Who Was Alfred the Great?

Alfred the Great was the last of four brothers to be King of Wessex, before taking the title King of the Anglo-Saxons. He kept his Kingdom safe from Viking invaders, built defenses unseen in Britain since the time of the Romans, and restored much of England's intellectual standards after the destruction of her places of learning.

But who really was Alfred the Great?

Subscribe for more history:

Get updates on Twitter:

Watch More:

Music:

Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

[chipsthedog]

The last kingdom is actually quite accurate for a TV show as well as being mad entertaining. King Alfred is amazing in the show as my favourite quote goes "you can't beat him because the bastard thinks"

[pushingprofound]

Anyone else here after listening to Hacks From the Past podcast?! I'm seriously obsessed with Alfred the Great now, can't get enough. The man had an indomitable spirit and his story is inspiring.

[obi-wankenobi]

But Uhtred of Bebanburgh will not be mentionned...

[julianmarsh]

As an old man, I find it sad that in American public education, history books now ignore Alfred, sometimes altogether. When I was young, there he was, right after reading of Charlemagne...now, all gone...or, almost all gone ( I shouldn't generalize so sharply)...Alfred is the only British king to be called 'the Great' and for good reason; he did not simply unite the Anglo-Saxons together and stalemate the Vikings; he also tried to revive civilization.

[twitts]

The first king of England was Alfred's grandson, Ethelstan, son of Edward.

[lehistoryconnoisseur]

A great but forgotten king of England. Even here in England.

I for one never learned about him in School till last year. (i knew of him before that from private study) But the fact that i wasn't taught till than goes into a deeper problem that History in general is massively under taught

[Wolfen]

Amazing story, The Last Kingdom in my opinion does a better job describing real history than Vikings.

[deepakpatrick]

I watched this video because of last kingdom series ♥️♥️♥️..


Video is good ✌️✌️

[carcaperu]

0:35 That guy is unquestionably an ancestor of Boris Johnson.

[AnonYmous-lkqy]

Wow, absolutely excellent video. Very clear with the pictures and animations, thanks very much.

[TriviaNight]

Very interesting video! Always enjoy learning more about European history!

[snazzyquizzes]

Good video about an underrated era of history.

I'm not being nitpicky, but I just thought you might like to know this: you know that symbol ae used in Anglo-Saxon names? They call it an ash and apparently you pronounce it like the a in 'hat'. So for a name like Aethelflaed, you would pronounce it 'Athelflad' not 'Ethelflade' like a lot of people do. I've seen a few vids about the Dark Ages in the past and plenty of people don't know this.

[ashleypenn]

Perfect for our homeschool unit. Thanks for sharing.

[Digmen]

Yes I enjoyed it
A real voice for a change
As a proud Englishman, I should know more of our early history.
It looks like we owe a lot to Afred the great with those burghs etc

[thanos_karagiannhs]

Though Aelfred is known as "the father" of England seeing as he kept the kingdom of Wessex alive during the Viking invasion so that there could one day BE and England, her first king was either his grandson Aethelstan, or William the conqueror who sailed across the narrow sea of france and brittain with an army in order to conquer her.

[alyinthevalley]

im just here because im watching The Last kingdom and wanted a lil more history on it :)

[Digmen]

Two things I think we need to know more about
How many Angles and Saxons actually invaded Britain after the Roman left.
Did they completly push the Britons into Wales etc or did they intermarry and just replace the language and culture?
I think that one day DNA etc will help us find out the truth

[FlawedFabrications]

Just a quick correction: the Anglo-Saxons never drove the Britons out of England. They ruled and interbred with them, eventually changing their language and culture, but there was never a population replacement.

[remy]

very helpful will definitely subscribe

[zaynisaac]

I subscribed and liked this vid and this is cool