The Battle of Britain - Brunanburgh was it local?

[katharine]

John A Clayton's book "The Valley of the Drawn Sword" is a great read & has a good record of what little is known of the Battle of Brunanburgh in 937. The case for it being fought somewhere near Worsthorne is very strong indeed.

[BazzaSoft]

Originally Posted by Darkstar

Walton's spire used to be a monolith, but the land owner A.T. Roe (sp?) had a stone mason dress it and add the spire as he thought it was a pagan site. Nearby is/was Nave hill farm which has what looks like a burial mound, it is possible that this was viking in origin, as the name is nave hill not knave as some spell it. A nave is the curved part inside a church which is roughly boat shaped, Therefore it is possibly a ship burial or ship type burial (as in Sutton Hoo) there are also 2 round barrows very near. If this is so then buried there could be 7 viking jarls (earls) and 5 minor kings.
I think that the burnley area is a definate possibility for the battle, which incidently wouldn't have been a pitched battle but more a series of running skirmishers, most of the evidence is conjecture but, Aethelston was king of Mercia he annexed the kingdom of Northumbria at. At the time of the battle Constantine king of the picts marched down to Mercia, the Irish vikings came over to England and sailed up the Ribble, the Yorkshire vikings came over the border and Athelston marched north past Wales where he also kicked ***. It seems logical that this area would be the meeting place for the various armies.

Sorry about the lenght of this post, but it is a subject i am very interested in, there is a lot more that could be said but this is not an essay lol.

I saw your reference to Nave Hill and an upturned-boat-shaped burial mound. There are similar neolithic mounds in Minorca, the most famous of which is called Naveta d'Estudons.
The similarity of name may be only coincidental but interesting nonetheless.

[steveearby]

interesting facts not discussed by the academics are considering the amount of man power on the move was immense this was also know as the battle of seven kings thats seven armies thats troops stores logistics stock and families times that by seven and you have an amazing amount of people all on the move from different directions the only way to move such numbers was to travel in river valleys and over well established track the long causeway is an option as is the ribble and calder valleys. castercliffe gives good view over the causway and the valleys surrounding the area. secondly lets just imagine Athelstan decided to split his forces and head north up either side of the pennines to conserve his force and to speed up movement this could explain the possibility of skirmishes in the wirrel the derbyshire area south Yorkshire area and the humber area once the main forces of Constantine where encounter both foces could have been brought together via the long causeway over clivage this would explain why the kings forces manipulated a six day delay before the battle I am of the opinion that the battle site was in this area my theory was based on local knowledge and my interest in military history and logistics reading the book valley of the draw sword mirrored my thoughts and made my perspective more feasible. would be willing to sit down with a team and try to find the site anyone interested in getting together to make history and find proof of the location of the site drop me a line steve.earby@hotmail.co.uk

[katharine]

I have received a reply from the BBC to my question "What is your evidence for siting the battle of Brunanburgh on the Mersey estuary for the new series "History of Scotland" presented by Neil Oliver. It is a triumph of corporate waffle but they say they do not have the time or resources to to the necessary research to answer my query. Hmm...