[7] brezkum ‘British’: The word brezkr here has been explained as ‘belonging to the inhabitants of Britain in general, i. e. the British Isles’ (Ashdown 1930, 207) or ‘English’ (Zachrisson 1927, 47), but skaldic attestations of brezkr/Bretar fit better with the gloss ‘Welsh, Briton’ (Poole 1987, 294; cf. Hermann Pálsson 1960, 43-6). There is support for the notion that Welsh people lent military aid to the defenders of London in Thietmar’s Merseburgensis episcopi Chronicon and Gaimar’s L’estoire des Engleis (Poole 1987, 294-6).
References
- Bibliography
- Poole, Russell. 1987. ‘Skaldic Verse and Anglo-Saxon History: Some Aspects of the Period 1009-1016’. Speculum 62, 265-98.
- Ashdown, Margaret. 1930. English and Norse Documents Relating to the Reign of Ethelred the Unready. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
- Hermann Pálsson. 1960. ‘Athugasemd um nafnið Bretland’. Saga 3, 43-6.
- Zachrisson, R. E. 1927. Romans, Kelts and Saxons in Ancient Britain: An Investigation into the Two Dark Centuries (400-600) of English History. Skrifter utgivna av Kungl. Humanistika Vetenskapssamfundet i Uppsala 24, no. 12. Uppsala: Almqvist & Wiksell.