Wood’s book of the series was published afterwards, and now, 40 years on, he has released a new edition. Our editor, and MJ Porter, author of Son of Mercia, had the opportunity to pose a few questions, along with some readers of Aspects of History.
The new edition of In Search of the Dark Ages is published on the 40th anniversary of the old book, which elements did you have to update due to new understanding?
It’s hard to believe the original edition of In Search of the Dark Ages was published forty years ago! When a new edition was proposed, though I had corrected it and done limited revisions over the years, I felt now the time had come for a major re-write. Important discoveries and major excavations have revolutionised our view of the period in the intervening time.
In archaeology, for example, think of the Staffordshire hoard, or the re-excavation of Sutton Hoo by Martin Carver whose new discoveries included fragments from a plundered ship burial of similar size and wealth as the one found in 1939. Or the recent electrifying discovery of the Danish camp at Torksey that has transformed our view of the Viking invasions and the campaigns of the Viking Great Army in the 870s – a turning point in English history.
There have been lots of new discoveries in manuscripts too. But I suppose you’d have to say the biggest is in the way we see the past, and especially in women’s history. The first edition of the book focused on the deeds of men; in that it was of its time. When I was a graduate student in the early 1970s there was still no women’s history course in any British university. There has been a huge growth in the subject since, advancing the understanding of every aspect of medieval life and society. That more than anything meant the book had to be reshaped. And that was a huge pleasure to do.
When the original documentary version of ISotDA was released, it launched your broadcasting career. Did you always plan to be on TV?
Not at all, it was a serendipity. I was working in BBC Current Affairs doing shows about education or the nuclear industry. I proposed a local show about the Mercian king Offa and I had someone in mind to present it, the late great Dr. David Hill, an archaeological Tom Baker in a long red scarf. But my boss suggested I do it and we did the show on Offa for BBC2. The next day we got some fantastic reviews and he said: ‘well you might as well do some more’. So, the series In Search of the Dark Ages was born (in which I’m glad to say David Hill played his part!). Tony Robinson said the series ‘wrote the book for history on TV’.
Here we still are: ‘Keep on keeping on’ as Bob Dylan says!
The term ‘Dark Ages’ is often thought to be inaccurate. Do you think we’re right in describing the period like this?
I have had a few comments about this! For a series beginning in the Roman period, and ending with the Norman Conquest the title was a bit of a stretch. Professional scholars (as opposed to TV producers) rightly frown on such generalisations. But the phrase ‘Dark Ages’ is interesting: it perhaps originated with the Italian poet Petrarch who, in early 14th century Italy and Avignon, found the immediate post Roman centuries a bit grim after the light of the classical world with which educated Renaissance people found such affinities.
But already in the 8th century the English scholar Alcuin, in the court of Charlemagne, could speak of the light coming out of Late Roman Africa, Italy and the Eastern Mediterranean, illuminating the darkness of Britain after the fall of Rome. In the 18th century European Enlightenment, the phrase took root describing the immediate post-Roman period when, in many places, the sources for history and society – and people’s lives – were virtually non-existent. Perhaps then, if the term has any use at all, it is when dealing with the 5th and 6th centuries where we might still retain it as a useful catch-all? But I have kept the original title not least for sentimental reasons!
Since you wrote ISotDA, and more recently in the last few years we’ve seen a new fascination with the period, from the TV Series including The Last Kingdom, historical fiction and a hit movie in 2021 with Netflix’s The Dig. Have you been surprised by the interest?
No surprise at all: it’s a fantastically dramatic creative and formative time with very exciting stories and larger than life characters: Alfred, Æthelstan, not to mention Eric Bloodaxe whose nickname is gruesomely apposite! What’s not to like?
The Dig by the way I really enjoyed. Ralph Fiennes’ portrayal of the Suffolk archaeologist Basil Brown was wonderful in its canniness and reticence. And as the action unfolded that summer of 1939, it had a poignant air of English pastoral about it: searching to discover our roots at the very last moment, at the end of an age that could never return.
You’ve written new chapters featuring Abbot Hadrian of Canterbury, King Penda of Mercia, Æthelflæd Lady of the Mercians, Eadgyth Queen of Germany, and Lady Wynflaed the mother of King Edgar. Were they originally edited out, or have you learnt more of them since writing the book?
No, the original book was hastily put together simply based on the eight films plus one on Sutton Hoo we never made. But as I said above times change and I wanted the new edition to reflect that, especially with biographies of early medieval women. In recent years I’ve made quite a few films about medieval women including Æthelflæd, and Christina Cok, a villain from Codicote in Hertfordshire at the poorest level of society (one of my personal favourites among my films).
It is sometimes said that it is not possible to write proper biographies of early medieval women. The things we would really like to know are largely hidden from us. It is very hard to imagine how they felt about their own lives, how they experienced the world, and the kind of relationships they had with family and friends. But it is possible, as I hope readers will see in the new edition of the book.
Your original has many legendary figures from Britain’s past: Boudicca, Arthur, Æthelstan and Alfred. Interestingly Æthelstan recently won a controversial twitter poll as greatest king, but do you have a favourite figure from your book?
I’d have to say Æthelstan obviously, having worked on his period most of my life. His is a very interesting and formative period, short though his reign was; the beginnings of the English state and of civil society, a crucial time for law, language and literature. But if I had to pick out one extraordinary story that has fascinated me since I was a graduate student, its Abbot Hadrian of Canterbury, whom Bede calls a vir de natione Afir: ‘a man of African race’. Hadrian was a Libyan who worked in England for over forty years, and was a leading light in one of the most important educational movements in English history. Was Hadrian the most important African in our history?
(A question from a reader) What mystery from the Dark Ages would you most like to have solved?
There are so many, but I guess as I am writing a biography of Æthelstan, the mystery I would like to see solved is the identification of the lost site of the Battle of Brunanburh (937). A writer of c980 says in his day the man in the street still called it the ‘Great War’. It’s been argued over for more than 300 years and only recently we’ve had suggestions that it lay up by the Solway, or near Hadrian’s Wall, in addition to the generally accepted view that it took place on the Wirral. I have to say I don’t think the case for Wirral is sustainable and that a fresh look is needed. Having been a pessimist for many years, I’m fairly optimistic now that it will be found.
(A question from a reader) Those who’ve read the source material can be reluctant to deviate from what those sources tell us, and I confess, I do find it a little frustrating sometimes. What do you think is the best way to open minds and understanding to new knowledge?
The best way is always to excite people with the story. History is about good story-telling. We all know how that feels, to encounter great stories for the first time. But there’s a caveat. Imagination is an important tool for the historian; we can hardly bring the past to life without what you might call sympathetic imagination. But you have to balance imagination with judgement. Studying history starts first with the excitement of the story, but if you really want to understand it, then you can’t avoid careful discussion of the sources; weighing up of the evidence. What is this source? When was it written, and what is its bias? Which sources did it use? Does it say what I think it says? And am I using it to confirm my already fixed opinion rather than testing my views in an open-minded search for what actually happened? That can sound teeth-grindingly dull, but actually it’s half the fun!
(A question from a reader) Your brilliant In the Footsteps of Alexander the Great (tracing Alexander’s journey to India) was made when it was still possible to do so (involving travel through Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan). Have you ever been tempted retrace your steps, perhaps with body armour or a small armoured car?
I have! We couldn’t go into Iraq when we made the series as I was persona non grata under Saddam for the films I did in the early 1990s about the destruction of the Marsh Arabs. But in 2006 I had the chance to go to Iraq with the British Army and get to Mosul and finally pin down the site of Alexander’s greatest battle at Gaugamela, which had never been securely located (Alexander’s Greatest Battle). It was an exciting trip, which of course (as the situation in Mosul was very dangerous) did require body armour and hitching a ride on a US Army Stryker armoured vehicle, plus getting the view from a Black Hawk helicopter. The situation was a bit tense with the Islamic State group but all went fine.
Then the following year, just before the Syrian crisis erupted, I went to Damascus, up to Aleppo, explored the ruined Greek towns of northern Syria, and got out by road eastwards to the famous site of Thapsacus, which is where Alexander made the crossing into Mesopotamia. It was a fantastic trip, though what a tragedy has unfolded since; Aleppo was one of the most wonderful cities on earth.
(A question from a reader) Did you have a favourite country from that trip – you seemed to love Iran the most (or perhaps that’s just me)?
Greece has always been a favourite place since I first hitched there in my teens. India of course. But all points in between there are fabulous places. Iraq I have a real soft spot for: few historical landscapes are more haunting. And Iran of course: the beauty of the towns and villages in the Great Salt Desert; it is still a great civilization despite the awful regime. On the Alexander trip when we were filming with the Zoroastrians around Yazd, I visited the famous sacred cypress tree at Cham, said to be more than 2500 years old: I took a seed pod home with me and planted it. We’ve now got a child of the sacred tree in our back garden, already about 25 feet high!
Your recent (brilliant) book, The Story of China, was highly acclaimed, and you’ve written on South America and India. Is there anywhere left you’d like to explore?
Thanks! Glad you enjoyed it – it was a labour of love. I like to spend a lot of time in places, to get to know them, and I go back often to the same places. I first went to China in the early 1980s and I’ve been working there pretty solidly since 2013, doing a dozen films. Civilisations as rich and old as China or India are inexhaustibly interesting and you never stop learning, so you never stop being drawn back to them. I’ve made twenty visits to India over the years, and well over dozen to China. Right now I’m writing a little book on China’s greatest poet Du Fu (on whom we made a film at the beginning of lockdown) using diaries photos and maps. The goal for me is always to understand things better: how we got here, who we are? Simple as that. But it’s a lifetime’s job!
Michael Wood is a historian and broadcaster, and presenter of countless TV documentaries, including In Search of the Dark Ages and In the Footsteps of Alexander. The 40th anniversary edition of In Search of the Dark Ages is out now.
