Theme 7: Irish Sea Worlds Flashcards
(74 cards)
What was ‘power’ in the Irish Sea World?
Power in this region relies less on bureaucratic institutions, like in Eng, but more so on interpersonal relations
Power was not tidily territorialised - we should think instead in terms of centres of authority and spheres of influence (authority over men, rather than land)
Power wielded by securing submission of rivals (threats of violence, physical force) and oaths securing obligations of a lesser man to a greater on. May also be wielded by extracting tribute payments (may be cattle, may be treasure, changes throughout period)
What are our main sources here?
Source materials intractable - due to way power was concentrated in this region (no records from bureaucratic rule)
Annals, especially Irish annals (written in Irish monastic communities) - e.g. Annals of Ulster, Annals of Inisfallen
^ annalistic record much lesser in Wales and Scotland (but Irish analysts sometimes comment on these regions)
^ the fact that Irish analysts comment on these places hints at the interconnectedness of the Irish sea world, information is able to circulate
Icelandic sagas - e.g. Orkneyinga saga, Njal’s saga
Archaeology, place name evidence - can help observe processes of cultural change and settlement
sculpture - can suggest presence of Vikings in particular area (but we should be cautious of this, as it may only show that the culture of Vikings has been adapted, rather than a large scale Viking settlement)
coins - can suggest structures of power
Viking activity in the Irish Sea c.795-c.850
- 795 attack on religious community in Iona (and again in 802 and 806 — eventually encourage the community to move to Kells).
- 824 After this date major Irish monastic sites on coast attacked and from 830s onwards raids on Ireland are growing in scale.
- 839 Vikings active in central Pictland. (probably some Viking activity here before this large attack)
- 840-1 Vikings establish a base at Dublin.
- Mid 9thC: named Viking leaders appearing in Irish records. (from this point they begin to extract tribute and establish dominance over local rulers) - continue to develop centres of power and bases for trade
- 853 Vikings attack Anglesey. (likely Vikings engaged in raiding Wales before this)
Geographic limitations to Viking activity
certain geographic limitations - e.g. in Ulster, power of native kings more robust, so less Viking activity here. The Vikings generally don’t penetrate deep into the land, instead concentrating power on the coasts. If faced with significant resistance in one place, they would move to another
^ due to their marine activity, they are very mobile
Dublin and York, c.853-c.954
- 840-1 Vikings establish a base at Dublin
- 853 Olaf, king of Dublin - Irish sources tell us he ruled together with Ivarr (Ivarr the Boneless? - Viking leader involved in capture of York)
- 866 Olaf of Dublin attacks kingdom of Picts
- 866 Vikings capture York
- 870 Olaf and Ívarr attack Dumbarton in kingdom of Strathclyde
- 870x3 Death of Ívarr the Boneless
- 902 Vikings expelled from Dublin (stimulus to settlement in Man, western Scotland, north-western England)
- 937 Battle of Brunanburh
- 954 End of the Viking kingdom of York
What does Clare Downham argue about Ivarr?
Argued that Ivarr and his descendants were central in this project of tying together significant political centres in the Irish sea world
The West Saxon Kings and ‘Britain’
920 - Edward the Elder attempts to assert some nominal form of overlordship over other British rulers
- 937 – King Athelstan: battle of Brunanburh - active campaigning in the north of Br (stimulus for other rulers in the periphery to unite against him, culminating in Brunanburh - Athelstan faced a coalition incl rulers of Scotland, Dublin and Strathclyde)
- 973 King Edgar on the River Dee at Chester: ‘… the king took his whole naval force to Chester, and six kings came to meet him, and all gave him pledges that they would be his allies on sea and land.’ (Anglo-Saxon Chronicle D-text). - Barrow seas this as a peace summit, a meeting of equals, but AS chroniclers embroidered it to make it seem like a submission.
- Edgar as ‘ruler of a British empire, tenth-century style’ (Janet Nelson) - thinks Edgar really is receiving submission of lesser rulers? … Or not? (Thornton and Barrow).
Nature of Viking activity in Ireland
Vikings are not conquerors in Ireland, they don’t take kingdoms, but carve out enclaves and become key players in Irish internal politics (e.g. Wrexford, Waterford, Cork, Dublin)
Political state of Ireland
In early medieval Ireland there is competition between different province kings - a strong stimulus of this competition is a desire of many of them to acquire authority over all Ireland (’high kingship’)
As Dublin grew in size and wealth, it became an increasingly attractive prize to Irish province kings. control of Dublin could lead to control over the entire island of Ireland
Brian Bóruma, king of Munster and high king of Ireland (1002-14). - fought a bloody battle at Glenmama in 999 to conquer Dublin
Set precedent that an aspiring high king had to claim Dublin
Brian faces ongoing resistance to his reign - culminating in major rebellion and Battle of Clontarf (1014) - he wins, but is killed on the field (pyrrhic victory)
Included men from Leinster, the earl of Orkney, Irish-Norse contingents from Dublin itself
^ clearly this is not a clear story of the Irish v the Vikings
Brian is fighting a coalition aiming to preserve status quo and the old world of power relationships (the men of Leinster did not want to be subject to a king from Munster, men of Orkney may have been aiming to preserve the trading matrix in which Dublin was central)
Power of Orcadian earls
Later 9thc - emergence of significant political power in the earldom of Orkney - earls able to project power down throughout Irish sea world
Expand power onto northern mainland of Scotland
During 10thc, power of these earls extends increasingly into the Irish sea
Important Orcadian earls
- Rognvald [King Harald Finehair of Norway]
- Sigurd I, the Mighty (d. 892); Thorstein the Red (d. c. 880x90)
- Sigurd II ‘the Stout’ (c.985-1014) - present at battle of Clontarf. His rule probably did not have much in terms of institutional scaffolding - managed by chiefs who had power at a local level. Sigurd’s own power probably took the form of securing the submission of these chiefs and the ability to mobilise them for war
- Thorfinn II ‘the Mighty’ (?1009-65) - enjoyed expansive geographic reach, power remained centred on Orkney. Power rests on contingent factors - had to fight to assert control over the earldom and had to fight subsequently within the regions of the Hebrides and the Scottish mainland to force local rulers back into submission. was his father’s heir but did not inherit much - had to secure power on his own volition. Succession was not secure, couldn’t count on the loyalty of his father’s followers.
The Normans as actors in the Irish sea world
At an early stage, the Normans become new actors in the politics of the Irish sea worlds
Normans and Norwegians in Wales: Hugh of Montgomery, Hugh d’Avranches and the Battle of Anglesey Sound (1098) - drive out the Welsh king - defeated not by the Welsh, but by King Magnus Barelegs of Norway - let the Welsh king back in
Normans in Ireland and the kingdom of Man: John de Courcy (d. 1219) and his marriage to Affreca, daughter of Godred Olafsson of Man. Man to act as a stepping stone for his endeavours in Ireland.
^ powerful Cambrian-Norman families begin to intervene in Irish politics
Geopolitical state of Scotland in c.800
- Kingdom of the Picts - control lands to the north of the Clyde, interior polity of the Pictish kingdom is difficult to reconstruct (much of what we know about them comes from external annals)
- Dál Riada (Gaelic) - south west of Pictland, originates from migration from Ireland
- Strathclyde (Brittonic) - as a Brittonic kingdom, it had a people whose linguistic and cultural connections were more naturally aligned to the peoples of Wales than to the peoples of Pictland and Dál Riada
- Northumbria - encompassed much of southern Scotland
‘core periphery model’ of Scottish development (core = developing kingdom of Alba)
^ revised versions - Brown, Taylor challenged that model
Summary of the early development of Alba
From c900, we find rulers who are beginning to style themselves as kings of alba. over the course of the 10thc, the kingdom acquires sharper definition. the heartlands if the kingdom lie to the south east
alba grows in fertile plains - lots of agricultural land
Summary of Strathclyde
- A ‘Brittonic’ kingdom. - closer culturally and linguistically to the Welsh
- Expanding in tenth-century, even as far as Penrith (modern Cumbria)? - in that expansionist phase, its rulers had likely enjoyed submissions from a range of different magnates (gallic, Norse and Northumbria magnates)
- A client state of Alba? Or more autonomous (fionna edmonds)?
- The end of the kingdom: between 1018 and 1054, most likely conquered by King Malcolm II, (1005-34).
- Battle of Carham (1018): King Malcolm II (with Owen, king of Strathclyde - suggests at least an alliance and perhaps a dependence of Strathclyde on alba) defeats the men of Northumbria (led by sons of Waltheof of Bamburgh).
no set of annals (typical of these periphery regions)
Summary of Moray and the Hebrides
moray eventually comes more firmly under the kings control over the course of the 12thc, esp. under reign of David I
moray remains culturally distinctive and unstable through the 10thc
12thc chroniclers refer to moray ss if they were a distinct group of people
e.g. Somerled (built up a substantial condominium in the west by contracting strategic alliances, incl his own marriage into the royal house of the isle of man)
by 1156, he was being styles in the Irish annals as king of the Hebrides and Kintyre
by 1160s, increasingly coming into contact w king of Scotland **
Mounts an invasion of Renfrewshire in 1164 with 160 (sense of scale of the invasion rather than an accurate number) ships.
Somerled killed in battle against the army of King Malcolm IV of Scotland - on his death, the polity he had built disintegrates, breaking back down into its constituent parts
no mechanism for him to transmit what he had created to a designated successor
transient power - people can build up empires by force
Sources of instability in Alba in the eleventh and twelfth centuries
- Political/military failure:
King Duncan (1034-40) invaded north-east England in 1040, but his failure to take Durham damages his credibility. Rebellion follows in Moray. Duncan is killed in battle. MacBeth (1040-57), a leading Moray magnate, succeeds.
- Contested successions:
Macbeth is succeeded by his son, Lulach, but he is defeated and killed by Malcolm, son of Duncan, who becomes Malcolm III (1058).
Stabilising factors for the kingdom of Alba in the eleventh and twelfth centuries
- A limited circle of the ‘throne-worthy’ - you needed a claim to royal blood to be a plausible candidate for the throne
- Movement towards primogeniture in royal succession - risked putting an incompetent on the throne
- The impartibility of the kingdom. - sense that there was a kingdom of alba that was not divisible - the kingdoms could be fought over but not broken apart
- The kingdom’s ‘adhesive’ properties (Alexander Grant) - rebellions within the kingdom happen, but they often tend to be battles for the crown, not to break the kingdom (when men of moray rise, they rise to put their man on the throne, not to break away from alba)
Rise of a Scottish ‘state’ in the twelfth century
Introducing sheriffs and sheriffdoms - they can guard the king’s interests, administer justice and supervise revenue
Innovations in law and Justice - notion that some legal pleas were specifically reserved for the crown was growing. growing sense that some offences were offences against the king’s peace
Raising up new men, new lordships (and feudal tenures)
Sponsoring Church reform and patronage of new orders:
- Glasgow displaces Govan as key ecclesiastical centre in Strathclyde - deliberate move on David’s part, creating a new religious centre associated with him
- New religious houses established (Cistercians at Melrose, Jedburgh; Augustinian canons at Holyrood; Tironensians at Selkirk) - creating religious centres loyal to him, but also behaving like a European prince
David I of Scotland’s achievements
David’s ‘Scoto-Northumbrian’ (stringer’s term) realm. - started with Cumbria, setting up a new capital in Carlisle, but also pushes into Northumbria and northern Yorkshire during Stephen’s reign
David’s authority extended in c. 1153 to Rivers Ribble/Tees according to the English chronicler William of Newburgh.
^ not to last, Henry II aggressively recovers everything he has lost and more
as a result, the Scottish kings begin to look north and west
Why does Scotland become stronger in 1266?
Treaty of Perth (1266): Magnus VI of Norway concedes the Hebrides and the Isle of Man to King Alexander III of Scotland.
How are the processes of state formation in Wales and Scotland comparable?
smaller polities squeezed into a firmly subordinate relationship with the king of Scotland
Gwynedd - another example of a kingdom dominating at the expense of other native kingdoms
Early Viking activity in Ireland examples
- 795: Viking raiders from Norway initiated attacks on Irish monasteries. The first recorded raid was at Rathlin Island (Rechru), a monastic hub off the northeast coast of Ireland.
- The attackers plundered monastic wealth, including gold and relics, and captured individuals for ransom or slavery.
- 802: Vikings burned the monastery at Iona (off Scotland). In 806, they killed 68 monks in a brutal attack, leading to the relocation of treasures and relics to Kells in County Meath.
- Early 9th century: Raids were exploratory and conducted by small bands. Key locations targeted included Skellig Michael, St. Patrick’s Island (Inis Pádraic), and Inishmurray.
Intensification of raids and inland expansion
- 836: Fleets of 60 Viking ships ravaged the Boyne and Liffey valleys. They attacked monastic settlements, fortresses, and agricultural lands.
- 839: Vikings launched a fleet on Lough Neagh, the largest lake in Ireland, using it as a base to raid northern Irish kingdoms and monasteries.
- 841: Vikings established permanent bases known as longphorts at Dublin and Linn Duachaill (Annagassan). These were fortified settlements that enabled year-round raiding and trade.
- 845: The Viking leader Turges was executed by Mael Sechnaill, King of Tara, signaling growing Irish resistance.
