THE PALE HORSEMAN
Bernard Cornwell
Medieval Magic and Mysticism
> foreseeing the future by means of rune-sticks and various omens, eg the flight of two ravens
> reading the auguries
> the Weird Sisters, spinners of destiny
> the ancient Nordic religion as still practised by the Danes (and still believed in by many of the English)
> a Shadow Queen
Medieval Outsiders
> an English boy brought up among the Danes - our hero
> a Cornish woman living among the West Saxons, Shadow Queen and seeress
In The Last kingdom, the book which opened this trilogy, we saw the Danes conquer most of England apart from Wessex, and now in 877 Alfred's kingdom, the "last kingdom" itself, is under threat, mainly because Alfred was too merciful, trusted Guthrum's word, and accepted hostages from him as a guarantee of peace - thinking this was the Christian thing to do. But Guthrum, the Danish king, cares nothing for the lives of the hostages: soon most of Wessex has fallen to him and Alfred is a fugitive in the marshes and swamplands of Somerset.
The Pale Horseman is the story of Alfred fighting back. As the author observes in a Historical Note at the back of the book: For a few months in early 878, the idea of England, its culture and language, were reduced to a few square miles of swamp. One more defeat and there would probably never have been a political entity called England. We might have been a Daneland instead, and this novel would probably have been written in Danish. Yet Alfred was no Arthur, no man of action, and it is Uhtred, the Northumbrian, brought up among Danes and now in exile among the Saxons of Wessex, who spearheads the resistance to the Danes he once fought alongside.
As one would expect, with Uhtred narrating (and Cornwell writing), there is plenty of detail about fighting and the warrior's life, including a vivid, almost blow-by-blow, description of the Battle of Ethandun (Edington), but there is much more to the novel than that. For instance, we follow and sympathise with Uhtred's continued uncertainties regarding his national loyalties, not only as between the Saxons and Danes, but now also the Britons: his woman, Iseult, is a "Shadow Queen" and seeress from the British kingdom of Cornwall, and his new friend a Cornish priest quite different from the bigots who surround Arthur and whom Uhtred finds so offensive - two more outsiders, like himself, in the land of the West Saxons.
And it is not only a matter of national loyalties but of religion. On this score, Uhtred has no doubts: he grew up a pagan, and remains one - yet fights for the unconscionably pious and priest-ridden Alfred and watches in dismay as Iseult, the beautiful so-called witch, is browbeaten into becoming a Christian.
Another unforgettable story. (I shall never be able to think of Alfred the Great again and especially of the famous burnt cakes without Uhtred and Iseult coming back to take over the story once more in my mind.)
JM
