In the year age 77, a vast host of Scandinavian raiders under the sea king Guthrum

treacherously broke their truce with Alfred of Wessex and thundered across his kingdom on horseback

to capture the town of Exeter, an important regional power base in the far west of the kingdom.

Wessex was the last Anglo-Saxon kingdom to stand firm against the Great Heathen army that had swept England in a blitzkrieg since the 860s,

yet it now stood alone against the oncoming storm from across the sea,

and increasingly from within Britain itself.

Guthrum's decision to cross Wessex in its entirety on horseback to capture Exeter in the far west,

rather than any of the other royal centres, remains a perplexing one when taken at face value.

Yet despite what the Christian writers of the time had to say about the unorganised, heathen horde from beyond the sea,

Scandinavians, in fact, tended to be shrewd tacticians. had to say about the unorganized, heathen horde from beyond the sea.

Scandinavians, in fact, tended to be shrewd tacticians.

They only struck when they felt that they had the advantage,

and if possible, when their enemies were at as much of a disadvantage as possible.

Sure, they wanted to raid, and to make war,

but only when they felt assured of victory,

or when they absolutely had to fight.

Guthrum, the new de facto leader of the army, was thus the shrewdest and cleverest of the lot.

His decision to take Exeter, therefore, must have been a premeditated one.

Had he planned to link up with the Britons of Dumnonia in order to face the West Saxons.

For centuries, the Britons of Cornwall had been engaged in a state of almost perpetual warfare with Wessex,

and Scandinavians are known to have allied with them on occasion during the reigns of Alfred's predecessors from the 830s onwards.

Exeter, situated near the old border between the West Saxons and the Britons, was a town already well known to Scandinavians. It also provided options for Guthrum should he need to retreat.

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