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OCR A Level History AY301/01 The Early Anglo‑Saxons c.400–800 MERGED QUESTION PAPER AND MARK SCHEME FOR MAY 2024 £8.76
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OCR A Level History AY301/01 The Early Anglo‑Saxons c.400–800 MERGED QUESTION PAPER AND MARK SCHEME FOR MAY 2024
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OCR A Level History AY301/01 The Early Anglo‑Saxons c.400–800 MERGED QUESTION PAPER AND MARK SCHEME FOR MAY 2024

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  • November 10, 2024
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Thursday 23 May 2024 – Morning
A Level History A
Y301/01 The Early Anglo‑Saxons c.400–800
Time allowed: 2 hours 30 minutes




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, 2

SECTION A

Read the two passages and answer Question 1.


1 Evaluate the interpretations in both of the two passages.

Explain which you think is more convincing as an explanation of the role of Offa in the
development of the Mercian supremacy. [30]


Passage A

By the final decades of his reign, Offa had become the ruler of a kingdom with a vast territory by
Anglo‑Saxon standards. Offa was not attempting to unify the English – even assuming such a
concept was meaningful in the eighth century – but simply to expand Mercian territory. At least one
Anglo‑Saxon king was beheaded on Offa’s orders. Offa reasserted Mercian authority over the Thames
Valley by defeating the West Saxons in battle. In a letter to a Mercian nobleman, Alcuin wrote of ‘how
much blood Offa shed to secure the kingdom for his son’, implying the brutal suppression of rivals. In
addition, Offa arranged marriages for his daughters to other kings.

Offa attempted to harness the ideological apparatus offered by Christianity and the Church. In 787
Offa had his son, Ecgfrith, anointed as co‑ruler by a bishop. Ecgfrith was the first Anglo‑Saxon
ruler so consecrated. What seems clear is that Offa, like the Carolingians, sought to mobilise the
possibilities afforded by Christianity for the legitimation of kingship and to bring into sharper relief the
moral underpinnings of his rule. His relationship with Charlemagne shows clearly his ambitions. When
Charlemagne sought the hand in marriage of Offa’s daughter for his son, Offa demanded a reciprocal
marriage: Charlemagne’s daughter for his son.

Nicholas J. Higham and Martin J. Ryan, The Anglo-Saxon World, published in 2013.


Passage B

Offa’s career shows a determined attempt to bring all the Anglo‑Saxon kingdoms south of the Humber
under his rule. To this end, it is possible that Offa had tried to capitalize on the growing sense of
ethnic unity among the various peoples he ruled. One way to encourage unity among disparate
peoples is to identify a common enemy – an ethnic ‘other’, against whom they can define themselves.
The obvious ‘other’ for the English of the eighth century were the ‘strangers’ to their west. Against
this background, it is easy to see why Offa, in deciding to build a dyke, would do so on his western
frontier. At one time that frontier had been a more permeable affair, a zone where Germanic settlers
and native Britons overlapped. But during the eighth century the ethnic identities of the English and
the Britons sharpened, and with it the hostility between them. By deciding to build a barrier against
them, Offa was isolating them, frustrating travel and trade, and perhaps even improving the security of
his subjects who lived close to the frontier. The communities on the western fringe of Mercia appear to
have become more anglicized. In building a great dyke Offa was emphasizing, in the most visible way
possible for an early medieval ruler, the differences between the Britons on one side, and the English
on the other.

Marc Morris, The Anglo-Saxons: A History of the Beginnings of England, published in 2021.

, 3

SECTION B

Answer any two questions.


2* Assess the reasons for the expansion of early Anglo‑Saxon kingdoms during the period from
c.400 to 800. [25]


3* ‘Religious belief and practice in Britain and Ireland before Augustine’s arrival in 597 was very
different to that in the period from 597 to 800.’

How far do you agree? [25]


4* ‘The similarities in the literature of the period from c.400 to 800 are much greater than their
differences.’

How far do you agree? [25]



END OF QUESTION PAPER

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