Queen Emma and the Vikings

May 23, 2005
While much remains unknown about Queen Emma as an individual, her story offers a fascinating entrance into the tumultuous world of late Anglo-Saxon England. Daughter of the duke of Normandy, descended just a few generations from Viking invaders, Emma (985–1062) was the wife of two kings (the English Aethelred and, later, his Danish Viking successor, Cnut), the mother of two kings and great-aunt of the Norman William the Conqueror. Despite her secondary status as a woman, Emma can be seen as a key factor in this momentous transitional period, serving as a source of stability and continuity in uncertain times. London-based journalist O'Brien provides a lively account of the harsh realities of war and politics in this era, the vagaries of political marriage and the thin line between invaders and settlers. She examines without condescension the competing values of Christian and pagan custom. Unnecessary excursions into the present tense—mostly at the beginning of chapters—mar the tone of the narrative, which is otherwise nicely ironic about its self-serving and conflicting sources. These sources cannot definitively reveal whether Emma made her choices as a wife, mother and political actor out of calculation or necessity, but she was a woman who clearly took what fortune offered and built the best life she could from it.

August 15, 2005
Queen Emma was the wife and consort of two successive kings of England, Aethelred (978 -1016) and Cnut (1016 -1035), and the mother of both Harthacnut, King of Denmark (1035 -1042) and England (1040 - 1042), and of England's Edward the Confessor (1042 -1066). She was the daughter of Duke Richard I of Normandy (where she was born) and great aunt of William the Conqueror. Clearly such a woman, who moved in powerful circles during the trying late Anglo-Saxon, early medieval era, deserves to have a few books written about her, and there have been some before O'Brien's, most recently Isabella Strachan's "Emma, the Twice-Crowned Queen" (2004)". "London-based journalist O'Brien ("Forgotten Land: A Rediscovery of Burma") here relies on primary sources that include Queen Emma's own "Encomium Emmae Reginae" and "The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles", as well as charters, court records, and secondary sources, all documented. The chapters move along very accessibly and keep the reader wondering what will happen next, and the good bibliography encompasses Internet sites as well as books and articles. Although an optional purchase for libraries already holding Strachan's work, this is recommended for medieval and women's studies collections in both academic and public libraries. -Br. Benet Exton, O.S.B., St. Gregory's Univ., Shawnee, OK

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