Alfred the Great : $b containing chapters on his life and times
History
Alfred the Great : $b containing chapters on his life and times
Alfred, King of England, 849-899; Great Britain -- History -- Alfred, 871-899
The East Franks, he tells us, were established east of the Rhine and
north of the source of the Danube. The Swabians were to the south and
beyond the Danube, while the Bavarians were farther east round the
town of Ratisbon, both peoples occupying the country up to the foot
of the Alps. East of the Bavarians was Bohemia, and to the north-east
was Thuringia. Turning to the north of Germany the king places the old
Saxons round the mouth of the Elbe, and the Frisians farther west. North
of the Elbe were the Angles, who nearly all came to people England, and
the Danes on the mainland and in the island of Zeeland. King Alfred then
gives some details respecting the Slavonic tribes in the eastern part of
Germany. The Afdrede were established in what is now Mecklenburg, and
the Wylte in that part of the mark of Brandenburg then called Hæfeldan.
The Sysyle were in a part of Eastern Prussia then known as Wineda-land.
Eastward from the countries of the Bohemians and Bavarians were the
Moravians; and to the south, beyond the Danube again, and extending to
the Alps, was Carinthia. A desert, by which the Karst may be intended,
extended between Carinthia and the land of the Bulgarians, beyond which
was the Byzantine empire. To the east of Moravia was Wisl-land, the
region watered by the Vistula, Dalamensan, Horithi, and Surpe. These
Slavonic peoples occupied Poland, and to the north-east was Sermende, the
modern Livonia.
Having given the relative positions of the peoples inhabiting central
Europe, King Alfred turns to the north, and takes us to the countries
bordering on the British sea and the Baltic, or Ost-sæ as he calls
it. The north Danes were then in the provinces of Halland and Scania,
now part of Sweden, as well as in the islands. To the eastward were
the Afdrede already mentioned as occupying Mecklenburg, the Burgendas
apparently on the island of Bornholm, and Osti or Easterlings, a Finnish
race, inhabited Esthonia. On the Scandinavian peninsula were the Sweon
or Swedes, the Northmen, and the Scride-Finnas or “striding Finns.” Far
to the north, between the Gulf of Bothnia and the Arctic Sea, including
Finmarken, was the waste country called Cwenland.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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