After the invasion of Great Britain, the Angles split up and founded the kingdoms of the Nord Angelnen (Northumbria), Ost Angelnen (East Anglia), and the Mittlere Angelnen (Mercia). thanks to the major influence of the Saxons, the tribes were collectively called Anglo-Saxons by the Normans. The regions of East Anglia and Northumbria are still known by their original titles to this day.

St. Gregory

The Angles are the subject of a legend about Pope Gregory I (ca. 540-604 A.D.). Gregory happened to see a group of Anglo children from Deira for sale as slaves in the Roman Market. Struck by the beauty of their fair-skinned complexions and bright blue eyes, Gregory inquired about their background. When told they were Angles, he replied with a Latin pun that translates well into English; "Non Angli, sed angeli" ("Not Angles, but angels"). Supposedly, he threafter resolved to convert their pagan homeland to Christianity.

Saxons

The Saxons or Saxon people were a confederation of Old Germanic trives whose modern-day descendants in northern Germany are considered ethinic Germans. Their earliest known area of settlement is Northern Albingia, roughly that of todays Holstein and the Northeastern part of the Netherlands. The word 'Saxon' is believed to be derived from the word seax, meaning a variety of singled-edged knives. The Saxons were considered by Charlemagne's historian Einhard (Vita Caroli c. 7), to be especially war-like and ferocious.
The Saxons long resisted both becoming Christians and being incorporated into the orbit of Frankish Kingdom, but were decisively conquered by Charlemagne in a long series of annual campaigns, the Saxon Wars (772 - 804). During Charlemagne's campaign in Hispania (778), the Saxons advanced to Deutz on the Rhine and plundered along the river. With defeat came the enforced baptism and conversion of the Saxon leaders and their people. Even their sacred tree, Irminsul, was destroyed.

Jutes

The Jutes, Iuti, or Iutae were a Germanic people who are believed to have originated from Jutland in modern Denmark and part of the East Frisian coast. The Jutes, along with the Angles, Saxons, and small number of Frisians, were amongst the Germanic tribes who sailed across the North Sea to raid and eventually invade Great Britain from the late fourth century onwards, either displacing, absorbing, or destroying the native Celtic peoples there. According to Bede, they ended up settling in Kent (where they became known as the Cantuarii), Hampshire (in Wessex), and the Isle of Wight (where they became known as the Uictuarii). There are a number of toponyms that attest to the presence of the Jutes in the area, such as Ytene, which Florence of Worcester states was the contemporary English name for the New Forest.

Sutton Hoo

The Sutton Hoo is one of Britain's most and atmospheric archaeological sites. It is the burial ground of the Anglo-Saxon kings of East Anglia (Home of the Germanic Angles). Priceless royal treasures were discovered in a huge ship-like grave. It is located near Woodbridge, Suffolk, England.

Venerable Bede

Bede (673-735) was an English saint, a historian and a scholar. He is known as "the Venerable Bede." Bede was ordained deacon at the age of 18 and priest at 29. He himself taught Latin, Greek, Hebrew, astronomy, mathematics, grammar, rhetoric, and music�in short, all the subjects that were necessary for the service of the church: languages for the study of the Scriptures, astronomy and mathematics for determining the date of Easter, rhetoric for preaching and instruction, and music for the church services. He is reported to have taught with a vivacity and charm that endeared him greatly to his pupils. Bede also wrote. Bede died in 735 at Jarrow, Durham, where he was buried; but in the 11th century his bones were placed in St. Cuthbert's coffin at Durham. Bede's most important work is his Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, or Ecclesiastical History of the English People, completed in 731 and revised shortly after.

Beowulf

Beowulf, the longest (3,182 lines) and greatest poem extant in Old English, the language of the English nation prior to the Norman Conquest. Beowulf has been preserved in one manuscript (Cotton Vitellius A XV, in the British Library), written about the year 1000. It was damaged, though not disastrously, in the fire that ravaged the Cottonian collection in 1731. The two best guesses as to the place and date of Beowulf's composition would be Northumbria during the "Age of Bede" (about 720�750) or Mercia during the reign of Offa II (757�796).
The poem opens by recounting the career of Scyld Scefing, a hero-king sent by God to the leaderless Danes. After Scyld's death the Danes prosper under his descendants, especially Hrothgar, who builds them a great hall, Heorot. Heorot is soon invaded by Grendel, a half-human monster, one of Cain's kin and hated by God. The Danes are helpless against Grendel's attacks until Beowulf, a young warrior of the Geats, arrives to aid them. He engages Grendel in fierce hand-to-hand combat within Heorot and destroys the monster by tearing off his arm. The Danes rejoice, but soon Grendel's mother comes to avenge her son. Beowulf and Hrothgar follow her to her lair, an eerie and hideous swamp-lake. Beowulf dives into the water and fights another furious battle with Grendel's mother in her "anti-hall" at the bottom of the lake. Beowulf's weapons fail him, but God aids him, and he kills the monster with an old sword he finds in the hall. Returning with Grendel's head to Hrothgar, Beowulf is lavishly rewarded and soon leaves for his own land, where he tells his adventures to his uncle, King Hygelac.
At this point the poet passes over 50 years to the time when Beowulf, in old age, is himself king of the Geats. The hero fights his last battle against a dragon, the guardian of a cursed treasure, who has been provoked by a chance violation of his hoard. The old king tries to fight the dragon alone, as he did Grendel, but the creature's fiery breath destroys the weapons and armor Beowulf has chosen, and he can defeat the dragon only with the aid of his young relative, Wiglaf, after all his other retainers have run away. The dragon dies but mortally wounds Beowulf, and the old king expires, gazing on the treasure. His death signals the decline of the Geats, who are surrounded by enemies made in campaigns described allusively throughout the last part of the poem. The poem ends on a note of double mourning, for Beowulf and for his nation.