THE LAST KINGDOM
BERNARD CORNWELL
This novel is a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
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First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2004
Copyright © Bernard Cornwell 2004
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016
Cover illustration © Lee Gibbons/Tin Moon – www.leegibbons.co.uk
Bernard Cornwell asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
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Source ISBN: 9780008139476
Ebook Edition © JULY 2009 ISBN: 9780007338818
Version: 2019-06-12
THE LAST KINGDOM
is for Judy, with love
Wyrd bið ful ãræd
Contents
Prologue: NORTHUMBRIA, 866–867 AD
The spelling of Place Names in Anglo-Saxon England was an uncertain business, with no consistency and no agreement even about the name itself. Thus London was variously rendered as Lundonia, Lundenberg, Lundenne, Lundene, Lundenwic, Lundenceaster and Lundres. Doubtless some readers will prefer other versions of the names listed below, but I have usually employed whatever spelling is cited in the Oxford Dictionary of English Place Names for the years nearest or contained within Alfred’s reign, 871–899 AD, but even that solution is not foolproof. Hayling Island, in 956, was written as both Heilincigae and Hæglingaiggæ. Nor have I been consistent myself; I have preferred the modern England to Englaland and, instead of Norðhymbralond, have used Northumbria to avoid the suggestion that the boundaries of the ancient kingdom coincide with those of the modern county. So this list, like the spellings themselves, is capricious: