East Anglia
East Anglia is a region of eastern
England, named after one of the ancient
Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, which was named after the homeland of the Angles,
Angeln in northern
Germany. The kingdom consisted of
Norfolk and
Suffolk but the region's boundaries are vague. It includes the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, with part or all of the pre-
April 1 1974 Cambridgeshire. Some people include
Essex - sometimes only the northern part thereof - and a small part of southern
Lincolnshire bordering
The Wash. Some of the area is characterised by its flatness, consisting of
fenland and reclaimed
marshland, though much of Suffolk comprises gently rolling hills. East Anglia forms part of the
East of England administrative region.
Arable
farming and
horticulture have proven very successful in this fertile country. The landscape has been heavily influenced by
Dutch technology, from the influx of
clay pantiles to the draining of the fens. It has a wide range of small-scale holiday destinations ranging from traditional coastal resorts, through historic towns such as
Bury St Edmunds,
Cambridge and
Ely to the modern holiday villas of
Center Parcs set in
Thetford Forest. The
Royal Air Force constructed many
airfields during
World War II and a few of these remain in use. One, near
Norwich, has become
Norwich International Airport, a civilian airfield to serve the city.
The
Norfolk and Suffolk Broads, now part of
The Broads National Park, form a network of
waterways between Norwich and the coast and are popular for recreational boating.
The
University of East Anglia lies about two miles west-southwest of
Norwich.
Norwich is the largest city in East Anglia, but the East of England regional assembly is based in
Bury St. Edmunds,
Suffolk.
Possibly the best candidate for arms of East Anglia are sometimes described as those of the
Wuffingas Dynasty - three crowns in a blue shield, the colour of the Swedish flag, superimposed on a
St. George's cross - but in fact that device was created in homage to an old legend of the three crowns of East Anglia and the blue colour represents the Anglo-Scandinavian heritage of much of East Anglia. The East Anglian flag as it is known today was invented by George Henry Langham and adopted by the London Society of East Anglians. It was first mentioned in print in 1900 and was flown locally in various places in Norfolk, but was not known widely even at the time it was invented. The crowns also appear in the arms of the borough of Bury St. Edmunds, and the University of East Anglia. [
1], [
2].
The
Kingdom of the East Angles, formed about the year
520 by the merging of the North and the South Folk, was one of the seven Anglo-Saxon
heptarchy kingdoms (as defined in the
12th century writings of
Henry of Huntingdon). For a brief period following a victory over the rival kingdom of
Northumbria around the year
616, East Anglia was the most powerful of the
Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England, and its king
Raedwald was
Bretwalda. But this did not last: over the next forty years, East Anglia was defeated by the
Mercians three times, and it continued to weaken relative to the other kingdoms until in
794,
Offa of Mercia had its king
Aethelbert killed and took control of the kingdom himself.
The independence of the East Anglians was restored by a successful rebellion against Mercia (
825 -
827), in course of which two Mercian kings were killed attempting to crush it. On
November 20,
870 the
Danes killed King
Edmund and took the Kingdom, which they named East Anglia (see
Ivar the Boneless). The Saxons retook the area in
920, only to lose it again in
1015-
1017, when it was conquered by
Canute the Great and given as a
fiefdom in
1017 to
Thorkel the High.
Much of East Anglia (including parts of
Cambridgeshire,
Lincolnshire, west
Norfolk, and
Suffolk), consisted of
marshland and
bogs until the 17th century despite the construction of early sea barriers by the
Roman Empire. During the 17th century the
alluvial land was converted into
arable land by means of systematic drainage using a collection of drains and river diversions.
*
Kings of East Anglia*
EASF*
Pride of Anglia
