Assandun 1016

Category: Dark Age Battles

Saxon Edmund Ironside advanced from London against raiding Danes under Knut/Cnut/Canute. The Danes were caught by suprise and forced either to fight or to abandon their fleet, which was at Burnham on Crouch. Cnut's initial hill position is commemorated by the name of the village to the east of the battlefield - Canewdon. The two armies seem both to have advanced into contact on a lower hill between Ashingdon and Canewdon. Edmund's treacherous Mercian vassal Eadric held off from the action, giving the Danes the victory, and making England for the next 25 years part of their great North Sea empire.