Artist’s impression of Langford, Essex in 700AD. I think this is a great resource for me as an author, helping to build up my visual idea of the settings that my characters inhabit.
The whole village seems so idyllic on a summer’s day, and the central activity is farming, we see crops being cultivated and livestock being herded down the path. It’s important to remind ourselves that although the history of the period is full of turmoils, daily life would carry on in the quiet farming communities throughout the countryside. We can see the smoke rising up through the roofs of the houses, by nightfall the villagers would be returning to the warmth beside the hearths.
There is no bridge over the river, illustrating that the settlement’s name came from it being situated at a long ford (a place where a river is shallow enough to cross). The continuity of names from the Anglo-Saxon period to the modern day gives us fascinating insight into each settlement’s origins. There is also no church, at this time there was certainly a large Christian presence in Essex, but even as recently as 683 a pagan king named Sighere had ruled Essex, alongside his Christian brother Sæbbi. This is the world of mixed loyalties and contending religions that I’ll be exploring in my book. Christianity would have rapidly been gaining a foothold in these communities around this time.
There is another reason why this picture is interesting, because Langford lies just outside of Maldon. We therefore know that the river that we can see in the picture is the Blackwater. If we were to follow it, we would discover the estuary and crossing to Northey island which is believed to be the site of the Anglo-Saxon defeat in 991 that is the subject of the famous poem “The Battle of Maldon”. The most significant outcome of this battle is that it ultimately led to the policy of paying Danegeld to keep the Viking raiders away.
**Unfortunately I cannot find any official website by the artist Jon Cane, which is a shame as it would be great to provide a link and to see other work.