The Cambridge Revolt was an Anglo-Saxon uprising against Danish rule in Cambridgeshire which occurred in 873 AD amid the Great Heathen Army's invasion of England. Led by Ealdorman Wigmund, a local nobleman, the Anglian peasantry rose up in Cambridge with the help of a traitor in the Danish ranks and massacred the Danes, forcing them to flee to the outskirts of the city. The Danes later rallied with the help of the Jarl of Ravensthorpe's right-hand man, Eivor, who helped retake Cambridge by storm. The Danish ruler of Cambridge, Jarlskona Soma, proceeded to send her lieutenants to fan out across Cambridgeshire and stamp out the last embers of Saxon resistance.
Background[]
In the years following the Danish Great Heathen Army's arrival in England in 865 AD, the invading Vikings fanned out across Northern England, the Midlands, and East Anglia, conquering York in 865 AD, crushing the remnants of Northumbria by 868, conquering East Anglia in 869, and conquering half of Mercia by 870 AD. One of the captured Mercian cities was Cambridge, and the Danish jarl Guthrum's wife Jarlskona Soma claimed responsibility for transforming Cambridge from a "mud hut" to a prosperous trading center. However, Anglo-Saxon resistance continued, as the rural settlements continued to resist Danish control over their conquered lands. Ealdorman Wigmund of Cambridge, the original Anglo-Saxon ruler of the territory, rallied resistance against the Danes in Cambridge, allying himself with the secretive Order of the Ancients. With their help, he stealthily seized control of Cambridge, massacring the occupying Danes and scattering their armies. Soma was forced to flee to the fenlands to the west of the city, hiding in the marshes of Norfolk and setting up her base at Middleton. Meanwhile, her lieutenant Magni withdrew to the ruins of Duroliponte with his sick and battered troops, and her lieutenants Birna, Galinn, and Lif were all either captured or forced into hiding in the nearby marshes.
Revolt[]
It was then that the Norwegian warrior Eivor rode south from Ravensthorpe to join Jarl Guthrum and Soma's army in their fight against Mercia, only to find that their "Great Heathen Army" had become scattered across Cambridgeshire. Eivor went on to find Soma, offering his services to her and helping her recover her stranded lieutenants Birna, Galinn, and Lif from Saxon captivity. With the Danish army reassembled, they marched to the west gate of Cambridge, where they initiated their siege of the city. The Danes blew open the city gates with a cart full of explosives before storming the city and taking it by force, although Wigmund succeeded in escaping through a secret tunnel known only to Soma and her three lieutenants. Soma deduced that there was a traitor in her ranks, so she dispatched Eivor to investigate as she sent out her lieutenants to stamp out Wigmund's power across the shire.
Wigmund's forces did not offer much resistance; Galinn and his force torched the small village of Earnningstone to punish it for its support of Wigmund's uprising, Birna and her small band stealthily stormed the hillfort of Ravensburg, and Lif and his men burned the town of Saffron Walden before assassinating its priest, Father Cuthbert, who had been siphoning tithe funds to Wigmund's rebels. With Wigmund's last known strongholds subdued, Soma focused on tracking down and defeating Wigmund, capturing his captain Letard the Thatcher and having her lieutenants interrogate him. Under threat of death, he ultimately confessed that Wigmund was hiding at the monastery on the Isle of Ely, but Galinn then suspiciously stabbed him dead before he could speak further, claiming that he was preventing Letard from cursing them. Birna stated that Christians did not curse pagans, raising suspicion of Galinn's treachery. After investigating into a trail of yellow paint which led from the secret tunnel to the coast, and then to Galinn's wrecked longship in the fenlands, Eivor then reported to Soma that he believed Galinn to be the traitor. Soma then reluctantly executed Galinn before her other lieutenants, and she then ordered her army to prepare for the final assault on Ely now that the traitor was executed. In the ensuing battle, Wigmund holed up in the monastery and was slain, and the Isle of Ely was thoroughly sacked. With Wigmund and Galinn dead, the shire restored to Danish rule, and Cambridge in the process of reconstruction, Soma was victorious, and she gifted Eivor with an honorific arm-ring to symbolize their new alliance and mutual trust, having returned to power with his crucial help.