Hernán Cortés’ Bloody Sack Of Cholula

In 1519, Hernán Cortés arrived in Mexico, leading a band of Spaniards into a precarious political environment that was dominated by the Aztec Empire. To Cortés’ good fortune, the Spaniards eventually landed in a region populated by the Totonacs, a people who grudgingly paid tribute to the Aztecs. By July of 1519, Cortés was able to bring the Totonac cities into rebellion against the then ruler of the Aztecs, Montezuma II. After founding the colony of Vera Cruz and building up his alliance with the Totonacs, Cortés headed inland toward the Tlaxcalans, the fiercest rival of the Aztecs at the time. As there were Totonac warriors—former Aztec tributaries—marching with the Spaniards, the Tlaxcalans reportedly believed that Cortés had aligned with Montezuma II, and therefore the forces of Tlaxcala were at first hostile to the conquistadors. In early September, the Tlaxcalans went to war against Cortés, attacking the Spaniards during the day and ambushing the conquistadors at night. Yet, after the Tlaxcalans suffered several costly defeats, they made peace with the foreigners. When the leaders of Tlaxcala subsequently discovered that Cortés was not aligned with Montezuma, but was instead stirring up all kinds of trouble for the Aztecs, the Tlaxcalans eagerly agreed to an alliance with Hernán Cortés.

Around the time that Cortés and the Tlaxcalans began negotiating, five Aztec diplomats from Montezuma arrived in the Spanish camp. The envoys brought with them gifts of gold, jewels and cloth for Cortés, and they also delivered a message from Montezuma, in which he reportedly promised to pay tribute to Cortés’ liege, Charles V, in exchange for the Spaniards never traveling to the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan (Mexico City). After peace was formally ratified between the Spaniards and the Tlaxcalans, some of the Aztec diplomats rushed off to inform Montezuma of the happenings. A few days later, more Aztec diplomats arrived (with a further helping of ornate gifts) and they delivered another message from Montezuma, in which he begged the Spaniards not to trust the Tlaxcalans. The Aztecs, however, were not the only ones sowing distrust—during Cortés’ alliance negotiations with Tlaxcala, the Tlaxcalans repeatedly advised the Spaniards not to trust Montezuma or his subject states. Unfortunately for the Aztecs, as the Spanish support for the Totonac rebellion had already shown, Cortés did not have Montezuma’s interests at heart—therefore he traveled to Tlaxcala, soaked up as much local intelligence about the Aztecs as he could obtain, and recruited 1,000 Tlaxcalan warriors to accompany the Spaniards on their journeys.

While the Spaniards were still in Tlaxcala, another message arrived from Montezuma, in which he said it was dangerous to spend so much time with the Tlaxcalans. Montezuma suggested that Cortés travel toward Tenochtitlan, where Aztec-aligned cities would take good care of the Spaniards. The Aztec ambassadors with Cortés pointed out the city of Cholula as an ideal destination—it was one of the most important cities in Mexico and it served as an agricultural, religious and military hub in the region. Most of all, Cholula was staunchly loyal to Montezuma. Upon hearing of the suggested city, Cortés sent a message to Cholula, requesting that leaders from the area come to meet him in Tlaxcala. The Cholulans, in response, sent messengers of low status to Tlaxcala with a message that the chiefs of Cholula would not be meeting with Cortés. Infuriated, Cortés sent the messengers home with a second, angrier-toned request that the Cholulan chiefs come to meet him. The Cholulans responded steadfastly that they would in no way send their chieftains into the territory of Tlaxcala, a long-time enemy of Cholula and the Aztecs. Hernán Cortés found this explanation reasonable and decided to instead bring himself and his forces to the Cholulans. The 1,000 Tlaxcalan recruits went with him.

When Cortés’ party neared Cholula, the city’s leaders and priests came out to meet the travelers on the road. The mood was said to have been joyous until the Cholulans sighted the large contingent of Tlaxcalans in Cortés’ wake. Upon this discovery, the leaders of Cholula forbid the warriors of Tlaxcala from entering the city. When the Tlaxcalans agreed to camp away in some nearby fields, the Cholulans, satisfied, let Cortés and approximately 400 of his Spanish followers, as well as his Totonac allies, enter into the city.

At first, Cortés’ experience in the city was pleasant. The Spaniards and their allies (minus the Tlaxcalans) were given lodging and plenty of good food. Once he had access to the Cholulan leaders, Hernán Cortés began making his usual requests of the locals—convert to Christianity and swear fealty to Charles V. The Cholulans refused the first command, but said they would think about the second. For two days, the cordial atmosphere lasted; local chiefs and priests met with the Spaniards, and the residents of Cholula crowded the streets and rooftops to get a glimpse of the strange foreigners.

The mood in Cholula underwent an abrupt change on the third day, however, when dignitaries from Montezuma arrived in the city. They presented another message from the indecisive Montezuma, in which he expressly ordered the Spaniards not to continue on toward Tenochtitlan. Montezuma’s ambassador’s also met with the local authorities in Cholula, resulting in a drastic change in the local attitude toward the Spaniards—they stopped bringing food, the chieftains no longer met with Cortés, and average Cholulans in the streets avoided the Spaniards like the plague.

Curiously, several local priests in Cholula eventually began mediating between Cortés and the leaders of the city, ultimately brokering a meeting between the two sides. In the parley, the Cholulan leadership explained that Montezuma had commanded the city to give no further food to the Spaniards and to not let them travel any further toward Tenochtitlan. In response to this revelation, Cortés merely replied that he would continue on the road to Tenochtitlan anyway, preferably the very next day, and that he wanted 2,000 Cholulan porters to accompany him on his journey. The Cholulans were reportedly startled by the reply, but they agreed to assemble Cortés’ escort at a designated courtyard near the city’s temple.

According to the story put forward by the Spanish sources, Cortés received an incredible number of revelations over the next few hours until sunrise. Cortés’ Totonac allies appeared, claiming that they had found hidden pits in the city that were filled with sharpened stakes, as well as rooftops stocked with stones that could be used as projectiles. They also claimed to have seen earthen and wooden defenses that had been recently been built in the city. Later, some Tlaxcalans who had sneaked into Cholula came to Cortés and informed him that they had seen signs of war preparation at the periphery of the city, including an exodus of baggage and civilians, as well as invocations to the gods for assistance in war. Finally, Hernán Cortés’ interpreter, Malinche (whom the Spaniards called Doña Marina), rounded up three witnesses—two local priests and an elderly woman—who allegedly all confessed that the Cholulans were planning to lead the Spaniards into an ambush of 20,000 Aztec warriors hidden just outside the city.

Although the validity of the evidence, and the motivations of the people who provided it, have long been debated over the centuries, Hernán Cortés and his fellow Spaniards were, at that time, apparently completely convinced that the Cholulans wanted to do them harm. In this state of mind, Cortés sent messengers to his Tlaxcalan allies, telling them to be prepared for battle, and to attack the city if they should hear a gunshot. Finally, before dawn, Cortés marched his Spaniards and Totonac allies to the courtyard where the 2,000 Cholulan porters were due to assemble. He set up troops at all entrances and exits from the courtyard and waited for the Cholulan leaders, priests and escorts to arrive. When these people began to pour into the courtyard, the atmosphere was reportedly joyous—the Cholulans were apparently in a giggly mood that morning and their steps were quick and purposeful. More than the required 2,000 appeared in the courtyard, filling up the space. Among the crowd were two of the informants that Doña Marina had brought to Cortés; these men were subtlety sent away by the Spaniards and were told to lock themselves in their homes.

Despite the ring of Cortés’ troops encircling the courtyard, and the selective sending-away of certain pro-Spanish Cholulans, the people who gathered in the square apparently took little notice of the vulnerable situation into which they had walked. The realization of danger, however, became all too apparent when Hernán Cortés started to speak to the crowd through his interpreter. He accused the gathered Cholulans of nefarious and treasonous acts against himself and his liege, Charles V—a crime that was punishable by death. After Cortés’ speech, the Cholulan leaders reportedly again claimed that they were only following Montezuma’s orders, yet it is unclear if they were referring to the withheld food or the planned ambush of which they were being accused. Whatever the case, Hernán Cortés found the explanation unsatisfactory and decided to show no mercy to the Cholulan chiefs, priests and warriors in the courtyard. As Bernal Díaz del Castillo, one of the Spaniards at the scene, described the event, Cortés “ordered a musket to be fired, which was the signal we had agreed on; and they [the Cholulans] received a blow that they will remember for ever, for we killed many of them” (The Conquest of New Spain, chapter 83).

A large portion of the Cholulans in the courtyard were unarmed, as their primary purpose for gathering had been to serve as porters and luggage carriers of the Spaniards. As such, Hernán Cortés’ small band of conquistadors, armed with swords, shields, crossbows and firearms, cut through the thousands of Cholulans in the square with ease in a period of about two hours. In a later dispatch to Charles V, Hernán Cortés claimed that 3,000 Cholulans died in the attack, yet other contemporary 16th-century sources reported as many as 6,000 were killed.

Cortés and the Spaniards were not the only threat to Cholula on the day of the massacre—1,000 Tlaxcalan warriors were still camped outside of the city. When they heard the sounds of gunshots, the Tlaxcalans stormed Cholula to kill, plunder and take captives in the streets. As had happened before the attack at the courtyard, the Spaniards sheltered certain selected Cholulan priests and chieftains from the rampage of the Tlaxcalans, yet many of the other leadership figures in Cholula died in the massacre or on the chaotic streets. When word of events in Cholula spread back to Tlaxcala, more Tlaxcalan warriors arrived at the scene to take part in the sacking of the city.

After an unknown number of days, Cortés began to rein in the chaos. The people who were still alive in Cholula were pardoned and the Spaniards managed to convince the Tlaxcalans to return to the outskirts of the city. Cortés also reportedly asked the Tlaxcalans to release their Cholulan prisoners, although the degree to which this was done is uncertain. A new regime of chieftains and priests, returned to power in Cholula, in which the figures sheltered by the Spaniards during the attack now took prominence. Finally, Cortés was able to broker some kind of peace between the new Cholulan leaders and the Tlaxcalans who had just sacked the city.

After staying a reported fourteen days in Cholula, Hernán Cortés set out in the direction of Tenochtitlan. The alleged 20,000 hidden Aztecs warriors near Cholula—if they had really been there—had by this time withdrawn, and Cortés faced no further harassment during his trip to the Aztec capital. As was hinted earlier, the events at Cholula were controversial and much debated even in the day of Cortés. During the 16th century, Cortés’ fellow Spaniards questioned the reliability of the evidence presented by the Totonacs, the Tlaxcalans and the interpreter, Doña Marina, which led to the preemptive killing of so many Cholulans. Hernán Cortés’ comrade, Bernal Díaz del Castillo, was especially hostile to the insinuations of a bishop and Dominican friar named Bartolome de las Casas (d. 1566), who alleged Cortés “punished the Cholulans for no reason at all” and accused the Spaniards of “great cruelties” in the city (The Conquest of New Spain, chapter 83). In rebuttal to Bartolome de las Casas’ accusations, Bernal Díaz del Castillo praised an investigation done by a team of “some good Franciscans,” who interviewed the leaders of the new regime in Cholula, and the accounts they received from the city leaders were reportedly identical to the ones presented by Cortés and his companions (The Conquest of New Spain, chapter 83).

Written by C. Keith Hansley

Picture Attribution: (Storming of Teocalli by Hernan Cortes, by Emanuel Leutze  (1816–1868), [Public Domain] via Creative Commons).

Sources:

• The Conquest of New Spain by Bernal Díaz, translated by J. M. Cohen. New York: Penguin Books, 1963. 
• https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32474/32474-h/32474-h.htm#FNanchor_35_36 
• https://www.britannica.com/biography/Marina-Mexican-Native-American-princess 
• https://www.historians.org/teaching-and-learning/teaching-resources-for-historians/teaching-and-learning-in-the-digital-age/the-history-of-the-americas/the-conquest-of-mexico/letters-from-hernan-Cortés/moctezuma-asks-spaniards-to-stay-put 
• https://www.historians.org/teaching-and-learning/teaching-resources-for-historians/teaching-and-learning-in-the-digital-age/the-history-of-the-americas/the-conquest-of-mexico/letters-from-hernan-Cortés/Cortés-meets-cholulans 
• https://www.thoughtco.com/the-cholula-massacre-2136527 
• https://www.heritage-history.com/index.php?c=read&author=banks&book=prescott&story=cholula  

The Destructive Trek Of The ‘Ten Thousand’ Mercenaries Along The Black Sea Coast

In late 401 BCE, an army of over 10,000 Greek hoplite mercenaries fought on the side of the rebel, Cyrus the Younger, against King Artaxerxes II of Persia at the Battle of Cunaxa, which took place somewhere in Babylonia. The rebel leader, Cyrus, was slain during the battle, but the Greek mercenaries survived remarkably intact. With their employer dead and the rebellion crushed, the Greek mercenaries found themselves in an incredibly precarious situation—they were deep in foreign territory beside an army of the king they had just tried to kill. Nevertheless, the two sides maintained peace for a time.

A truce was brokered and Artaxerxes II entrusted the handling of the Greek problem to several governing satraps, including Tissaphernes, a Persian noble who was often entangled in Greco-Persian issues. The mercenaries and the watchful Persians coexisted as the Greeks marched past several villages and cities, yet at a place along what was called the Zapatas River, the situation changed drastically. Both sides blamed the other for the breakdown in relations. Greeks accused the Persians of treachery, while Persians decried the mercenaries for looting. Both sides were partially right—it appears that Tissaphernes provided the Greeks too little food at too high a price, and the mercenaries scavenged for food out of necessity. Whatever the case, the Persians arrested twenty-five of the highest-ranking mercenary officers and executed them, some immediately, and others at a later date.

After the arrest of the mercenary commanders, a group of around one hundred surviving field officers gathered to elect new leadership. The two most important of these newly elected mercenary generals were Chirisophus (a Spartan who would command the front) and Xenophon, an Athenian who took command of the rear guard. That same Xenophon would later write down the experiences of these mercenaries, remembered as the Ten Thousand, in his Anabasis Kyrou (The Upcountry March/Expedition of Cyrus).  

Under the leadership of the likes of Chirisophus and Xenophon, the mercenaries began the next phase of their journey. Persians forces were now openly hostile to the Greek mercenaries, and the stranded warriors-for-hire were often stalked and harassed. Yet, the Greeks were not the only people endangered because of the breakdown in relations. As the Greeks were no longer provided with a supply line by the Persians satraps, local villages and cities (with their food, shelter and wealth) became more and more tempting to the army of hungry mercenaries. In consequence of their foraging and looting, the Greek mercenaries made many enemies during their journey through Mesopotamia and Armenia, and finally the shores of the Black Sea.

Around 400 BCE, the mercenaries reached the Greek-populated city of Trapezus, located on the southeast end of the Black Sea. By this point, the discipline that had allowed the mercenaries to survive Persian armies and local militias in multiple roadblocks, mountain ambushes, and full-scale battles began to diminish. Upon reaching the coast of the Black Sea, more and more mercenaries began to seek loot to the point of insubordination against their commanders. To keep the troops happy (and fed), the mercenary generals were now always on the lookout for places to pillage.

The city of Trapezus was spared, but the region surrounding it was foraged to the extent that scavengers sent out by the mercenaries were gone for more than a day before returning with supplies. Meanwhile, the mercenaries received one or two ships from the Trapezuntians, with which the mercenaries tried their hand at piracy and commandeered several unlucky merchant vessels. Eventually, the people of Trapezus thought of a way to gain a respite from their rowdy guests—they sent the mercenaries off to raid a rival people, called the Drilae. Half of the mercenary army accepted the plan and invaded the Drilae lands, where they besieged and broke into a stronghold and gathered as much loot as they could before being forced out by local opposition.

After the raiders returned from the territory of the Drilae, the mercenaries decided to resume their travels. They had not commandeered enough ships to carry the reported 8,600 mercenaries who were still fit to fight, but some of the camp followers and injured were able to sail alongside the marching adventurers. Departing from Trapezus, the mercenaries and their rag-tag fleet of commandeered ships reached the nearby city of Cerasus. This city, too, was mainly populated by Greeks. Yet, the rowdiness of the mercenaries was increasing and they showed this city less respect than they did Trapezus.

According to Xenophon, a certain Clearetus and a band of warriors went rogue and attacked some villages that were under the protection of Cerasus. Three elders from the afflicted villages traveled to Cerasus to report the incident. They delivered their message, but were soon after murdered by some of the guilty mercenaries. The mercenaries also caused trouble for the Greek inhabitants of Cerasus—Xenophon claimed that a mob of angry mercenaries tried to stone an unfortunate market official named Zelarchus to death.

From Cerasus, the mercenaries bumbled their way into the midst of a civil war among a group of people known as the Mossynoecians, which roughly translates to ‘those who live in wooden towers.’ The mercenaries joined the rebel side of the conflict and besieged what the Greeks thought was the capital city of the region. The mercenaries captured the city for the rebels, but not before looting the buildings and setting fire to its wooden structures.

After helping the rebel Mossynoecians win their war, the mercenaries continued their march westward along the coast of the Black sea. They then reached the Chalybian people, who were likely spared maltreatment because they were subjects or allies of the Mossynoecian regime that the mercenaries had just helped. After the Chalybians, the Greeks encountered a group called the Tibarenians. The appraising eye of the mercenaries recognized that the land would be easy for an army to maneuver over and that the Tibarenian settlements were poorly defended. It was a tempting target for even the most pacifistic of the mercenary leaders. The Tibarenians, who likely had heard tales of the devastation left behind in the wake of this mercenary army, sent out delegates to offer the foreigners friendship and military access. Xenophon (in third person perspective) gave a blunt account of the his and his comrades’ response to these delegates: “The generals wanted to attack the villages, to give the men a little something by way of profit, so they refused to accept the tokens of friendship which arrived from the Tibarenians, but told them to wait until they had decided what to do” (Anabasis Kyrou, Book V, section 5).

After delivering this eerie response, the mercenary generals called for animal sacrifices to be performed and had diviners read omens to determine if the gods were in favor of the Greeks attacking the Tibarenians. As stated earlier, the mercenary commanders were eager to attack, so when the first sacrifice and omen reading produced a disappointing outcome, they sacrificed a second time…and a third time, so on and so forth. Xenophon described their battle with the will of the gods: “They performed sacrifices, and eventually, after many victims had been sacrificed, the diviners unanimously declared that the gods were absolutely opposed to war” (Anabasis Kyrou, Book V, section 5). With no divine support for the planned raids, the mercenaries accepted the friendship of the Tibarenian people and marched peacefully through their land to reach the Greek-inhabited city of Cotyora.

The Tibarenians were lucky, for when the mercenaries reached Cotyora, they quickly began to cause drama. Although the city and the mercenaries initially exchanged cheerful greetings, held religious processions and competed in athletic contests, the warriors-for-hire soon began to cause tension by scavenging from the local villages. The mercenaries caused such a stir that delegates from the powerful city of Sinope (the colonizer of Trapezus, Cerasus and Cotyora) arrived on the scene and told the mercenaries to behave themselves or face dire consequences.

The army, however, did not change their ways. They went on to threaten Sinope to send a fleet of transport ships for the mercenaries to use, and later attempted to extort money from the city of Heraclea. Even after the mercenaries reached Byzantium—the seat of Spartan power in the region—the roaming army remained chaotic. The mercenaries momentarily occupied Byzantium, forcing the Spartan officials to seek shelter in a stronghold. Yet, there were smooth-talkers in the ranks of the mercenaries who were able to miraculously talk the Spartans out of imposing any drastic consequences. Instead, the army left the city and offered their services to Prince Seuthes of Thrace.

Written by C. Keith Hansley

Picture Attribution: (Sketch of the Ten Thousand reaching the Black Sea, by Bernard Granville Baker (1870-1957), [Public Domain] via Creative Commons).

Sources:

• Anabasis Kyrou (The Expedition/Upcountry March of Cyrus) by Xenophon and translated by Robin Waterfield. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
• https://www.ancient.eu/image/128/map-of-persia-and-the-march-of-the-ten-thousand/ 
• https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/daily/military-history/the-battle-of-cunaxa-and-the-march-of-the-10000/  

The Raids Of Saint-King Olaf In England And The Brutal Execution Of An Archbishop of Canterbury

Olaf Haraldsson, born in 995, was a member of the Norwegian royal family and the alleged godson of the Christian King Olaf Tryggvason of Norway (r. 995-1000). Although Olaf Haraldsson eventually became the king of his homeland, he had to wait for his throne, as a Scandinavian coalition of Danes, Swedes and Norwegians killed Olaf Tyggvason and imposed a new regime on Norway. Nine years later, Olaf Haraldsson would have been in his early teens when England was hit by a massive wave of reinvigorated Viking activity—these invasions would eventually force the English king, Æthelred the Unready, to flee to Normandy. Olaf, who later became a respected figure in the medieval church, was among the Vikings who journeyed to England in the first decades of the 11th century. His behavior there, however, was not so saintly.

At the head of a fleet of ships with a veteran band of guardians and family friends, young Olaf reportedly reached the shores of England around 1009.  Commentary on what exactly he did in England from this point on is a curious topic. Sources such as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Florence of Worcester (d. 1118), Henry of Huntingdon (d. 1160), and the 11th-century court poets, Sigvat the Skald and Óttar the Black, who are also cited in the Saga of St. Olaf from the Heimskringla, all agree on the same setting and timeline of events. According to all of these texts, Viking armies were present at London in 1009, at East Anglia in 1010, and captured Canterbury between 1011 and 1012. The 11th-century Nordic sources place Olaf Haraldsson usually on the side of the Vikings during these battles and sieges. Yet, Snorri Sturluson (c. 1179-1241), the compiler of poems and writer of the Heimskringla, contradicted his sources (Sigvat and Óttar) and oddly placed Olaf on the side of the English at all times during his stay in Britain. Snorri Sturluson, however, was writing long after Olaf Haraldsson had become a beloved and respected figure in the church, and he may have been trying to paint this unsaintly period of Olaf’s life as rosily as possible. Olaf did indeed eventually aid the English, but that defection came as late as 1012, by which point he had been slaughtering Englishmen for years.

The reason Olaf Haraldsson is believed to have been in England in 1009 is because he was a witness to (and participant in) a Viking siege of London during the reign of Æthelred the Unready. Only in the year 1009, were both King Æthelred and Olaf alive at the time of a Viking siege of London. For that year, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle stated, “And they [the Vikings] often fought against the town of London, but to God be praise that it yet stands sound” (ASC 1009). The aforementioned Scandinavian skald, Óttar the Black, also wrote of the event:

“Boldly brokest London

Bridge’s towers, thou Odin’s-

Storm-of-steel’s keen urger,

Striving to win England.”

(cited in Saint Olaf’s Saga, chapter 13)

Perhaps, as Snorri Sturluson claimed, Olaf’s participation in the attack on London Bridge was a move to help the English—Óttar the Black was also cited as stating, “Landedst, and land gavest, liege-lord to Æthelred [the Unready]. Much did need thee, mighty man of war, the sovran” (cited in Saint Olaf’s Saga, chapter 13). Then again, due to the unknown location of these lines in the skald’s original poem, the “land gavest” phase in Olaf’s relationship with Æthelred the Unready may have occurred years after the incident at London.

Olaf Haraldsson’s actions are easier to decipher when he reached East Anglia in 1010. The entry for that year in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle stated:

“the beforementioned army came to East Anglia, and went forthwith to where they understood Ulfkytel was with his force…And then the East Anglians immediately fled. Then Cambridgeshire stood firmly against them. There were slain Æthelstan, the king’s son-in-law, and Oswig and his son, and Wulfric Leofwine’s son, and Eadwig Æfic’s brother, and many other good thanes, and people out of number… And the Danes had possession of the place of carnage” (ASC 1010).

Óttar the Black, and his uncle Sigvat the Skald, both mentioned this event in their poems. They agreed with Anglo-Saxon sources that a large battle took place in the domain of Ulfkytel (or Ulfkel), specifically at a place that they called Hringmara Heath, which has been identified as Ringmere, East Anglia. Sigvat the Skald wrote:

“Even a seventh time Olaf

urged a bloody sword-thing

in the land of Ulfkel,

as I heard it told me.

Hringmara Heath full was—

high were piled the dead—of

Ella’s offspring [Englishmen], whom the

heir of Harald [Olaf Haraldsson] battled.”

(cited in Saint Olaf’s Saga, chapter 13)

Sigvat’s nephew, Óttar the Black, more clearly stressed that Olaf was battling the Anglo-Saxons, not fellow Norwegians or Danes, in his own poem about the battle:

“Liege-lord, then learned I that

laden was with corpses

Hringmara Heath all bloody,

when that inland you battled.

Bowed and overborne, king,

by you, country-folk of

England, awed, submitted

or else fled off headlong.”

(cited in Saint Olaf’s Saga, chapter 14)

After piling English dead high in East Anglia, Olaf followed a Viking force to Canterbury and participated in a Viking siege against the city in 1011. The poets, Sigvat and Óttar, claimed that Olaf played a leading role in the capture of Canterbury and caused great death and destruction in that city. Óttar the Black wrote:

“generous king, you captured

Canterbury in the morning.

Fiercely burning, firebrands

fell into houses, nor didst,

liege-lord, learned I, spare the

lives of luckless burghers.”

(cited in Saint Olaf’s Saga, chapter 15)

Anglo-Saxon sources corroborated that Canterbury was captured and burned by Vikings in 1011. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and the Chronicle of Florence of Worcester provided much more information than the Nordic Skalds. They claimed that the city was betrayed to the Vikings by a certain abbot or archdeacon named Ælmar, and that Archbishop Ælfeah of Canterbury (also spelled Elphege or Alphege) was among the prominent people captured during the sack of the city. In his entry for year 1011, Florence of Worcester wrote:

“they [the Vikings] dug a trench round Canterbury, and laid siege to it. On the twentieth day of the siege, through the treachery of the archdeacon Ælmar, whose life St. Elphege had formerly saved, one quarter of the city was set on fire, the army entered, and the place was taken…Meanwhile, Alphage, the archbishop, was seized, and being loaded with fetters was imprisoned and tortured in various ways. Ælmar, the abbot of St. Augustine’s monastery, was permitted to depart; Godwin, bishop of Rochester, was made prisoner, as well as Leofruna, abbess of St. Mildred, Alfred, the king’s reeve, with the monks and canons, and vast numbers of the people of both sexes…When the people had been thus slaughtered, and the city pillaged and burnt to the ground, Alphege, the archbishop, was brought out in fetters and dragged along, severely wounded, to the ships” (Florence of Worcester, AD 1011).

The Viking force that sacked Canterbury kept Archbishop Ælfeah captive for the remainder of the year, as well as several months into the next. They were apparently hoping to ransom the archbishop for a hefty sum of money. Archbishop Ælfeah and the Vikings, however, did not get along at all. As the months went on and no ransom was promised, the raiders became more and more loathsome of the clergyman. By April of 1012, the Vikings finally reached their limit and decided to kill the archbishop. Ælfeah’s gruesome and chaotic death was reported by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle:

“Then on the Saturday the army was greatly excited against the bishop, because he would not promise them any money, but forbade that anything should be given for him. They were also very drunk, for wine had been brought thither from the South. They then took the bishop, led him to their ‘husting’ [assembly]…and there shamefully murdered him; they pelted him with bones and with the heads of oxen; and one of them struck him on the head with an axe-iron, so that with the dint he sank down, and his holy blood fell on the earth, and his holy soul he sent forth to God’s kingdom” (ASC 1012).

The sack of Canterbury and the subsequent execution of Archbishop Ælfeah may have been a turning point for Olaf. According to the Anglo-Saxon sources, a sizable force from the Vikings that sacked Canterbury decided to split from the rest of the raiders not long after the killing of the archbishop. This splinter group (which likely included Olaf) then formed a mercenary contract with the English king before the end of 1012. On this event, the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle stated, “Then submitted to the king [Æthelred the Unready], from the army, five and forty ships, and promised him that they would defend this country; and he was to feed and clothe them” (ASC 1012). The appearance of this band of 45 mercenary Viking ship crews meshes well with Snorri Sturluson’s statement that, after the events of Canterbury, “King Olaf had under him the defense of England” (Heimskringla, Saint Olaf’s Saga, chapter 15). The poet Sigvat also wrote a verse about Olaf, which emphasized that he battled both Englishmen and Danes during his expedition in England:

“Scatheless, in that skirmish

scalps red he gave the English.

Dark-red billowed blood on

blades in Nÿjamótha.

Now have I nine battles

named for thee, king of Norway.

Danes fell where the deadly

dart-storm raged ‘gainst Olaf.”

(cited in Saint Olaf’s Saga, chapter 15)

Olaf Haraldsson (and Æthelred the Unready, for that matter) would not be staying in England for long. King Sweyn Forkbeard of Denmark (r. 986-1014)—one of the leaders from the coalition that had killed the previous king of Norway—arrived in England with a large force in 1013. Either upon or just before King Sweyn’s appearance in England, Olaf Haraldsson decided it was the opportune time to end his mercenary contract with England and to instead go raiding and adventuring on the European mainland. He was said to have pillaged regions of Spain, and then sailed to Normandy by 1013, where he may have been baptized or re-baptized, as he had reportedly already been given a semblance of a baptismal ceremony as a child in 998, during the reign of his godfather, Olaf Tryggvason. Well-traveled and reinvigorated in faith, Olaf Haraldsson returned to his homeland to seize the Norwegian throne around 1015.

Back in England, the legend of the slain Archbishop Ælfeah grew and the martyr was considered a saint by the mid-to-late 11th century. Ironically, Archbishop Ælfeah might have been beaten to sainthood by one of the Vikings who possibly was present at his execution. King Olaf Haraldsson, upon seizing power in Norway, devoted great attention to converting his subjects to the Christian religion, if not by the persuasion of his missionaries, then by the force of his military. His dedication to the conversion of Norway to Christianity apparently far outweighed his earlier Viking career and his likely involvement in the killing of an archbishop of Canterbury. King Olaf Haraldsson was slain in battle in 1030, and only one year later he was canonized as a saint. Reverence for Saint Olaf spread far and wide in Christendom—both the Roman Church and the Orthodox Church of Constantinople recognized his sainthood.

Written by C. Keith Hansley.

Picture Attribution: (Scene from the Saga of Olaf Tryggvason, illustrated by Halfdan Egedius (1877–1899), [Public Domain] via Creative Commons).

Sources:

• The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle translated by Benjamin Thorpe in 1861 and republished by Cambridge University Press, 2012.
• The Chronicle of Florence of Worcester translated by Thomas Forester. London: Petter and Galpin, originally published 1854. 
• Heimskringla, by Snorri Sturluson and translated by Lee Hollander. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1964, 2018. 
• https://www.britannica.com/biography/Olaf-II-Haraldsson 
• https://www.britannica.com/biography/Sweyn-I 
• https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Aelfheah 
• https://www.encyclopedia.com/people/history/scandinavian-history-biographies/olaf-ii 
• http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11234a.htm 
• https://archive.org/details/chroniclehenryh00foregoog/page/n229  

The Lifelong Payments Of Tribute By King Æthelred The Unready To The Danes

Æthelred the Unready became king of England in 978, following the assassination of his brother, King Edward the Martyr. Æthelred was reportedly only ten years old when he ascended to the throne, and his epithet, Unready (Unraed), actually meant “bad counsel,” as the young king’s regent, advisors and vassals gave him little sound support during his life. Yet, the modern definition of unready also fits King Æthelred, for when a relentless wave of Viking activity began plaguing England in 980, the king and the kingdom were caught totally unprepared.

King Æthelred and his poor advisors may have tried to imitate the success of their famed ancestor, King Alfred the Great (r. 871-899). Alfred had paid the Vikings for peace in his first year as king, but it was only a temporary truce and the Vikings came back to force Alfred into the marshes of Somerset by 978. Yet, Alfred mobilized his forces, wrested back control of Wessex, and, by the end of his reign had implemented a network of military garrisons in the burghs of his kingdom that were strong enough to defeat Viking raiders even when Alfred was not present on the battlefield. The success of Alfred’s defense system was showcased in the Battle of Lea (c. 895), where Anglo-Saxon garrisons worked together to defeat a Viking encampment while Alfred was elsewhere in the kingdom building river defenses. Around a century later, Æthelred the Unready apparently attempted a similar scheme of paying the invaders to buy time and letting his regional garrisons deal with the Viking problem. Unfortunately, the burghs of Æthelred’s day no longer had the individual power to effectively fight off the Vikings, and, unlike Alfred the Great, Æthelred seemed totally incapable of adapting to the new situation. Consequently, while Alfred is remembered as one of Britain’s greatest kings, Æthelred is regarded as one of its worst.

In 991, after over a decade of Viking activity, King Æthelred took one of his first executive actions against the Viking threat. To set the scene, a powerful Viking force had just sacked the city of Ipswich and killed the regional noble, Aldorman Brihtnoth, in a battle at Maldon. One of the leaders of the Viking force was apparently Olaf Tryggvason, who would go on to become the king of Norway in 995. Instead of mustering his forces against this Viking threat, King Ætheltred instead pulled together England’s finances and paid off the invaders with a tribute of 10,000 Anglo-Saxon pounds. Æthelred did, however, later make an effort to gather together a fleet of ships in 992, but the man he put in charge of the armada unfortunately defected to the side of the Vikings.

The tribute payment (and the poorly-led fleet) did not bring Æthelred peace, as Vikings continued to wreak havoc on England in 992 and 993. By 994, Olaf Tryggvason had returned, this time with King Sweyn Forkbeard of Denmark. With a large fleet at their disposal, Olaf and Sweyn raided all over England, attacking Essex, Kent, Sussex and Hampshire. Once again, Æthelred apparently left the defense of the kingdom to his regional nobles, and no known military action was taken by the king, himself. As the Vikings continued to sow destruction, Æthelred decided to offer a second payment of tribute—this time reportedly around 16,000 Anglo-Saxon pounds. The wealth did buy off Olaf Tryggvason, who went to Norway to seize the throne and never returned to Britain. Yet, the money did not stop other Vikings from raiding English soil.

After a brief period of peace, Vikings returned to cause mayhem in Æthelred’s kingdom. Widespread annual raids resumed in 997. By 999, Æthelred finally decided to raise his land and sea power against the invaders, but by this point, the kingdom’s military was in a neglected and pitiful state. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle did not pull any punches when assessing Æthelred’s attempt to take a more personal control over the kingdom’s defense in 999: “in the end neither the naval force nor the land force was productive of anything but the people’s distress, and a waste of money, and the emboldening of their foes” (ASC, 999). By 1002, Æthelred decided to pay a third tribute to the Vikings, giving them a reported 24,000 pounds. Yet, that very year, the Anglo-Saxons idiotically massacred Danish settlers in England, ensuring further confrontation with King Sweyn Forkbeard of Denmark.

As could be expected, when King Sweyn heard that his countrymen had been ruthlessly purged in England, he set sail for Britain and embarked on a relentless war against Æthelred as early as 1003. By this point, King Æthelred decided to let his regional nobles once again the take lead in the war. Sweyn Forkbeard apparently faced only regional garrisons until 1006, when Æthelred decided to muster another army. Yet, as before, Æthelred’s military was still in poor shape and was woefully inadequate to halt Sweyn Forkbeard’s campaign. As the Danes plundered region after region, Æthelred the Unready pulled together a fourth tribute payment of 36,000 pounds.

King Sweyn accepted the payment and England was at relative peace for several years. In that brief respite, Æthelred tried to build up England’s navy, but his progress was undermined by unruly noblemen, such as Brihtric and Wulfnoth Cild, who reportedly put around 100 of Æthelred’s new ships out of action during a personal feud. Ironically, it was right after the Englishmen destroyed their own ships that Sweyn Forkbeard returned to England in 1009. From 1009-1012, King Sweyn’s forces acted as an unstoppable steamroller, flattening all resistance in their path. King Æthelred’s distress can be glimpsed at the enormous tribute—the largest of his reign—that he sent to the Danes. In 1012, Æthelred sent as his fifth tribute a whopping 48,000 Anglo-Saxon pounds. This time, however, Sweyn Forkbeard showed no mercy and continued his campaign despite the money. In 1013, King Sweyn conquered England and Æthelred fled to Normandy.

Sweyn Forkbeard, however, did not have a long reign as the king of England—he died in 1014. Sweyn’s son and heir, Canute, was reportedly in the north of England at the time and eager to return to Denmark to secure his hold on the Danish homeland. In the uncertainty of succession, the people of England invited Æthelred to return to Britain to retake the throne, an offer he gladly accepted. When Æthelred returned to England in 1014, he continued his life-long foreign policy of paying tribute. In an effort to appease King Canute, Æthelred sent a payment of 21,000 pounds to the Danes. It would be his sixth and final tribute. Nevertheless, Canute returned to England in 1015, determined to retake the English throne. Æthelred died in London in 1016, shortly before King Canute’s fleet arrived to besiege the city. In all, Æthelred’s six tribute payments to the Vikings totaled around 155,000 Anglo-Saxon pounds. In his book, The Pound: A Biography, author David Sinclair estimated that a single Anglo-Saxon pound from the day of Æthelred the Unready could purchase 15 cows. If that calculation is correct, then the Vikings would have been able to purchase a massive cattle herd numbering 2,325,000 animals with all of the money given to them by Æthelred the Unready.

Written by C. Keith Hansley.

Picture Attribution: (Miniature of Æthelred the Unready from MS Royal 14 B VI, placed in front of a image of bags of money from pixabay.com, both [Public Domain] via Creative Commons).

Sources:

• The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle translated by Benjamin Thorpe in 1861 and republished by Cambridge University Press, 2012.
• Asser’s Life of King Alfred and Other Contemporary Sources translated, introduced and denoted by Simon Keynes and Michael Lapidge. New York: Penguin Classics, 2004. 
• https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ethelred-the-Unready 
• https://www.britroyals.com/kings.asp?id=ethelred2 
• https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-26169070 
• https://www.britannica.com/biography/Olaf-Tryggvason 
• https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofEngland/Sweyn-Forkbeard/ 
• https://englishhistory.net/vikings/sweyn-forkbeard/ 
• https://www.britannica.com/biography/Canute-I  

The Great Athenian Baiting Of Syracuse

In 415 BCE, a fleet of over 130 Athenian and allied trireme ships, accompanied by more than a hundred supply boats, reached the eastern shores of Sicily on the pretext of combating the potential threat posed by Syracuse. While most Sicilian communities on that stretch of coastline wanted nothing to do with the Athenian expedition, the cities of Naxos and Catana allowed the foreigners into their walls, albeit the latter city took some coercion. After expelling the minority pro-Syracusan party in Catana, the Athenians built their camp there, reportedly housing more than 7,000 hoplites, skirmishers and some cavalry in or around the premises.

At least one prominent member of the pro-Syracusan party managed to stay behind in Catana. The unnamed man began taking notes about the Athenian forces, such as repetitious schedules, the locations of armories and even the positioning of their sleeping quarters. After memorizing such details, the man departed from Catana and rushed to Syracuse. As the refugee was a well-known member of the downfallen pro-Syracusan party in Catana, the contacts that he had in Syracuse vouched for his loyalty, and the military leaders of the city took his words with all seriousness. Once allowed to speak, he vividly described to the Syracusans the layout of the Athenian camp, as well as their daily routine. He claimed that the camp became especially lazy at night and that the Athenian warriors would leave their weapons outside the city walls while they slept without their armor in makeshift barracks within Catana. In addition to this, the informant also swore that there was still a spirited pro-Syracuse core of the population in Catana that would betray the Athenians if given a chance.

After being told these details, the military of Syracuse fell into a bloodlust. They assumed that a night attack, or an assault at dawn, would result in the Athenians being cut off from their weaponry and ships. If the foreigners were caught unprepared, the enemy ships and weapons outside the walls could easily be torched and then the unarmed Athenians in their stockades would not be able to avoid being slaughtered by a Syracusan assault. Thinking it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, the Syracusans mobilized virtually their entire army, and, with any allied forces they had on hand, they began marching overland toward Catana.

It was a fairly slow march for the warriors of Syracuse, but their cavalry was out ahead scouting the region. When the mounted warriors reached Catana, they discovered a horrible sight—there was no sign of life in the Athenian camp at Catana. All of the foreigners were gone and the large Athenian fleet was nowhere to be seen. Taking in this unsettling information, the scouts rushed back to their army to relay the news. When the generals of Syracuse were briefed on the scene at Catana, they immediately turned the army around and began a forced march home to Syracuse.

Unfortunately for the leaders of Syracuse, they had not questioned how the informant from Catana had survived the Athenian purge of dissidents and they similarly did not investigate his supposed escape from the tight Athenian occupation of the city.  Furthermore, they had not devoted enough time to discovering if his information about the Athenians in Catana was credible. It was a costly mistake—according to the Athenian general and historian, Thucydides (c. 460-400), the informant from Catana had defected to the Athenian side and had been sent to Syracuse by the leaders of the Athenian expedition specifically to sow disinformation.

Although Syracuse had hoped to catch the foreigners in a trap, it was the Syracusans who had fallen victim to a ploy. While the entire army of Syracuse set out on a long march to Catana, the Athenians were simultaneously sailing their whole force to the now defenseless Syracusan homeland. By the time the forces of Syracuse realized that they had been duped, they had already marched a great distance away from their city and it would take time for them to rush home.

Luckily for the Syracusans, the defenses of their city were intimidating even without a full garrison manning the walls. When the Athenians and their allies disembarked outside of Syracuse, they decided to not assault the city but instead focused on choosing a defensible location and devoted themselves to building camp fortifications. It took so long for the Syracusan army to return home that the Athenians were given enough time to demolish a bridge, build a stockade around their ships and construct a makeshift stone fort. Moreover, this was all constructed on land specifically chosen to counteract Syracuse’s vast cavalry superiority.

When the army of Syracuse finally arrived, they besieged the Athenian camp, but did not attack on the first day. On the second day, however, both sides prepared for battle. According to Thucydides, the commanding general in charge of the Athenian forces for the battle was Nicias. Even though the Athenians had spent a lot of time fortifying their position, Nicias apparently decided to make the first move. Perhaps the Syracusans had been lured into unfavorable ground, but Nicias reportedly marched his men forward to ignite a pitched battle.

Despite all of the drama, buildup and pre-battle maneuvering, the actual armed clash outside of the city of Syracuse did not last long. According to Thucydides, the battle was initially a stalemate, but as the men began to fatigue, the experience that the Athenians and their allies had picked up during the Peloponnesian War (begun in 431) began to sway the battle in their favor. After a while, the Syracusan infantry lines began to give way under pressure, and they became so disjointed that the army of Syracuse was ultimately split in half. After the Syracusan line was broken, it did not take long for the spirit of the army to break completely. With the forces of Syracuse fleeing for the safety of their walls, the Athenians were victorious.

Fortunately for Syracuse, the battle was more of a psychological defeat than a physical massacre. According to Thucydides, the Syracusan cavalry survived the battle virtually unscathed and they provided cover and support while the rest of the army fled to the city. As a result, even though the army of Syracuse had been routed, there were only 260 reported lives lost on the Syracusan side of the battle. Interestingly, the Athenians were content with the damage they had done in the battle and decided not to do anything else against Syracuse for the time being. Instead, the Athenian warriors returned to their fleet and sailed back to Catana for the winter.

As for the battle’s blow on the morale of the Syracusans, the city took the defeat as a teaching moment and strove to take the war more seriously. In response to the battle, a council of three generals reportedly took control in Syracuse to whip their city into shape militarily and diplomatically for the war to come.

Written by C. Keith Hansley.

Picture Attribution: (a trireme from a panel of the Temple of Isis, Pompeii; Naples Archaeological Museum, Italy, [Public Domain] via Creative Commons).

Sources:

• History of the Peloponnesian War (Book IV) by Thucydides, translated by Rex Warner and introduced by M. I. Finley. New York: Penguin Classics, 1972.