Back in 2018 after a trip to Sicily my Condotta armies project began to go off the rails. The reason was simply that a visit to Palermo fired up my interest in the Normans rather than say the fabulous Baroque architecture of the city.
And then I picked up a copy of Early Medieval Italy by Chris Wickham (MacMillan Press) 1981 – ISBN 0 333 26672 2. I still have not read beyond page 60 yet not through lack of interest. It looks a great book (on flick through) for the period of Lombard domination of the Italian peninsula. And this period does not seem awash with books of this type.
It simply reminded me that before the Normans arrived in Italy and after the end of Belisarius the whole of Italy was subject to numerous invasions and fragmented rule. Great for wargames and as a backdrop to “imaginative wargaming”.
Within weeks my Condotta project had been abandoned and I was back in the “dark ages” or early medieval period. It was not long before I switched to Carolingian history with two books about Charlemagne.
Before that another chance bookshop visit resulted in two books I quickly read. The first “A Brief History of the Normans: How the Viking Tribe Came to Conquer Europe by Francois Neveux published by Robinson english edition 2008 ISBN-10 1845295234. The second was “The Lost King of England” by Gabriel Ronay published by Boydell Press ISBN 0 85115 785 8 (paperback 2000).
The book about the Normans is unusual I suspect – a french writer translated to english or should that be Anglish? The Anglish have written extensively about the Normans as they are a key part of the “british empire” mythmaking. After all, all Empires need to make a narrative, a back story and myth making is a key part of it. Professor Neveux comes from Caen so Normandy is his back yard, so to speak and he would have first hand slightly different source material and crucially secondary material/opinion differing in perspective. The book gets a “ok” score on “good reads” with lots adverse comments about poor proof reading. And yes there are plenty of typos. However the value of the book was its purpose to start sometime before the popular english view of the Normans as in “in 1066 the Normans appeared from nowhere and invaded England”. And of course except for a little damp eyed look at the Saxons of Alfred the English quickly move onto “Anglo-Normans” and their inevitable journey of conquest.
So I can see why this book was not that loved. It maybe reads far better in french? The point is that it made me think about that period prior to 1066 a bit more and tying into my recent discovery of Chris Wickhams book I was swirling around the 8th Century.
Gabriel Ronay’s book was a surprise – I had no idea Aethelings could travel so far. I liked the story of Edward the exile and along with it a view of a more joined up northern european world than many history books would have you believe.
A good read in my view although I am not so sure about some of the connections the author makes about the Aethelings themselves.
At least I was painting again – some strelets normans were on the paint table. I wrote about these in this blog back in December 2019. https://thewargamingerratic.home.blog/2019/12/17/basing-normans-in-the-south/
And then nothing. Zilch. I had quite a long gap where wargaming dark age history took a back seat. But boy did I read. Now reading about history is the thing for me. My wargames interests such as they are, are driven by what I am reading. If I am erratic on wargaming at least I am a consistent reader of mainly military history. The books come first not the games, figures or rules.
I read Peter Heather’s monumental Empires & Barabarians which caused me to reread his Decline of the Roman Empire in short order plus I read two crazy books (again from charity shops) plus some I bought at the Colours Show at Newbury.
The Newbury “buys” were Carolingian Cavalry published by Osprey & Vandals by Simon McDowell published by Pen & Sword.
From the Charity shop I bought Arthur & British Kings – the TRUTH! by Martin Russell published in 2016; plus St Albans – a pocket history book (published in the early 1920’s).
Martin was brave to include Arthur and TRUTH in his book title. It was on sale at Fishbourne Palace https://sussexpast.co.uk/ – a location which does convey a feeling of lived in Roman Britain to me.
Despite being written 100 years apart and under very different contexts, reading them together meant I could easily compare them. And the core story was there. So even though Martin was intent on giving us chapter and verse about an apparent medieval fiction he managed to provide the essential continuity story of what we would call today the south of england.
I suppose that would also be more the “west saxon” or wessex history as well. I actually enjoyed his book although it required a lot of concentration to retain the story line about Arthur he wanted to convey.
The 1920’s St Albans pocket history did what it said and in short order told the story of a great city with an ancient past. It was also an easy read and not too “empirish” in its style, given when it was published the British Empire was still the “force” across the globe.
Enjoying Simon McDowells “The Vandals” (published by Pen & Sword 2016 ISBN 978 1 47383 770 6) I descended back into the Later Roman period – another of my favorite reading subjects. “The Vandals” does a good job of explaining the journey of a much maligned tribal grouping. The authors passion for his subject shines through.
“Patricians & Emperors” by Ian Hughes (published by Pen & Sword 2015 ISBN 978 1 84884 412 4) shows an equal passion. He has been a prolific late roman period author. Ian’s writing style was harder for me although I admire his dedication to dig out effective mini biographies of the various shadow like players at the end of empire. This makes it an unusual book style unless I am mistaken?
I enjoyed both these books and they drew me into the period. It was not long before I was thinking about Visigoths and Merovingians though. I am digressing yet again!
The Peter Heather double header of “The Fall of the Roman Empire” and “Empires & Barbarians” (published by Maxmillan 2005 ISBN 0-333-98914-7 and 2009 ISBN 978-0-333-98975-3 respectively) are worth the read and with a combined page count of 1077 give you lots of background on the main story. It never ceases to amaze me that Apollinaris Sidonius still seemed to project an almost classsic roman world when the dark ages were apparently already well underway in places like the british isles.
These led me to the Penguin Classic of Gregory of Tours and his history of the Franks translated by Lewis Thorpe. I bought the 1974 paperback publication in a charity shop by chance again. I tend to browse randomly and just buy these older books on the hoof. It leads to my meandering across subjects, one of the pleasures of history I think.
Already a good read, I have yet to finish “Gregory” as my mind was turned yet again this time by a magazine article about “The battle of Vlaardingen” in Medieval Warfare VIII-3 published by Karwansaray B.V.. That sent me forward into Ottonian times. And before you know it another charity purchase brought me back to “Charlemagne – The Great Adventure” by Derek Wilson published by Hutchinson in 2005 ISBN 0-0917-9461-7. I enjoyed this book which at just over 200 pages sticks to the subject. Derek even ventures into the more modern usage and views of Charlemagnes Empire.
So back to Gregory then – nope – Another Pen & Sword publication took me sideways into the anglo-saxon world of Offa or should I say Mercian? This is the underated King of the Mercians – note not angles or saxons or english as that is reserved for the ever popular King Alfred. Chris Peers booklist is african and asian so this seems a one off by him. It shows I think in some of the content he chooses to dwell upon which reduces the books value. The fact that I have never read any book before on Offa means that he has done some good though in atttracting me to this subject. In fact my tortured view of the dark ages of these british islands is – the end of Roman rule, celts again, lots of squabbling anglo saxon visitors – british/welsh in retreat – sutton hoo – then the vikings and alfred (brief recovery), vikings, norse, danes visiting and staying again before the great fall after Hastings. Not much else. The Mercians seem mercurial.
“Offa and the Mercian Wars has got me thinking otherwise. And the net result is more dark age “anglish” history to consume before I get back to Italy and the Normans. Still it has sustained my painting of anglo saxons or maybe thats now mercians as well.
The Wargaming Erratic 