This book is a study of the exercise of royal authority before the Norman Conquest. Six centuries separate the 'adventus Saxonum' from the battle of Hastings: during those long years, the English kings changed from warlords, who exacted submission by force, into law-givers to whom obedience was a moral duty. In the process, they created many of the administrative institutes which continued to serve their successors. They also created England: the united kingdom of the English people.

ANN WILLIAMS is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of East Anglia, UK.

Preface
Abbreviations
Chronology
Genealogical Tables
Through a Glass Darkly: The Origins of English Kingship
The Time of the Warlords
The Shadow of Mercia
Strategies of Power
All the King's Men
Out of the North: The Impact of the Vikings
The Making of England
Rule and Conflict, 978-1066
The Ill-Counselled King
The Danish Conquest
Authority and Ambition, 1042-66
Index.