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96 VOKK.<br />

were seen in the Humber, and they advanced as far<br />

as York, of which they took possession. In 869,<br />

East Anglia was completely in their power : it became<br />

a Danish Kingdom, and was the first distinct Danish<br />

settlement in England. Predatory incursions were<br />

made from time to time in different directions, the<br />

churches and monasteries being special objects of<br />

attack.<br />

In 876, Halfdene entered Northumbria with<br />

his forces. This was no mere piratical descent for<br />

the sake of plunder. It was with a view to settled<br />

occupation. The inhabitants were too terror-stricken<br />

to offer any actual resistance. The invader assumed<br />

the dominion of the country, parcelled it out, and<br />

began to cultivate tracts of land within its limits<br />

which had long lain waste and untilled. AVe may<br />

j)robably date from this period the Danish names of<br />

places which are so common in many parts of the<br />

northern counties.<br />

From the time of Eanbald s death in 812 to the<br />

end of the century, and for certainly the first two<br />

decades of the succeeding one, the ecclesiastical<br />

history<br />

of Northumbria is in utter obscurity. The names<br />

of successive Archbishops are preserved, but very<br />

little is known of them. The country must have been<br />

in a most lamentable state, and in many parts, probably,<br />

the public ministrations of religion were altogether<br />

laid aside, Christianity itself preserving but a<br />

precarious and feeble existence. The most interesting<br />

records relating to the Church of York which<br />

have been preserved occur in the letters addressed<br />

by Lupus, the Abbot of Ferrieres, to Wigmund, who<br />

became Archbishop about the year 837. They are

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