Question:
We're Anglo-Saxon english or german?
anonymous
1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
We're Anglo-Saxon english or german?
54 answers:
peevee
2016-02-16 15:31:30 UTC
Angles and Saxons were people who had migrated to Britain(an area then occupied by Celts) from the Germanic region of Saxony and Jutland. Britain was a province of the Roman Empire. The pulling out of Roman troops from Britain made the migration of the Angles and Celts smooth and soon most parts England came to be settled by the new migrants. The very name England and English are derived from the term 'Angles'. The Anglo Saxons were thus people of Germanic origin, who got their identity as 'English' after settling in Britain.
?
2016-02-16 09:30:59 UTC
I understand that modern archaeology and scholarship no longer believe that there was a real 'conquest' and that The Venerable Bede may have been stringing us along on that one. Certainly there was an influx of peoples from Jutland and Saxony but no evidence has been found of massive military engagements and skeletal remains have, in some cases, pointed to the native Celts being masters and those with Saxon DNA as slaves. There is also the point that the Celts, whom Julius ("would you buy a used chariot from this man?") Caesar attempted to expunge from history to get his hands on their gold, were an accommodating sort of people, a culture rather than a race, and assimilated easily with incomers. So the English background is Celtic-Jutish-Saxon-Viking-bit of French (the Normans were after all Viking stock) and various other odds and sods. But the mix was probably very successful. English. That's what we are.
Tim D
2016-02-15 15:34:06 UTC
The article is confused. The inhabitants of post-Roman Britain were Britons (many of whom had fully adopted Roman culture), the English did not exist at this point.



Superficially the Saxons and Angles are sometimes characterised as arriving en masse in an organised migration, but that is incorrect, the early invaders were often small groups of adventurers taking a chance on overthrowing the Romano-British aristocratic remnant and taking their place, with the remaining British peasantry accepting new overlords. Gradually these invaders forged a kingdom for themselves, which is why there were several Saxon and Anglian kingdoms, and one Jutish kingdom, Kent.



Over centuries these kingdoms changed in size and dominance, at times Kent, Northumbria, Mercia and Wessex were predominant eventually Wessex gained such a strong position that it ruled the area which is now known as England – until the Danes arrived.
Jon
2016-02-15 14:14:23 UTC
The Saxonen and the Angliche (Saxons and Angles) were both Germanic tribes from areas which are now parts of north Germany and Denmark. Following the weakening of the Roman Empire's authority in Britain, members of the two tribes jointly migrated en masse to south-eastern Britain and successfully seized control of a large part of it from the Romano-Celtic inhabitants.



These conquerors became the main ancestors of the modern English. The name 'English' is derived from 'Angliche', and the names of several counties of southern and eastern England reflect the presence of Saxons 1500 years ago. 'Norfolk' and 'Suffolk' were the newly established territories of the Anglo-Saxon 'Nord Volk and 'Sud Volk' ('northern people' and 'southern people'), while the East Saxons, Middle Saxons and South Saxons gave their names to Essex, the old Middlesex and Sussex.
anonymous
2016-02-15 10:59:39 UTC
Maybe you need to learn some critical-thinking skills. There are better ways to determine whether an article about history was wrong than to ask random illiterate morons on Yahoo.



Who wrote that article? Was it a professional historian, or some random dweeb?



What sources did the article cite? Are they reliable sources?



Please learn how to use your own brain.
keith
2016-02-15 10:56:20 UTC
Loads of books on this
Shahbaz Ahmad
2016-02-16 21:40:27 UTC
In the history of Great Britain, Anglo-Saxon England refers to the historical land roughly corresponding to present-day England, as it existed from the 5th to the 11th century, but not including Devon and Cornwall until the 9th century.



The Anglo-Saxons were the members of Germanic-speaking groups who migrated to the southern half of the island from continental Europe, and their cultural descendants. Anglo-Saxon history thus begins during the period of Sub-Roman Britain following the end of Roman control, and traces the establishment of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms in the 5th and 6th centuries (conventionally identified as seven main kingdoms: Northumbria, Mercia, East Anglia, Essex, Kent, Sussex, and Wessex), their Christianisation during the 7th century, the threat of Viking invasions and Danish settlers, the gradual unification of England under Wessex hegemony during the 9th and 10th centuries, and ending with the Norman conquest of England by William the Conqueror in 1066. Anglo-Saxon identity survived beyond the Norman Conquest,[1] and came to be known as Englishry under Norman rule and ultimately developed into the modern English people.

--------------------

Isn't Wikipedia wonderful?



Best to say, in very broad terms, "Germanic" in that the separate territories occupied by the Angles and the Saxons (and the Jutes, etc) before they started to invade England bear very little resemblance to the borders of Germany today.



And remember that Germany became a unified country only in 1871, and since 1918 it has had three substantial changes of boundary. In the Middle Ages much of the Germanic lands (within various borders at various times) formed the heart of the "Holy Roman Empire", with no connection to the pope in Rome, and often in dispute or actual conflict with the Pope.



The more you look ay European history, the more you will see that peoples have moved from place to place in the last 2,000 years and more. There are few countries in Europe with borders more than 120 years old. Since 1990 17 new countries have been created in Europe or on its edges.



Even the USA did not fully sort out its border with Canada until 1903 (Alaska Panhandle).



The problem you are having is that you are thinking of the Anglo-Saxons as one people.



That was not the case, not only did Angles, Saxons and Jutes have different languages and customs, even within the groups there were cultural differences, the Saxons of Wessex, for example, were not the same as the Saxons of Essex, and certainly not the same as the Angles of Mercia or Jutes of Kent, there were some basic similarities but also evident differences.



England as a vague national description could not be usefully applied until centuries after their arrivals, and almost immediately separated again.



Try F M Stenton's Anglo-Saxon England.



The Angles, Saxons and Jutes came from Germany, Denmark, and Norway. They migrated to Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries AD after the Romans had left. They didn't invade or conquer England, they simply emigrated in family or tribal groups and quietly settled in the country eventually becoming the dominant ethnic group,
Steve S
2016-02-16 12:06:00 UTC
The Answer is "Yes"



The tribes moved form northen Europe to England ... but this was from 300 to 600 ADish ... there was no "German" or "English" at the time just tribes with common languages. Both English and German derive from these trbal languages ... so the answer is "Yes, both or neither"
Robin
2016-02-15 13:06:27 UTC
german
Salty dog
2016-02-18 02:58:33 UTC
They were neither. They were like some contributors have already pointed out tribes form Jutland then called Anglii and from Saxony. Anglii is what we today call Denmark and Saxony today is a province in the German Federation.



However the boarders of today's Denmark or Germany can't be used as a reference as to where the Anglo-Saxon tribes came from, because there habitat stretched into what we today call Jutland,Northern Germany and Dutch Friesland.



Viking tribes also inhibited the some area, Normans were Viking tribes that had habituate Lower Brittany( France) the local tribes called them Norsemen. It would be the Norseman of Lower Brittany that would invaded Greater Brittany in 1066.



Today Viking DNA is the most prominent DNA of the Basques of Northern Spain, Iceland and the Faeroe islands are nearly all 100% Viking DNA.



The word England is Norse and means Eng = pasture and Land = land therefore the word England: meaning Pasture-Land. English must be a slang word of someone like me who was born in the Pasture-lands of Greater Brittany.



Cnut the Great one of the Viking kings to rule over Eng-land.
Efnissien
2016-02-18 07:02:11 UTC
The term 'Anglo-Saxon' is misleading. In the years preceding the fall of the Roman province of Britannia in 410AD, there had been a steady influx of immigrants from across the North sea. Among these groups were the Angles (from what's now modern Denmark), Saxons (From the German coast) and Jutes (also now located in modern Denmark). The Vikings didn't enter the country until the 7th century. However, the vast majority of the population were still essentially local 'Romano British' who adopted new customs and traditions in the same way their 'Celtic' ancestors had done when the Romans took over. Essentially it was a 'change of management', a bit like a Labour government being elected after a Conservative government - the policies change, but the citizens remain the same people as before.
?
2016-02-20 03:01:07 UTC
English
Martin
2016-02-16 00:01:48 UTC
English
chris
2016-02-15 19:49:01 UTC
English
Megan
2016-02-16 03:11:43 UTC
English
Ted
2016-02-15 22:38:12 UTC
English
?
2016-02-19 08:13:06 UTC
Angles were a Germanic tribe, Saxons were a Germanic tribe they invaded England in the 5 and 6 centuries became the dominant power. Anglo-Saxon reflects that heritage but in present usage it means English.

The people they displaced were called Brythons most of whom fled to Wales and Brittany(France).

The Gaels , celtic tribes, took up residence in Scotland and Ireland.
Kamila
2016-02-17 00:45:12 UTC
English
ahasan
2016-02-16 07:08:48 UTC
English.
Lexy
2016-02-17 08:59:42 UTC
English
Laurence
2016-02-16 15:45:56 UTC
Low German (low because they came, in the 5th and 6th centuries AD, from the lowlands by the shores of Friesland in North Holland, Jutland (in southern Denmark) and from Angeln and Schleswig-Holstein on the North Sea and from the Baltic coasts of the what was then the Saxon province of Germany. The Jutes (from Jutland) settled in Kent, the Isle of Wight and a small area of south-eastern Hampshire. The Saxons (from Saxony) settled in Essex, Sussex, Middlesex, Surrey and Wessex (the rest of Hampshire, Dorset, Somerset, Devon, Gloucestershire, Wiltshire, Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire. The Angles (from Angeln and Friesland) settled in the rest of what became England, and in S.E. Scotland. The Britons of Wessex fled into Devon, or across the sea to Brittany. The rest of the Britons fled into Wales, Cumbria and SW Scotland, although some remained as slaves in the areas conquered. by the so-called Anglo-Saxons (Angles, Saxons and Jutes). just how many Britons aka Celts aka Welsh remained in the conquered areas is a subject of on-going dispute, but DNA research and the actual physical types among the modern population suggests that the Low German invaders formed an overwhelming majority in at least Norfolk and Suffolk (perhaps because the upper classes had more children who, being better fed, survived in larger numbers). In the 9th and 10th centuries a large number of Viking raiders from northern Denmark settled in much of the Angles' territory in what became known as the Danelaw. .
Amelia
2016-02-16 02:47:56 UTC
England was taken over by the Saxons , Angles and Jutes (The Anglo-Saxons) they were Germanic tribes. They are our ancestors along with Celts , Romans and Vikings etc.
plwimsett
2016-02-17 02:53:26 UTC
It depends on whether you re talking about Anglo-Saxons who live in England (or the smaller countries that would become England), or Anglo-Saxons who live in what is now Germany (most of the Angles came from Denmark).
?
2016-02-16 12:09:17 UTC
I understand that modern archaeology and scholarship no longer believe that there was a real 'conquest' and that The Venerable Bede may have been stringing us along on that one. Certainly there was an influx of peoples from Jutland and Saxony but no evidence has been found of massive military engagements and skeletal remains have, in some cases, pointed to the native Celts being masters and those with Saxon DNA as slaves. There is also the point that the Celts, whom Julius ("would you buy a used chariot from this man?") Caesar attempted to expunge from history to get his
Kevin7
2016-02-15 21:19:17 UTC
The Angles,Jutes and Saxons were Germanic tribes that intermarried with Romans ,Celts and other groups in what is now England ,they eventually became some of the ancestors of the English
Prussian
2016-02-17 05:07:34 UTC
English though they relate to Saxon Germans
anonymous
2016-02-17 03:01:34 UTC
Not so simple as your question suggests. After the Romans departed, various waves of people invaded the British Isles, but few of them covered even the whole of what is now "England".



Indeed Angles (from what is now southern Denmark) and Saxons (from what is now eastern parts of Germany) and Jutes (from northern parts of Denmark) etc, etc (including Vikings later - from what is now Norway) at various times held sway over parts of England, and certainly the Germanic language of the Saxons has swayed into much of our everyday speech in modern English. But we have words from Latin and French, via the Normans and later, and from Norse via the Vikings. Note that I have said "what is now Denmark" etc. Countries and borders have changed hugely in the last 1500 years, even in the last 120 years the map of Europe has changed vastly - for instance, Germany only became a unified country in 1871, and has undergone 3 substantial changes of border since then.



Later still English has gained words from all around the world - curry; tattoo; taboo; algebra; alcohol; algorithm; etc, etc, etc! Ours is probably the most mongrel language on Earth. The English which you or I can easily understand has only been around for 200 or 300 years - ever had difficulty with parts of Shakespeare? He wrote just over 400 years ago.
James Crawley Maximus Meridius
2016-02-15 11:18:06 UTC
The Anglo Saxons were two Germanic tribes who merged together they were neither English or German there is still regions called Saxony and Angeln in Germany were the Angels and Saxons came from in one of the King Arthur books Enemy of God the Saxons were known as the English and the Britons were known as the Welsh.
?
2016-02-15 13:39:07 UTC
Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Friesians together migrated to and conquered Britain up to the Forth/Clyde valleys out to what is now the Welsh Border.

Various kingdoms formed with the original Romano-Celtic population staying in place.

The Germanic conquerors set the tone and language and the various Germanic dialects fused to become Early English and the people began to see themselves as racialy English.
Doug Freyburger
2016-02-19 19:36:59 UTC
Yes. Please go on.



Whether we're American, English or Saxon depends on the era of history you are reading about. But not German in that sense. Germany united far later.
anonymous
2016-02-17 01:00:29 UTC
You are English from the Germanic tribes from Denmark, northern Germany and the Netherlands. The Saxons, Angles, Jutes came to Britain and conquered the people there and intermingled with them.
?
2016-02-16 08:49:00 UTC
There was no Germany at the time of the three main immigrations of Angles, Saxons, and Jutes. And the Celts & Picts from Ireland and Scotland came from a different area of the continent than the Angles, Saxons or the Jutes.
anonymous
2016-02-15 12:16:17 UTC
Technically Germanic they came from near the Danish peninsula the tribes you also had others like the Jutes and the frisians but they came to England and blended through time to become Anglo Saxons
John
2016-02-16 12:39:08 UTC
Google "Saxony" and "Saxons". Medieval 'Saxons" lived mainly north of the modern

Netherlands which IS the Rhine River Delta ( >nether< meaning "lower" or downstream on

the river). They lived north of NORMANDY; settled by "Norsemen" / Normans south of

the Dutch; also "deutsch" and extended north through mainland Denmark. The Saxons

waged war against "Angles" and "Franks" among others and when they eventually defeated

"Angle" rulers in Britain BOTH factions intermarried becoming Anglo-Saxons.

, ,

SAXONY was an area in Eastern Central Germany BEFORE the various "Duckies" etc

unified to become Germany. The TWO things were geographically separate but possibly,

like the "Normans" developed After the Vikings (NORSE men) "settled down" as merchants

across Europe.
anonymous
2016-02-17 02:32:08 UTC
The anglo saxons came from France. The Anglo Saxons invaded southern britain. They recalled it England. Then the Celtic Normans came along and conquered England. They never bothered to change the name of England
?
2016-02-16 07:23:22 UTC
When Saxons got to England they constantly fought in warfare with Celtic tribes. Some of them raped the women and children. And some of them mixed with celtics. Today I would say that 90% of British people carry the Saxon and Celtic DNA all together because of Saxons invasion during roman empire.
thegreatone
2016-02-16 20:40:32 UTC
The Angles were German. The Saxons were German. That makes the English German.
John
2016-02-18 17:17:37 UTC
The Angles came from a small angle of land that juts out of the west side of Denmark close to Germany. The Saxons are from Saxony in Germany.
samir
2016-02-15 22:01:23 UTC
he Anglo Saxons lived in Northern Ireland
poornakumar b
2016-02-17 10:23:27 UTC
The fact that you wrote this in English is enough proof that you're not a German [what a trivial question].
?
2016-02-15 11:11:10 UTC
German. There is still a region in Germany called Saxony, the area of Europe where the Saxons originally came from.
ethan
2016-02-16 09:10:29 UTC
Engliwh
felix
2016-02-15 12:29:08 UTC
The Saxons came from the Netherlands and Angles came from Denmark.
?
2016-02-16 13:18:56 UTC
english
anonymous
2016-02-15 11:14:18 UTC
I think the Saxons were in England before the Celts/Slavs split up in Hungary and headed west. Before the last Ice age there was a land bridge with the continent and the Saxons arrived then.
anonymous
2016-02-16 06:23:30 UTC
If for "we" do you mean english people you are a mix between Celtic ,roman and a bit slavic people .
anonymous
2016-02-17 17:33:27 UTC
British islander
Soikot
2016-02-17 03:46:21 UTC
I think German.
London Man
2016-02-17 13:46:03 UTC
Now Englandistan
?
2016-02-15 10:58:13 UTC
The Anglo Saxons lived in Northern Ireland and then migrated to the United States in the 1800s, yes, your facts are wrong
anonymous
2016-02-17 18:46:04 UTC
They/we are Hybrids.
?
2016-02-19 07:52:24 UTC
none
?
2016-02-17 12:14:06 UTC
****** germ
Catie
2016-02-16 08:19:02 UTC
Idk


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