Just telling you what I am doing...a seriously uninformative announcement

After Wulfhere, Aethelred and Aethelbald laid the foundations, a prince from the Hwicce, Offa, took Mercia to its greatest achievements.

Pretty much a century in just one, fun-filled episode - 650 ish to 750 is. It's Mercia's turn - an increasingly integrated Mercia, growing in power. With yer Wulfhere's and Æthelbalds, Mercia's hegemony was held back only by Ine of ...

Towns had simply disappeared along with the post Roman economy by 500. But slowly by 600 there's tiny shoots of recovery discernible - so we talk about towns. And we have a hack at something a little tiny bit more literary, and talk of Continental...

From pagan war leaders to Christian kings

Through much of the 7th Century, Penda increased the power and influence of the Mercians. He built his kingdom as a traditional warrior, tribal leader - defeating the Northumbrians, and East Anglians, raiding and gathering treasure, rewarding his follo...

7th Century England was inherently unstable, populated by a patchwork of communities, petty kingdoms successful and less so. Into this pagan mix also comes the lure of Christianity again. Meanwhile, in central England a pagan warrior called Penda becam...

It's difficult to know how much to believe of the stories relayed in the Anglo Saxon Chronicle about the formation of the early kingdoms - do they simply reflect the history they wished they'd had? Plus, was Arthur a legend or reality?

What kind of society had arrived in Roman Britain? How how did societies and communities form and become the kingdoms before the days of the Heptarchy.

The traditional story of the arrival of the Anglo Saxons is one of death and destruction, and the catastrophic and complete replacement of a British population by a new Germanic race within a generation. But there are other theories too - much more pea...