Post-Roman Britannia

 In honour of the Olympic Games in London

The modern day British Isles are often seen as a very well-to-do region with booming infrastructures and successful economies. However well over a thousand years ago, soon after the Romans left the barbaric isles, the land fell into a war-torn frontier --  a clashing grounds for ethnicities and religions.

There were three main sections of the Isles at that time. Hibernia (Ireland) Caledonia (Scotland) and Britannia (Wales, England). Hadrian's Wall, or what remained of it, separated The northern Picts from the southern tribes. The tribes warred against each other, and against the invaders from the north, and the Scoti from Ireland. The tribes were almost always in a brutal struggle to survive. Then the final straw landed: The Anglo-Saxons. The Anglo-Saxons were frontiersmen of a sort, and many came as a means to spread the Gospel of Christianity to the barbaric tribes of Britannia. They also came as hired blades. The Tribes of Britannia, invited and even paid the Anglo-Saxons to fight the Picts and Scoti.  The Angles and the Saxons (from the modern-day regions of Angeln and Lower Saxony in Germany), as well as the Jutes (probably from Jutland in modern day Denmark), all came to inhabit the land for their own reasons. However, the Anglo-Saxons found themselves ill-content with what was given to them by the Britannic Tribes.  Eventually their power far surpassed the quablling tribes and the Britannic peoples were now fighting against the Picts from the north, the Scoti from the west, the Anglo-Saxons from the south and east, and they also fought against each other. It was times like these where great unifiers (Like King Arthur) were born and fought against the invaders. The Anglo-Saxons brought Christianity that mixed with the religions of the natives known only as "pagan."

Best Map I could find for Britannia in the year 500A.D. The Angles (purple) , Saxons (grey), and Jutes(white) are already consuming half of Britannia.

 The Anglos and Saxons ruled Britannia until the mid 11th century when The Norman Invasions took place and William the Conqueror took Britain for himself and defeated Harold Godwinson, last Anglo-Saxon King and Harold Hardrada, the Norwegian Viking King.

Since that time The Isles have never been completely unified, and Britain the larger Island was unified under the United Kingdom in 1707. Well actually back then it was referred to as the Kingdom of Great Britain.

Hope you like this British History, Enjoy the games!