Alfred's Military reforms Flashcards
(12 cards)
What problems did Alfred need to address with his own defensive system?
- Not many major fortified centres
- Those fortified centres which were in place were isolated
- Generally poor communications between forts
- Outdated/small navy
- 40 day for harvest - farmers need to be back home
What advantages did the Vikings have?
-Naval advantage - clinker boats (Shallow drafts) = speed and manoeuvrability
What sources did Alfred use as inspiration for his military reforms?
Many varying sources: eg.
- -Other rulers/kingdoms
- The bible (potentially inspired with the rotational system from the Old Testament King Solomon who used a rotational system for his workforce).
- His own experiences
All in all, Alfred was an open-minded and intelligent king
What did the rotational system involve?
- (ASC) “The king divided his army in two, so that always half its men were at home, half on service, apart from men who guarded the burhs” - meaning men would always be available to fight throughout the campaign season
What problems did the rotational system solve?
- Overcame the local bias of his forces - in that, during the 870s, his troops would be anxious to return home, making it more expedient for Alfred to ‘make peace’ with the Vikings, therefore, the rotational system got rid of this problem
- Allowing some men to stay at home and tend to the essential business of agriculture was important because Alfred would have no kingdom at all if the harvests could not be gathered as a result of the continual drain of manpower. - therefore allowed the economy to function
Rotational system also negated the main drawback from the fyrd system , being the time taken for men to assemble for ‘their turn’
What else did Alfred reform his military with aside from the rotational system?
(Chronicle entries for the early 890s) - Alfred also turned at least part of the fyrd into a mounted force.
- Evidence of where this being true and becoming crucial: (893) English army ‘intercepts’ a Viking force - suggesting their mobility
- The army then ‘overtakes’ a marauding band and begins to besiege these Vikings when they retreated to their fort
- (895) “English army rode after the enemy”
What was Alfred’s initial solution towards his naval weaknesses?
Destroying boats the Vikings had stored in their fortifications - however was only a temporary solution
What was the real naval reform which Alfred undertook?
Alfred embarked on a major shipbuilding effort
- (896) - ASC - “King Alfred had ‘long ships’ built to oppose the Danish warships.”
- Aside from the design, Alfred also took the ad hoc system of constructing ships and tied it to the common burdens already imposed on his landowners - meaning that he could rely upon marshalling a certain number of ships every year
What was the issue with Alfred’s navy even post-reform?
However many ships he could produce, it would never be enough to cover the entire coastline of his kingdom and the king and his advisors seem to have realised this. It seems likely that they used a type of watch and beacon system to warn of Viking attacks (ultimately though this needs to be viewed within the context of the other reforms that Alfred introduced - in that it gave other facets of his military more time to prepare).
What were the ‘common burdens’ that Alfred used?
The king would impose these on the kingdom as collective duties
- included bridgework and fortress work
- Alfred’s use of the burdens grew as the Viking threat grew
What did Alfred’s burghal system involve?
The burhs which were not made on surviving Roman walls still shared similar defensive features:
- ditch and earth bank - likely topped off with a timber wall, generally 3m high and 10m wide
- Alfred had ‘herepaths’ built (network of roads and trackways connecting the burhs together)
- All burhs were placed about ‘one day’s march’ away from eachother - appprox 32km - meaning burhs were mutrally supporting & less vulnerable
What was Alfred’s potential inspiration for his burghal system?
Offa’s Dyke in Mercia:
- an enormous fortified line of ditches and walls running for 150 miles across Mercia’s western frontier, constructed by the king Offa a century before to defend against the Welsh.
(Keynes) Frankish king Charles the Bald 860s:
- had similar fortified bridges built to fend off the Vikings (Alfred’s step-mother, had come from the West-Frankish court)
(Wormald) Overall though, very likely a system of Alfred’s own creation
