In Defence of the Dark Ages

Why it’s okay to say bad things were bad

We live in an exciting time for fans of early medieval history.

For decades the period between the fall of the Roman empire in Britain and the rise of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms (roughly 410–600AD) has been especially murky. It is almost the last great, unknown frontier in British history — certainly the most well known and talked about.

But over the last ten years or so, we’ve seen big developments largely driven by archaeology. It now seems there was no great…