AS Conquest

[Ray Hendon]

----- Original Message -----
From: "David L. White" <dlwhite at texas.net>

>Enslavment (or enserfment) is much more profitable than extermination/
>expulsion, and is the general practice of conquerors.  People do not risk
>their lives so that they can spend the rest of them looking at the back siide
>of an ox.

>From my limited study of Saxons, Jutes and Angles, slavery (in the Roman
sense of definition) was not practiced among these peoples.  Their "slaves"
were local people who had been such bad farmers that they could not take
care of their families and had to assign themselves to another member of the
tribal group.  Furthermore, their "slaves" were not doomed to be permanently
enslaved.  They could dig themselves out of slavery and resume their normal
life as a citizen if they prospered under the domain of their master.

Furthermore, I am not certain, but it looks to me as if the farming and
hunting conditions of England were not especially suited for slave
ownership.  Slaves were tradtionally used in enterprises where the
production of the slave was so high as to be able to support not only the
physical needs of the slave but have a substantial surplus for the owner to
enjoy.  This is the reason that farms in early New England were unsuitable
for slaves.  Large farms with highly productive soil or mines with valuable
mineral deposits might be suitable for slaves, but not small land parcels of
typical AS farms and woodlands.

One other note on the process of the AS incursion and the development of
English: It is quite apparent that the AS people brought their women with
them, so that the language of the new-born would be that of the mother.  If
they had taken local wives, then the Celtic language would have had a much
longer life and would seemingly influence the new language that would
ultimately develop from the migration.

To me these suppositions and inferences point to the Celts being either
killed or completely displaced by the invaders.  But I am open to other
possibilities.