JS observes that the BBC is attempting to completely eradicate the real history of British invasions. At this rate, it won’t be long before they’re not only denying Bede, but trying to write Caesar’s Commentaries out of the historical record as well.
After watching the first Voxiversity episode (well done, btw), by chance I watched a series of BBC documentaries on “Arthurian Britain” which argued the opposite occurred in Britain: that there were no invasions, that the native British gradually accepted the multicultural influences of continental culture with no disruption to daily life and they all lived happily ever after.
King Arthur’s Britain (Roman Britain Documentary)
I say “argued”, in fact the series is a transparent exercise in persuasive rhetoric verging at times on outright propaganda. I have been an amateur student of the period for many years and my own conclusion is that there is not enough available evidence to ever come to any conclusions. The best it can do is inspire fiction.
The well-spoken, avuncular presenter starts with a fully constructed straw-man; that current history insists Britain collapsed into the Dark Ages in 410 AD when the Roman legions left. Overnight, people fled the towns and returned to subsistence farming, forgot how to read and write while woodlands reclaimed the land. He then goes on to “prove” that this didn’t happen and that it was merely the interpretation of Victorian imperialists who saw themselves as Rome reborn and wanted to emphasise the dangers of removing imperial power.
Over the three episodes, various experts deconstruct and reinterpret the scant, available evidence to show that there was no Anglo-Saxon invasion and no population replacement. Genetic evidence showing that the indigenous people were driven west into Wales while continental people settled in the east was dismissed out of hand because one other study showed something different and the presenter himself didn’t believe it.
I’m no rhetorician but even I recognised the fallacious language used throughout e.g. “There is no evidence, but this is what must have happened,’ when it supported his thesis, “There is no evidence so it must be wrong,” when it didn’t as he insisted throughout that he was telling you the “real” story etc.
Bede’s “The Ecclesiastical History of the English People” was dismissed as a complete fiction by a young, female expert who concluded that there were never any Anglo-Saxons in Britain, consequently there never were any English and that Bede made the whole thing up and reinvented history.
The projection was palpable. The fact that they were arguing their central thesis, that everything we believe is wrong because previous generations interpreted the evidence to support their political biases, by overtly manipulating the evidence to support their own political bias seems to sail right over their heads. They state that there never was a pure British race (which the presenter paradoxically argues in support of half the time) and you can guess the final conclusion, can’t you?
“The real people of Britain AD did not only survive an influx of foreign influences but actually flourished because of it.”
Diversity is our strength!
It descends into farce at the end as former socialist politician, Robin Cook explains that Chicken Tikka Masala is the English national dish as it represents the rich, diverse people that the English have always been. Literally saying at one point, “… what makes Britain great, makes Britain strong is not purity, it is our diversity…”
I understand you might not have time to watch the series but I think it could make an interesting “compare and contrast” exercise for the Voxiversity viewership.