The Birth of the Anglo-Saxons by Max Adams

The Birth of the Anglo-Saxons by Max Adams

A brilliant, profound, and authoritative history of the golden age of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom in Britain.

For too long, the eighth century has been a neglected era in British history: a shadow land between the death of Saint Bede and the triumphs of King Ælfred and the eventual unification of England.

But before the victories of King Ælfred against the Viking invaders, the kingdom of Mercia--spread across a broad swathe of central England--was the reigning power that exercised central political authority for the first time since the Roman Empire. This authority was used to construct trading networks and markets; to develop strong economic, cultural, and political links with the Continent; and to lay the foundations for a system of defense that would be invigorated and reinvented by Ælfred at the end of the ninth century.

Two kings, Æthelbald (716-757) and Offa (757-796), dominated the political landscape of the rising power of Mercia. During their reigns, monasteries became powerhouses of royal patronage, economic enterprise, and trade. Offa constructed his grandiose dyke along the borders of the warlike Welsh Kingdoms and, more subtly, spread his message of political superiority through coinage bearing his image. But Æthelbald and Offa between them built something with an even more substantial legacy--a geography of medieval England. And these two kings engineered a set of tensions between kingship, landholding, and the church that were to play out dramatically at the dawn of the Viking Age.

In this illuminating history of Early Medieval Britain, Max Adams reconnects the worlds of the three kings--Æthelbald, Offa, and Ælfred--in an absorbing study of the landscape, society, and politics of a fascinating century of change.

Max Adams is an author and award winning screenwriter. She has written professionally for Columbia Pictures, Hollywood Pictures, Touchstone Pictures, Universal Pictures, Walt Disney Studios, and Tri-Star Pictures. She has lectured and taught at University of Southern California, Squaw Valley Community of Writers, Film Arts Foundation, New York Film Academy, Gotham Writers, University of Utah, and the Academy of Motion Pictures, Arts and Sciences. She is a former Writers Guild of America online screenwriting mentor, is the founder of two international online screenwriting workshops, The Left Door and 5150, is the author of The New Screenwriter's Survival Guide; Or, Guerrilla Meeting Tactics and Other Acts of War, is a University of Utah associate professor and is the founder of the The Academy of Film Writing. Her produced feature film projects include Excess Baggage, The Ladykillers, and One For the Money.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9781639368310
ISBN 10	1639368310
Title	The Birth of the Anglo-Saxons
Author	Max Adams
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Hardback
Publisher	Pegasus Books
Year published	2025-04-01
Number of pages	464
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.