Alex's Historical Fiction

The Last Kingdom

Still reading Bernard Cornwell's 9th century book. Looks like he'll be including Aethelflead of Mercia at some point. I reckon there'll be three books - Aethelflead's just been born in this one. I'm over half way through, and the narrator, Uhtred, is still only 15. Uhtred is making a big thing of Aethelflead's birth so ...

As usual, the West Saxons are fighting hard for the land. They seemed to have had a hard time gaining it (in the 5th-6th centuries), so I guess they'd put up a fight when someone tries to take it from them! Funny enough, the Late Romans always complained about the Saxons more than any other of the Germanics.

When I was at Comprehensive (senior) school, we had school 'houses' Each child was assigned a 'house' and could get 'house' points to contribute to the competition for one of the 'houses' to get a cup at the end of the school year - exactly like Harry Potter's school houses. Our houses were: Northumbria (blue) Mercia (yellow) Anglia (green) and Wessex (red) Guess which house I was in: Wessex! The main competition was nearly always between Wessex and Northumbria, with Mercia occasionally butting in, and Anglia trailing beind. Which, in a way, reflects what went on in Anglo-Saxon England :-)

There were also school houses in Junior School, and they were: Winston, Leonard, Spencer, Churchill (so I have no trouble in remembering Winston Churchill's full name!) I was in Churchill (yellow) Don't know if they still do school houses these days.

posted by Alex Bordessa @ Monday, July 04, 2005