Miles' Blog: Textbook Notes (p.4-14)

Britain was conquered by many civilizations. First the Celts who were overpowered by the technologically advanced Romans who remained the rulers of the land for over 300 years
Britain was then conquered by the Anglo-Saxons from Germany
The Romans adopted Christianity as the religion of their civilization
A long time after the Romans, the Danes from the east made their way through England and conquered the northern, eastern, and central regions of England
The Normans also squeezed themselves in England and when King Edward died, William of Normandy took the throne
Britain took on a feudal society :
The plantagenets ended up taking over the rule of England and kept feudalism as the structure of the government
as time went on, the lower classes began to revolt and gain some respect and at least money for the jobs they were doing

Anglo-Saxon literature was mainly poetry
A popular example would be Beowulf but the author is unknown due to poor record keeping
Many different works were produced from the Anglo-Saxons in mainly Latin and some in Old English
Geoffrey Chaucer was a great poet from the Medieval Ages, he produced works that portrayed the life and times of the Middle Ages, knights doing good deeds, and romance
Many plays were made after stories from the bible
Johann Gutenburg created a printing press through typing which sparked new literary works
Chaucer was just below and aristocrat in terms of social class which gave him a great viewpoint for his poetry
Chaucer changed the game of literature for the Middle Ages
He wrote about things that were compassionate and included humor in his work
A great Celtic Hero named King Arthur was highly written about in Medieval Times as a heroic and courageous icon
Historians aren't completely sure if King Arthur ever existed and some think he was just a fictional character like Spider-Man or Huckleberry Finn
Tales of King Arthur spread all throughout Europe, changing the image of him
the ballad was another popular expression of love or admiration
A famous ballad is of Robin Hood, a bandit-like character that robbed the rich to help the poor

around 449 B.C., the Celts, Danes, Angles, Normans, and Romans all occupied around the same area in Britain began mixing their languages together in a Frankenstein-like creation called "Englisc"
After about 100 years, the Normans took over more of England and introduced more French influences on the growing language

Britain's Anglo-Saxon's period had lots of entertainment in the forms of plays or storytellings
many stories came about from legends or tall tales told down from generation to generation like the Native Americans
In the Anglo-Saxon society, women had few rights, and men were the more dominant gender

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