May 878
The shield wall at Ethandun
At dawn Alfred leads his army from Iley Oak to Ethandun. Asser writes that he fights fiercely against the whole Viking army with a dense shield wall and holds firm for a long time, until at last he gains the victory. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says only that he fights against the whole army and puts it to flight.
The first page of Asser’s Life of King Alfred, from a facsimile drawn in 1722 of the Cotton manuscript, which burned in 1731Wikimedia Commons, Asser, Public domain (Asser facsimile.png)
The ground is known only by tradition, which puts the fighting on the open down in front of Bratton Camp, the hillfort on the edge of the scarp. On that reading the Danes stand with the camp behind them and the West Saxons come up across Salisbury Plain from the south. Modern estimates put the Danes at about 4,000 men and the West Saxons, the levies of three shires, at 2,000 to 6,000.
Sources
- Asser, Life of King Alfred, chapter 56.
- Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, entry for 878.
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