| Battle of Ringmere Heath | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of the Viking invasions of England | |||||
| |||||
| Belligerents | |||||
| Anglo-Saxons |
 Danish Vikings | ||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||
| Ulfcytel Snillingr |
Thorkell the Tall Possibly Olaf Haraldsson | ||||
52°28′30″N 0°49′30″E / 52.475°N 0.825°E
The Battle of Ringmere was fought on 5 May 1010 between an East Anglian contingent led by Ulfcytel Snillingr and a Danish army under Thorkell the Tall. Norse sagas recorded a battle at Hringmaraheiðr; Old English Hringmere-hǣð, modern name Ringmere Heath.[1]
The Anglo-Saxon chronicle records that the English were routed by the flight of Thurcytel "Mare's head", and only the men of Cambridgeshire stood to fight.
John of Worcester records that the Danes defeated the English. Over a three-month period the Danes wasted East Anglia, burning Thetford and Cambridge.[1]
In his Víkingarvísur, the poet Sigvat records the victory of Saint Olaf, fighting alongside Thorkell the Tall
Enn lét sjaunda sinni
sverðþing háit verða
endr á Ulfkels landi
Ôleifr, sem ferk máli.
Stóð Hringmaraheiði
(herfall vas þar,) alla
Ellu kind (es olli
arfvǫrðr Haralds starfi).
- Yet again Óláfr caused a sword-assembly [BATTLE] to be held for the seventh time in Ulfcytel’s land, as I recount the tale. The offspring of Ælla [= Englishmen] stood over all Ringmere Heath; there was slaying of the army there, where the guardian of Haraldr’s inheritance [= Óláfr] caused exertion.[2]
- ^ a b Stevenson, W. H. (April 1896). "Notes on Old-English Historical Geography". The English Historical Review. 11 (42): 301–304. doi:10.1093/ehr/xi.xlii.301. Retrieved 20 May 2011.
- ^ Judith Jesch (ed.) 2012, ‘Sigvatr Þórðarson, Víkingarvísur 7’ in Diana Whaley (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 1: From Mythical Times to c. 1035. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 1. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 544. https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=verse&i=3848