Romano-Britains repulse the Saxon invasions

Pellaeon

Banned
So after the romans departed in 410 AD the saxon invasions began in earnest and continued for the next two centuries or so. What if the romano-britains had driven them back into the sea? How would Britain have gone from there? Could it have unified perhaps under the Romano-British elite and appointed some sort of emperor or imperator of the Britannia?

Is this possible?
 
Hmm. Well it is worth noting that ethnic identity in this time was fairly malleable. Although he was likely a legendary figure, Cerdic, the alleged first king of Wessex had a Brythonic name. Indeed, this name isn't too dissimilar from the Caratacus that Claudius captured. His successors also had Brythonic names.

I would imagine that much of the conquest consisted of British notables assimilating into the aristocracies of the incoming Anglo-Saxon invaders.
 
The Romano-Britons don't have the military forces or the unity to stop Germanic incursion and settlement. There's a reason large numbers of them were recruited as mercenaries as Roman legions dwindled.
There was probably also a population drop following the plague.
However, settlement can be limited if there's a larger native recruitment and single military command who delay Angle and Saxon control of the Thames valley.
 
Isn’t there some historical revision/analysis that suggests the actual migratory presence was a vanishingly small amount of invaders that established themselves the ruling class after having been invited in as mercenaries?
 
Isn’t there some historical revision/analysis that suggests the actual migratory presence was a vanishingly small amount of invaders that established themselves the ruling class after having been invited in as mercenaries?
I think so.
The situation is complicated because you have some settlement and some elite replacement at different times and places with not much evidence to differentiate them. DNA analysis certainly points to a lower settlement than would be expected if a simple invasion with explusion/genocide occurred.
Personally I equate it as similar to the Danish invasion - both elite replacement and settlement occurring wherever possible - but with a higher emphasis on language replacement.
 
The Romano-Britons don't have the military forces or the unity to stop Germanic incursion and settlement. There's a reason large numbers of them were recruited as mercenaries as Roman legions dwindled.

They managed to hold out for the better part of two centuries. Whilst we don't know enough to tell what exactly caused their final defeat, I don't think it's too unlikely to suggest them winning.
 
They managed to hold out for the better part of two centuries. Whilst we don't know enough to tell what exactly caused their final defeat, I don't think it's too unlikely to suggest them winning.
Where did you get that 200 years from?
Germanic settlement start in the same century that the legions left - the exact timescale depends when you class Britain as post Roman and when you class the laeti settlements as gateways for the invaders.
See here for a list of maps detailing the history of Britain.
It's fairly clear that the lack of administrative and military unity between the post Roman states in Britain were what enabled most of it to fall to the Anglo-Saxons over the following centuries.

Edit: to have any chance of deflecting the immigration Britain needs a single military administration across the generations so that the mist fertile lands are retained and any foothold established is isolated and can be removed later.
 
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Isn’t there some historical revision/analysis that suggests the actual migratory presence was a vanishingly small amount of invaders that established themselves the ruling class after having been invited in as mercenaries?

I will throw a huge caveat in on this one- most of what I know about Post-Roman Britain comes from the History of Britain podcast. There is a modern view, backed by DNA analysis of modern Britons, that the Romano-British never left or were killed off. They just rapidly shifted their cultural identity following the departure of the Roman administration. This change in ethno-genesis meant that a grandfather may have saw himself as Roman, a father as a Briton, and a the son as Anglo-Saxon.
 
I will throw a huge caveat in on this one- most of what I know about Post-Roman Britain comes from the History of Britain podcast. There is a modern view, backed by DNA analysis of modern Britons, that the Romano-British never left or were killed off. They just rapidly shifted their cultural identity following the departure of the Roman administration. This change in ethno-genesis meant that a grandfather may have saw himself as Roman, a father as a Briton, and a the son as Anglo-Saxon.
Not in the board game "Britannia" they don't. :) The Romano Brits last as long as the Angles and Saxons cannot be bothered to squash them. No chance of "changing sides."

In some respects that would make sense; towns occupied by Angles and Saxons retain their Roman name. On the other hand in the 6th century at any rate there is very little trade between the British controlled areas and those by the Angles and Saxons.
 
The 'Forts of the Saxon Shore' did well for quite a long time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saxon_Shore

I didn't realise there was an equivalent set-up on the French side, along the then-Gaul coast.

What you need is a truly charismatic 'Governor' with written authority from Rome to raise and maintain local legions, auxiliaries, light & heavy cavalry etc etc specifically for the Saxon Shore 'in perpetuum', rather than the 'ad hoc' of OTL. Institutions endure. The legend of 'King Arthur' may date to such. The trick is not to collapse into faction fights due local politics...
 
I will throw a huge caveat in on this one- most of what I know about Post-Roman Britain comes from the History of Britain podcast. There is a modern view, backed by DNA analysis of modern Britons, that the Romano-British never left or were killed off. They just rapidly shifted their cultural identity following the departure of the Roman administration. This change in ethno-genesis meant that a grandfather may have saw himself as Roman, a father as a Briton, and a the son as Anglo-Saxon.
What about the North ? And Wales ?
 
What about the North ? And Wales ?

From as near as I can understand:

The Proto-Picts and Proto-Scots are and were the descendants of the of the original Britonish. That is to say the pre-Romano-British Celts that were on the island before Caesar arrived. The Proto-Picts/Scots never were subject to Romanization as the Romans never made it up there. The Proto-Welsh were the re-Celtified Romano-British, and weren't subject to Saxonization.
 
Honorius telling the Brits to look to their own defences in 410 to Battle of Deorham in 577, which marked the point when most of modern-day England fell into Saxon hands.
The battle marked when the southwest was cut off from the other Britons and wasn't really the last point that the Britons could then expel the Angles and Saxons who had been gaining ground steadily. Albeit a loss could be useful.
 
The battle marked when the southwest was cut off from the other Britons and wasn't really the last point that the Britons could then expel the Angles and Saxons who had been gaining ground steadily. Albeit a loss could be useful.

All the sources I've read seem to consider this the moment when the Saxon conquest became truly irrevocable, although given the poor state of our information we can't really know for sure. Regardless, though, the Britons still did better than the other Roman provincials -- Gaul, Spain, etc., all fell as soon as the Roman armies were defeated; Britain was one of the few places where the provincials were able to successfully organise their own defence for some time.
 
All the sources I've read seem to consider this the moment when the Saxon conquest became truly irrevocable, although given the poor state of our information we can't really know for sure. Regardless, though, the Britons still did better than the other Roman provincials -- Gaul, Spain, etc., all fell as soon as the Roman armies were defeated; Britain was one of the few places where the provincials were able to successfully organise their own defence for some time.
If they'd won it would just have been like Badon - a peace that stops the Saxons but doesn't roll them back. The Britons lost the chance to roll them back when they lost the Thames Valley.
While the Britons certainly defended themselves well, compared to other provinces, they still needed that military unity to keep the invaders at bay.
 

Brunaburh

Gone Fishin'
The battle marked when the southwest was cut off from the other Britons and wasn't really the last point that the Britons could then expel the Angles and Saxons who had been gaining ground steadily. Albeit a loss could be useful.

We know frighteningly little about the process of the Anglo-Saxon conquest, the battle of Dyrham was important because it almost certainly led to the integration of British Hwicce into Mercia and broke the power of the urban centres of the region around Gloucestershire, Somerset and the Chilterns.

I would actually put the key date for near irreversible Anglo-Saxon cultural dominance of all of today's England at 617, and the conquest of British Elmet around Leeds and the Pennines. Having said that, Cadwallon of Gwynedd's conquest of Northumbria in 634 could have been enough to create a strong Northern polity which could have led to a British reconquest of south central England, or an eventual partition of Britain into 4 kingdoms rather than 3. There were clear British elements in Anglo-Saxon elites in Mercia at this time, and there would be in Wessex until the 8th century. The population of Anglo-Saxon England (outside the South-East) must have contained British-speaking elements up to the Viking era.

Of course we don't know enough about how strong or big Elmet was, or what Cadwallon's plan was, to be sure of this.
 
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We know frighteningly little about the process of the Anglo-Saxon conquest, the battle of Dyrham was important because it almost certainly led to the integration of British Hwicce into Mercia and broke the power of the urban centres of the region around Gloucestershire, Somerset and the Chilterns.

I would actually put the key date for near irreversible Anglo-Saxon cultural dominance of all of today's England at 617, and the conquest of British Elmet around Leeds and the Pennines. Having said that, Cadwallon of Gwynedd's conquest of Northumbria in 634 could have been enough to create a strong Northern polity which could have led to a British reconquest of south central England, or an eventual partition of Britain into 4 kingdoms rather than 3. There were clear British elements in Anglo-Saxon elites in Mercia at this time, and there would be in Wessex until the 8th century. The population of Anglo-Saxon England (outside the South-East) must have contained British-speaking elements up to the Viking era.

Of course we don't know enough about how strong or big Elmet was, or what Cadwallon's plan was, to be sure of this.
Some fair points.

Still not enough to remove/absorb the Angles and Saxons completely which was the impression I was given as being possible by the 200 years comments.

I apologise if I've been arguing too strongly to give an impression of Anglo-Saxon inevitability in complete dominance. However, it does appear to me that due to the lack of permanent unity among the post Roman states in Britain the best the Roman-Briton culture can hope to retain is the western 2/3 rather than the 1/5 they ended up with, and even that feels too optimistic to me.
 

Brunaburh

Gone Fishin'
Some fair points.

Still not enough to remove/absorb the Angles and Saxons completely which was the impression I was given as being possible by the 200 years comments.

I apologise if I've been arguing too strongly to give an impression of Anglo-Saxon inevitability in complete dominance. However, it does appear to me that due to the lack of permanent unity among the post Roman states in Britain the best the Roman-Briton culture can hope to retain is the western 2/3 rather than the 1/5 they ended up with, and even that feels too optimistic to me.

No need whatsoever to apologise. Your view is entirely reasonable given the evidence, as is mine, as is that of others. Which tells us a lot about the paucity of evidence!

The date I'm giving here is an absolute cutoff date, but elite Anglo-Saxons with Celtic influenced names disappear in Mercia by about 690 (Welsh borders excepted), Northumbria by 720 and Wessex by about 780. Conversion and the virulent rejection of Celtic Christianity we see in Bede seems to have caused a strong reassertion of Anglo-Saxon identity in Mercia and Northumbria, and from that point we can say that AS identity was firmly established and pretty much unchallengeable by anybody already in Britain by around 700.

The PODs post 550 require an implausible amount of things to happen in the South and the Midlands in order to preserve anything more than Cheshire, Shropshire and bits of Herefordshire, Gloucs, Devon and the area around Glastonbury. I'd say the north is more open, a POD of 550 could strangle Northumbria almost at birth, setting up a century of *Gogledd v Mercia and Pictland and Dalriada. OTL Northumbria would have got most of Scotland if it hadn't been for Nechtansmere, so that would be an intriguing prospect.
 
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