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Saxon Biography & Facts

The Saxons were a group of Germanic peoples whose name was given in the early Middle Ages to a large country (Old Saxony, Latin: Saxonia) near the North Sea coast of northern Germania, in what is now Germany. In the late Roman Empire, the name was used to refer to Germanic coastal raiders, and in a similar sense to the later "Viking" (pirate or raider). Their origins are believed to be in or near the German North Sea coast where they appear later, in Carolingian times. In Merovingian times, continental Saxons had been associated with the activity and settlements on the coast of what later became Normandy. Their precise origins are uncertain, and they are sometimes described as fighting inland, coming into conflict with the Franks and Thuringians. There is possibly a single classical reference to a smaller homeland of an early Saxon tribe, but its interpretation is disputed. According to this proposal, the Saxons' earliest area of settlement is believed to have been Northern Albingia. This general area is close to the probable homeland of the Angles. During the eighth and ninth centuries the Saxons of Old Saxony were in continual conflict with the Franks, whose kingdom at the time was ruled by the Carolingian dynasty. After thirty three years of conquest due to military campaigns led by the lord king and emperor Charlemagne beginning in 772 and ending around 804, the Franks defeated the Saxons, forced them to convert to Christianity and seized the territory of Old Saxony, annexing it into the Carolingian domain, although the Franks had been enemies of the Saxons in the time of Clovis I, during the early Merovingian period of the fifth and sixth centuries. Charles Martel, Duke and prince of the Franks and Mayor of the Palace of Austrasia, the grandfather of Charlemagne, had fought and led numerous campaigns against the Saxons. In contrast, the English Saxons, today referred to in English as Anglo-Saxons, became a single nation bringing together migrant Germanic peoples (Frisians, Jutes, Angles [whence "English"]) and assimilated Celtic Britons populations. Their earliest weapons and clothing south of the Thames were based on late Roman military fashions, but later immigrants north of the Thames showed a stronger North German influence. The term "Anglo-Saxon", combining the names of the Angles and the Saxons, came into use by the eighth century (for example Paul the Deacon) to distinguish the Germanic inhabitants of Britain from continental Saxons (referred to in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as Ealdseaxe, 'old Saxons'), but both the Saxons of Britain and those of Old Saxony (Northern Germany) continued to be referred to as 'Saxons' in an indiscriminate manner, especially in the languages of Britain and Ireland. Although the English Saxons were no longer raiders, the political history of the continental Saxons is unclear until the time of the conflict between their semi-legendary hero Widukind and the Frankish emperor Charlemagne. The continental Saxons are no longer a distinctive ethnic group or country but their name lives on in the names of several regions and states of Germany, including Lower Saxony (which includes central parts of the original Saxon homeland known as Old Saxony), Saxony in Upper Saxony, as well as Saxony-Anhalt (which includes Old, Lower and Upper Saxon regions). Etymology The name of the Saxons may derive from a kind of knife associated with the ethnos; such a knife has the name seax in Old English, Sax in German, sachs in Old High German, and sax in Old Norse. The seax has had a lasting symbolic impact in the English counties of Essex and Middlesex, both of which feature three seaxes in their ceremonial emblem. The names of these counties, along with the names "Sussex" and "Wessex", contain a remnant of the root of the word "Saxon". The Elizabethan-era play Edmund Ironside suggests that the name "Saxon" derives from the Latin saxa (stones; singular form: saxum): Their names discover what their natures are, More hard than stones, and yet not stones indeed. Saxon as a demonym Celtic languages In the Celtic languages, the words designating English nationality derive from the Latin word Saxones. The most prominent example, a loanword in English from Scottish Gaelic (older spelling: Sasunnach), is the word Sassenach, used by Scots-, Scottish English- and Gaelic-speakers in the 21st century as a racially pejorative term for an English person and, traditionally, to the English-speaking lowlanders of Scotland. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) gives 1771 as the date of the earliest written use of the word in English. The Gaelic name for England is Sasann (older spelling: Sasunn, genitive: Sasainn), and Sasannach (formed with a common adjective suffix -ach) means "English" in reference to people and things, though not when naming the English language, which is Béarla. Sasanach, the Irish word for an Englishman (with Sasana meaning England), has the same derivation, as do the words used in Welsh to describe the English people (Saeson, singular Sais) and the language and things English in general: Saesneg and Seisnig. Cornish terms the English Sawsnek, from the same derivation. In the 16th century Cornish-speakers used the phrase Meea navidna cowza sawzneck to feign ignorance of the English language. The Cornish words for the English people and England are Sowsnek and Pow Sows ('Land [Pays] of Saxons'). Similarly Breton, spoken in north-western France, has saoz(on) ('English'), saozneg ('the English language'), and Bro-saoz for 'England'. Romance languages The label "Saxons" (in Romanian: Sași) also became attached to German settlers who settled during the 12th century in southeastern Transylvania. From Transylvania, some of these Saxons migrated to neighbouring Moldavia, as the name of the town Sascut, in present-day Romania, shows. Non-Indo-European languages The Finns and Estonians have changed their usage of the root Saxon over the centuries to apply now to the whole country of Germany (Saksa and Saksamaa respectively) and the Germans (saksalaiset and sakslased, respectively). The Finnish word sakset (scissors) reflects the name of the old Saxon single-edged sword – seax – from which the name "Saxon" supposedly derives. In Estonian, saks means colloquially, "a wealthy person". As a result of Northern Crusades, Estonia's upper class comprised mostly Baltic Germans, persons of supposedly Saxon origin until well into the 20th century. Related personal names The word survives as the surnames of Saß / Sass (in Low German or Low Saxon), Sachse and Sachs. The Dutch female given name, Saskia, originally meant 'a Saxon woman' (metathesis of Saxia). Saxony as a toponym Following the downfall of Henry the Lion (1129–1195, Duke of Saxony 1142–1180), and the subsequent splitting of the Saxon tribal duchy into several territories, the name of the Saxon duchy was transferred to the lands of the Ascanian family. This led to the differentiation between Lower.... Discover the Saxon popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Saxon books.