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Where in the UK is Reading?
Sir John Betjeman wrote about Reading in the 1940s: “Few cities are less engaging at first glance than Reading – but few reward it so much if you explore them anyway” (freely translated). The unspectacular busyness displayed by the small town of Reading in Berkshire, about halfway between London and Oxford, is deceptive: Reading played an important role in the past – and still does so today as a business location and cultural center.
Every year the famous Reading Festival makes the city shake with rock, punk and new wave. The rush for tickets here can only be compared with ticket sales for the legendary Glastonbury Festival. And like Glastonbury, Reading looks back on a significant episode in the history of England. Where rock and heavy metal fans indulge their passion every year in August today, an important battle took place almost 1,200 years ago: the Battle of Reading.
Today it is difficult to imagine in the middle of this modern city what it might have looked like here around 871 AD. Almost nothing has been preserved from that time, but with a little imagination you can conjure up that dark time of Anglo-Saxon history again. In “The Life of King Alfred” we read today that King Ethelred of Wessex and his brother Alfred, the later Alfred the Great, fought a battle in Reading in 871 against a pagan army (meaning Danish Vikings) who plundered the city. For their protection, the pagans, as it is said in the chronicle, had erected a protective rampart in front of the city. There, the army was initially provided by Ethelwulf, the father of Elthelred and Alfred. Both sides are said to have fought persistently and courageously at the Battle of Englefield (December 31, 870) – until the Christian troops under Ethelwulf finally managed to achieve victory.
Is Reading north or south of London?
Where in PA is Reading?
What is Reading Pennsylvania famous for?
