Oh No! It’s The Vikings!
On Blackwell we were fairly safe from the Vikings to begin with. They went for the easy pickings around the coast, usually the monasteries since they were the places with money and valuable objects. However soon enough they were sailing down the main rivers such as the Trent, and also uing the old Roman troads like Rykneld Street to get inland. They were looking for land to settle in. Apparently South Normanton was nothing to do with the Normans, but named for Norse or North Mans Farm.
Eventually the Vikings took control of the area surrounding the five boroughs of Derby, Nottingham, Leicester, Lincoln and Stamford so at that
point we were in what was called the Danelaw and the east of the country was firmly under Viking control.
It was however not to last, because King Alfred from Wessex came on the scene and when he wasn’t burning cakes , he and his sister were trying to win the land back. Fighting the Vikings was a family business, and Alfred’s sister Aethelflaed, Lady of the Mercians won back Derby in 917 AD. There was lots of violence back and forth between the Vikings and Anglo Saxons for the next hundred years or so, some kings English, and some Danish, until the Normans came along in 1066.
Dorothy Mellors 2024