland to North Wales. The Vikings also ruled the far West and the Hebrides (inner and outer) and the Isle of Man. Their rule eventually evolved into the Lord of the Isles which lasted for a few centuries.
Scottish town and mountain names are predominantly Celtic but the far North West, the North East and a few other areas have Viking names. The United Kingdom is a hotch potch of names derived from Anglo Saxons, Normans, Vikings and Celts but I was trying to emphasise that the the Vikings did not just raid but also colonised and settled and interbred and became part of the country in the same way as various immigrants became Americans.
@@UnknownUser-rb9pd That is true.
You need to react to Horrible Histories. They are a massive cultural piece and many people's including myself's childhood, they are hilarious and will also teach you about Britain's History.
The children's show more accurate than the History Channel.
Very good call.
BBC subversive rubbish
I would recommend this too
Best show ever. Watch the monarch song and see if you can memorise them
One American who was reacting to the "Difference between UK GB England ...." said that they did not know that "England"(GB) was an island.
You should react to CGP Grey's History of Kings/Queens!
21:38 England is multilingual, with many roots, including latin, germanic, old Brittonanic celt, Anglican, Scandinavian sbd frankan.
Have you considered starting a patreon, with exclusives and longer edits? etc
William of Normandy wasnt "let in". He is called William the Conqueror for reason.
There are plenty of British-made movies and series that represent particular events, attitudes and identities. If you wanted to diversify your content you could include some of these to analyse how Brits tell stories about themselves, especially if they focus on a subject you have acquired prior knowledge of.
Rollo, from the show Vikings, was the great great grandad of William the Conqueror. Rollo caused so much shit in France that King Charles the Simple gave him the chunk of land he named Normandy, basically Land of the Northman.
Referring to the monks saving historical information you might like to look up how the Irish saved civilization. It refers to Irish monks how stored and hide literature leading into the dark ages to preserve history.
I'm English, and I tend to get rather irked when it's stated that English history began with the Romans: as if we hadn't already had a thousand years of history before that.
I've read that there were eight waves of prehistoric peoples who came to Britain, but only the last wave survived; they've found plenty of evidence for Neanderthal colonisation.
The English Channel didn't exist until about 12,000 years ago, so people could walk across what is now the North Sea, and was then Doggerland, to follow migrating herds. Once the Channel was formed, people were stuck here.
There was actually a second Roman Wall, the Antonine Wall, further north, but the Romans couldn't hold it and pulled back to Hadrian's Wall.
I think English royalty was like any other nation's royalty: bunches of bullies fighting to see who was the biggest bully, who then became king until a bigger bully came along.
As someone who comes from a heavily celtic area of Britain it really makes me feel like my history is just washed over
@@Smoneey - ancient British history starts with the Romans, and British history since then only happens in London. shee.
Good afternoon from Wessex! There's a ton of ancient stuff in England wherever you care to turn your eye. The small town I live in is the burial place of two of King Æthelstan's uncles who were bigwigs in the Royal House of Wessex before England's unification. Stonehenge is just up the road and we're still not entirely sure how they built it with 5000 year old technology. Down the road in the other direction is a 2000 year old chalk engraved figure in a hillside called "The Cerne Giant". He's instantly recognisable by the large club he's wielding over his head and the large erection he's sporting. There is a local legend that barren couples could conceive if they made love on his engraved ding-dong on the night before May-Day. If you like history, folklore, mythology and a very tangible sense of being able to touch the past then England should definitely be on the bucket list.
Right,I'm off fer a cuppa tea. Cheers bruv! 🇬🇧👍
The composition of Great Britain can't change as that is a geographical area, but the UK could change if Scotland gains independence.
England didn't exist at the time of the Romans as that was name given later to the 'Land of the Anglisch (English) Speaking People" and English didn't exist as a language yet.
Aethelstan was the first king of all the English but later dynasties were not his descendants. The current Monarchy are descendants of the Electress Sophia of Hanover.
William I was a Norman who had invaded, which is why he replaced the Anglo-Saxon aristocracy with Normans.
The vote to leave the EU polarised the countries of the UK. Scotland & N.Ireland voted to stay - and Wales's vote to leave was swung by the number of English retirees who live there. That has left internal strains on the UK - if one union can be left, why not another?
IMHO it's only a matter of time, now - and I say that as someone born 'British', of English, Welsh & Irish roots who married a Scot. The break up of the UK will diminsh all of us - and further damage our influence and economies. It angers me that the nationality I was born with is likely to be taken from me, by ignorance and lies.
Also Anglo Saxon kings weren't in power through purely bloodlines, often they'd be voted in by the other nobility if the heir was considered incompetent or not worthy
@@wessexdruid7598 well that's not strictly true, it's due to the SNPs incompetence and blaming Westminster for their own mishandling of things, so they lie and push for a referendum, it failed once so they just keep trying to push again and again, I truly hope Scotland wakes up to the SNP and realise they're a nationalist part in name only, they're a globalist party who want to exchange England (a partner with shared history and culture) with the EU (a master who doesn't care about anyone).
I personally want English independence from the UK, we bear the brunt of everything and receive very little in return but everyone hates us for it, it's about time we let everyone else hold the bill
The Queen is not a descendant of Aethelstan but she is a descendant of Alfred the Great (source google)
@@Sahaib3005 Through Æthelflæd?
Tyler: Look up about William the Conqueror, who came over from France in 1066 and became the first King William.
The true Game Of Thrones was Brittan in the middle ages.
Like the Princes in the Tower, one day they were the hair and the spare, and the next day they were considered Bastards/ illegitimate. Not Royal blood.
The Norman claim was also Viking related. Vikings or Norsemen, settled in France and became the "Normans". American history, along with Canadian, Australian, New Zealand etc are actually just continuations of "British" history if you look at it that way. William replaced the English barons with this own men. And PS, this is very, very simple explanation of a much more complex history.
The Angevin Empire wasn't really England ruling bits of France, it was really a French dynasty that ruled both England and parts of France. It was common for the "English" kings of that time to actually spend most of their time in France.
Yeah the majority of Plantagenet kings wouldn't have identified as "English", at least not until King Henry IV who was the first to speak English as his first language.
Also there were the Burgundians who were French nobility who were on the English Crown's side for rulership of France, its believed by some that the concept of an army uniform came from the Burgundians who required all soldiers to wear a blue uniform and red X on their chest and backs (with their heraldry and badges displayed elsewhere), every man from Knight to simple man at arms had to adopt this dress within their army
Richard the Lionheart famously barely lived in England 😂 more happy to crusade and live in France.
@@jamesswindley9599 Also, remember his Queen, Berengaria, never even set foot in England.
@@jamesswindley9599 yeah he was literally an Occitan king. Wasn't even particularly Norman thanks to Eleanor.
Its is the worst video about our history - it is full of mistakes.
Hear. Hear.
It really is poor.
The bit where it says England took over Dublin, and shows south Wales. 😬
Worth noting, before anyone gets any funny ideas that France ever successfully conquered us, The Normans weren't French, they were essentially more refined and civilised Vikings (Norsemen) from Normandy (now modern France)
The term 'Vikings' refer to raiders. Danes Swedes Norwegians, etc went viking, ie 'raiding.
It only takes 14 hours (traffic dependent 😁) to drive from the top of the mainland to the bottom.
I think almost every UK museum you visit contains Roman artifacts.
Yeah. The Americas. The USA, Canada and Mexico are all the same place. Right? : )
Both continents of north and south America I think might be classified as the Americas
Small correction:
The English crown did not pass from Elizabeth I to James I&VI (two royal numbers to account for both England and Scotland) due to Elizabeth not having a male heir, she didn't have an heir, period.
Edit: Corrected spelling error
EliZabeth.
@@lizbignell7813 You're right, my bad. Corrected the comment
Thank you. As you can see it is my name too!
@@lizbignell7813 Yes, I can see ^^
Accidently used how her name is spelled in my native language (German), so I can assure you no disrespect was intended
The reference is to William the Conquerer, otherwise known as William the Bastard.
William was nominally French, but was actually of Viking inheritance. He was a Nordic.
Checkout The people profile channal, it has some good royal profiles, or David Starkey, you want William the conqueror, who build the castle to mark his domance of England, then his sons, William 2, known as William Rufus, then Hernry first, 20:12
The British Isles go back quite a way before the Romans. Julius Caesar landed near Hastings in 55 BC in Pegwell Bay, Thanet, not far from the International train station … built more than two thousand years later. There’s a big rock on the beach near Hastings where he was supposed to have landed - and where my and my friends ate fish and chips once all the while thinking that the rock was quite big but not big enough for Caesar to have stepped on it when he landed and used it to commemorate the event.
Stop watching US made videos on UK history. Often wrong and confusing!!
🎯🎯🎯
You probably know the name Tudor through architecture I think there are alot of mock Tudor style houses in the US
This 68 year old Londoner never knew Tudor derived from The War Of The Roses.
An important point to remember is that the vast majority of the population could not read or write. Only the nobles and the clergy got the education necessary to write books. It wasn't until 1870 that the Education Act became the very first piece of legislation to deal specifically with the provision of education in England and Wales.
You have a wonderful channel and it is great to see someone explore a place in which I call home all of my life home. I think I don't appreciate it as much as I should because I live here. Certainly this needs to change.